NATIVE AMERICAN AND INDIGENOUS STUDIES - As a citizen of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation of Oklahoma and a Black American, 2003 alumna Amber Starks is immersed in issues important to many Native Americans and African Americans. Now she’s helping the University of Oregon examine these issues.

HUMAN PHYSIOLOGY - By James “Jim” Livesay, BS ’53 (physical education), owner of Lake Oswego-based PSI Conveying Groups, as told to Matt Cooper of Oregon Quarterly

THEATRE ARTS - As a kid whose parents introduced him early and often to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Sean Andries (BS ’06, theater arts) appreciates the value the arts can bring to rural communities.

BIOLOGY - The question of how reproductive cells like sperm and eggs maintain their DNA integrity during development is at the heart of a new study by student researchers in the lab of molecular biologist Diana Libuda.

MATHEMATICS, THEATRE ARTS - The Heritage Project will receive $58.5 million in bond funding to renovate University and Villard Halls, the UO’s two founding buildings that together make up one of only 17 National Historic Landmarks in Oregon.

The 14 fellowship recipients are pursuing projects in a range of disciplines, from conducting a study of the experiences and health of transgender people of color during COVID-19 to research that seeks to increase the accessibility of hydrogen fuel usage to an investigation of the effect of video-coaching interventions for early childhood caregivers.

BIOLOGY - Kelly Sutherland, an associate professor of biology, has been awarded the Alec and Kay Keith Professorship for her research on the motion of gelatinous zooplankton.

ECONOMICS - Those who are strongly skeptical about climate change are unlikely to change their minds for many years to come, according to a new study by University of Oregon environmental economist Grant McDermott.

ECONOMICS, BIOLOGY - Around the O is revisiting a story from a year ago, where UO experts weighed in on COVID-19 through the lens of their research expertise. Now they’re providing insights into what surprised them during the pandemic, what’s currently happening in their field and what they are watching as things reopen.

ENGLISH - Mat Johnson, a professor in the Creative Writing Program in the College of Arts and Sciences, is the UO’s newest Philip H. Knight Chair. Johnson joined the UO faculty in 2018 after a decade teaching at the University of Houston’s creative writing program.