News

Destructive and costly fire ants, crazy ants, moth larvae and invasive grasses can wreak havoc on Texas ecosystems, but biologists at The University of Texas at Austin are bringing the fight to them. With the help of a $6 million continuing grant from the Lee and Ramona Bass Foundation, researchers in the Texas Invasive Species Program will seek new, sustainable approaches to counter exotic pests that threaten Texas.

As computers advance, encryption methods currently used to keep everything from financial transactions to military secrets secure might soon be useless, technology experts warn. Reporting today in the journal Nature, a team of physicists and engineers led by University of Texas at Austin physics professor Xiaoqin Elaine Li report they have created a material with light-emitting properties that might enable hack-proof communications, guaranteed by the laws of quantum mechanics.

Heather Leidy, associate professor of nutritional sciences, will be among 20 scientific experts who will draft dietary guidelines for the United States.

University of Texas at Austin computer science professor Kristen Grauman was elected a fellow of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), a lifetime honor.

A team of synthetic biologists led by Steven Benner at the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution—and including Andy Ellington at The University of Texas at Austin—have synthesized a new kind of DNA that uses eight building blocks instead of the four found in all earthly life. Reporting today in the journal Science, the researchers suggest the new eight-letter DNA could find applications in medicine and biological computing. The finding also has implications for how scientists think about life elsewhere in the universe.

It's been said that variety is the spice of life, and now scientists say variety in your social circle may help you live longer. Researchers at The University of Texas at Austin have found that older adults who spend more time interacting with a wide range of people were more likely to be physically active and had greater emotional well-being.

A new astronomical spectrograph provides the highest precision measurements to date of infrared signals from nearby stars, allowing astronomers to detect planets capable of having liquid water on their surfaces that orbit cool stars outside our solar system. The Habitable Zone Planet Finder (HPF) allows precise measurement of a star's radial velocity, measured by the subtle change in the color of the star's spectra as it is tugged by an orbiting planet, which is critical information in the discovery and confirmation of new planets.

Alison Preston is the Dr. A. Wilson Nolle and Sir Raghunath P. Mahendroo Professor of Neuroscience in the College of Natural Sciences. She also holds appointments in the in the College of Liberal Arts' department of psychology and the Dell Medical School's department of psychiatry. She spoke with The Texas Scientist about her work. 

Caitlin Casey, UT Austin astronomy assistant professor, has been named a 2019 Cottrell Scholar by the Research Corporation for Science Advancement (RCSA).

Before she was winning awards at UT Austin, computer science sophomore Chineye Emeghara was teaching herself to code in high school with resources she discovered online. Later, on a trip to Nigeria, where her mother lived before immigrating to the U.S., she realized that she could apply her interest in technology to improve the lives of others.