Latest News

September 25, 2024

To better guide farmers managing nitrogen in the soil, a team of Penn State agricultural scientists conducted a new study on dairy manure management strategies for ecosystem services in no-till crop systems. In findings recently published in Agronomy Journal, they report a new strategy that achieves multiple conservation goals while maintaining corn yield: injecting manure into a growing cover crop in early spring.

September 25, 2024

Francisco Dini-Andreote, assistant professor of plant science in the College of Agricultural Sciences at Penn State, has been awarded the Dorothy Foehr Huck and J. Lloyd Huck Early Career Chair in Microbial Community Ecology.

September 24, 2024

Praharsh Patel, doctoral candidate in energy, environmental, and food economics at Penn State, will give the talk, “Behavioral responses to two-part tariffs: evidence from the introduction of volumetric water pricing,” at noon on Wednesday, Sept. 25, in 157 Hosler Building at Penn State University Park.

September 24, 2024

Weeds are a major factor limiting yield in organic vegetable and other horticultural crop systems, and the lack of effective biological weed-management solutions is a significant obstacle to the adoption of organic farming practices. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has awarded a four-year, $1 million grant to a team led by plant scientists and an economist from Penn State to investigate anaerobic soil disinfestation, a microbial-driven process to manage weeds, to support transitioning from conventional to organic production systems.

September 19, 2024

First used in the 1940s to monitor for polio, wastewater surveillance proved such a powerful disease monitoring tool that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention established the National Wastewater Surveillance System to support SARS-CoV-2 monitoring in September of 2020. Now, a team of scientists from Penn State and the Pennsylvania Department of Health have shown that domestic sewage monitoring is useful for a foodborne pathogen as well.

September 17, 2024

Jasna Kovac, associate professor and Lester Earl and Veronica Casida Career Development Professor of Food Safety in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences, has been selected to receive the 2025 Award for Early Career Environmental Research by the American Society for Microbiology.

September 11, 2024

The Huck Innovative and Transformational Seed (HITS) Fund initiative has awarded three high-risk, potentially high-impact project seed funding. 

September 4, 2024

Ram Neupane, a doctoral student in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences, received a $10,000 research award given by the Storkan-Hanes-McCaslin Foundation.

August 28, 2024

Two Penn State-led research teams have received funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture for projects investigating the ways microbiomes — the microorganisms in a particular environment, such as in soil or a living organism — can affect disease dynamics in agriculture.

August 26, 2024

Nitrate, a common chemical compound that occurs naturally and is found in plants, water and soil, can break down into molecules harmful to human, animal and ecological health and accumulate as a pollutant. Nitrate contamination in streams, lakes and estuaries is a critical problem in many agricultural watersheds, but water-quality data is limited, making monitoring stream health and making management decisions difficult, according to researchers at Penn State. To enhance available data, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has awarded a four-year, $650,000 grant to a research team at Penn State.

August 26, 2024

Two recent studies involving Penn State researchers shed light on the ecological importance of red-backed salamanders and confirmed that proactive measures could prevent costly impacts from a wildlife disease spreading across Europe that has not yet reached North America.

August 23, 2024

After three weeks of testing as required under a voluntary state monitoring program for bird flu in dairy cattle, animal health experts in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences announced that the University’s dairy herd has been certified as free of highly pathogenic avian influenza, or HPAI.

August 22, 2024

Cocoa may be the dark horse in the race against obesity, according to researchers at Penn State. Nearly one in three adults are overweight and more than two in five have obesity in the U.S., both conditions that come with inflammation-related health concerns. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has awarded a research team, led by Joshua Lambert, professor of food science in the Penn State College of Agricultural Sciences, a three-year, $650,000 grant to characterize the sex-specific beneficial effects of cocoa against obesity-related inflammation and fatty liver disease.

August 22, 2024

Community scientists in Pennsylvania have reported multiple new species of bees never before found in the commonwealth through a monitoring program led by Penn State.

August 22, 2024

A project aimed at helping prepare undergraduate students to serve as future agricultural educators has received $750,000 in renewed funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

August 22, 2024

A bottle of water sampled from a lake or river can reveal what fish, amphibians insects and bacteria are present, thanks to environmental DNA, the genetic material shed by organisms. This way of measuring transforms scientists’ ability to determine the extent of aquatic life in various water bodies, according to a team led by Daniel Allen, assistant professor of aquatic ecology in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences.

August 21, 2024

Pesticides reduce crop loss, helping to stabilize production, but excessive use of pesticides has brought huge negative impacts to the environment and human health, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. To address the problem, a team of Penn State researchers is developing a robotic precision pesticide sprayer capable of targeted application while minimizing unintended exposure.

August 21, 2024

Honey bees may play a role in increasing virus levels in wild bumble bees each spring, according to researchers at Penn State who analyzed seasonal trends of parasite and virus transmission in bees. 

August 21, 2024

Honey bees may play a role in increasing virus levels in wild bumble bees each spring, according to researchers at Penn State who analyzed seasonal trends of parasite and virus transmission in bees. 

August 19, 2024

Some veterans continue to struggle with underemployment and dissatisfaction with their pay up to four years after leaving the military, according to a recent survey study by researchers in the Clearinghouse for Military Family Readiness at Penn State.

August 16, 2024

Take a deep dive into the wide world of insects — including a special spotlight on the Pennsylvania firefly — at this year’s Great Insect Fair on Sept. 14 at Penn State University Park. 

August 16, 2024

Christopher Scott, a researcher with more than three decades’ experience in international and domestic water, food and energy policy, has been named an associate director of the Institute of Energy and the Environment at Penn State.

August 14, 2024

Early life exposure to "forever chemicals" in the environment permanently disrupts the gut microbiome in mice, contributing to the development of metabolic disease in later life, according to a new study led by Penn State researchers. The results suggest that human exposure to these chemicals during early childhood may be contributing to the recent epidemic of metabolic disorders, including obesity and Type 2 diabetes among adults.

August 13, 2024

A team of researchers, including two Penn State agricultural economists and an Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education fellow, received funding from U.S. National Science Foundation to develop a new method for accurately measuring innovation activity in small geographic regions.

August 12, 2024

Indigenous communities around the globe face profound threats from climate change, biodiversity loss and land degradation. Now, an international team that includes researchers from Penn State have been awarded $5 million by the U.S. National Science Foundation, along with funding from Canada, the United Kingdom and Germany, to investigate how to mitigate these threats.

August 12, 2024

Because basic knowledge about the spotted lanternfly's biology remains limited, a team of Penn State researchers is collaborating with the Center for Quantitative Imaging to detail the spotted lanternfly's anatomy and physiology.

August 12, 2024

Citing a shared commitment to a sustainable future, Penn State and Shell USA Inc. have announced the launch of a collaboration that will support efforts across the University’s mission of research, education and community impact.

August 12, 2024

Researchers at Penn State and the U.S. National Science Foundation found a significant relationship between cloud-computing use and export performance among U.S. firms. They also found that cloud-using firms exported goods and services even more than exporting firms that do not use cloud-based services.