Penn State Smeal students help address rural gaps in food, healthcare, community
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Students working on the multi-semester MGMT 365 project in the Smeal College of Business are getting a hands-on lesson in social entrepreneurship, which tasks founders with starting businesses that prioritize solving societal or environmental problems alongside financial health.
Women scientists, love of nature inspire donor’s gift to the Ag Sciences
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Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences and its Department of Entomology are benefiting from a $1.5 million gift from a donor who has chosen to remain anonymous. The gift, split into two parts, supports the creation of the Maria Sibylla Merian Endowed Faculty Position and the Rachel Carson Graduate Training Program.
Unusual molecular conformation could help explain RNA’s versatility
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Despite being made from a relatively simple set of building blocks, ribonucleic acid (RNA) has a broad array of complex responsibilities. Researchers at Penn State have revealed a potential explanation for how RNA molecules can be so functionally diverse: a “shifted wobble” of two components in the structure of some molecules of RNA.
Chemistry professor named Blavatnik National Awards finalist
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Joseph Cotruvo Jr., professor of chemistry at Penn State, has been named as a 2025 finalist for the Blavatnik National Awards for Young Scientists in the chemical sciences.
Q&A: Dating fossils from hotbed period of early human evolution
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Erin DiMaggio, associate research professor of geosciences at Penn State, was part of an international team of scientists who recently published in the journal Nature on their new discovery of fossils belonging to our genus Homo and a new, yet identified, species of Australopithecus from a site in Ethiopia. The fossils — dated to between 2.6 and 2.8 million years ago — indicate that Australopithecus and the oldest specimens of Homo co-existed in the region.
Can nanobots play follow the leader?
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A group of tiny particles followed “breadcrumbs” left behind by a different group of particles in new experiments demonstrating the first steps in creating intelligent communicating systems involving active particles — sometimes called nanobots — that perform specialized tasks.
Sustainability Education Gateway launched as a hub for opportunities
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With the launch of the new Sustainability Education Gateway, an abundant variety of opportunities to engage in sustainability at Penn State are now just a click away. The gateway is intended to be a helpful tool for both prospective and current students, as well as for academic advisers seeking to guide students toward sustainability in a variety of learning environments. Office hours to discuss the gateway will be held on Sept. 24 and Oct. 3, on Zoom.
Penn State recognized as a top performer in the 2025 Sustainable Campus Index
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Penn State has been recognized as a “Top Performer” in the 2025 Sustainable Campus Index, and is tied for sixth position in the area of research among doctoral/research institutions. A publication from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education, the index recognizes top-performing sustainable colleges and universities overall and in 13 impact areas, as measured through the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System (STARS).
Center for Social Data Analytics now accepting grant applications
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The Penn State Center for Social Data Analytics is currently accepting proposals for seed grants to support projects during the 2025-26 academic year that advance the field of social data analytics.
Explore the wonderful world of insects at Penn State’s Great Insect Fair
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Learn about the diverse world of insects at this year’s Great Insect Fair, the annual Penn State event that celebrates insects with a variety of activities, games, crafts and more.
Sustain Penn State kicks off its 2025-26 season of public events on Sept. 17
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Sustain Penn State is kicking off its 2025-26 sustainability public programming season on Sept. 17. This year’s events open with three short films in the Intersections film series that highlight overcoming adversity through a connection with nature: “Soundscape,” which features climber Erik Weihenmayer who is fully blind; “About Damn Time,” which tells the story of the first women to pilot handcrafted wooden dories in the Grand Canyon; and “Planetwalker,” featuring activist John Francis who walked across the United States in silence.
New method calculates rate of gene expression to understand cell fate
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How rapidly gene expression in a single cell changes over time can provide insight into how cells might become more specialized, but current measurement approaches are limited. A new method developed by researchers at Penn State and Yale University incorporates spatial information from the cell as well as data from cells processed at different times, improving researchers’ ability to understand the nuances of gene expression changes.