COMPUTER SCIENCE - Cybersecurity jobs to protect users and companies from hackers are in growing demand, and a new undergraduate degree in the College of Arts and Sciences is training students to fill that role. Launched in the fall of 2023, the cybersecurity major combines rigorous courses and hands-on fieldwork with the aim of preparing students to hit the ground running in a cybersecurity career.

CINEMA STUDIES, THEATRE ARTS - Built in the late 1800s, University and Villard halls haven't been state-of-the-art in a long time. But $68 million interior and exterior construction work is bringing new life to the two iconic University of Oregon buildings, which will host new facilities for the cinema studies and theatre arts departments.

INDIGENOUS, RACE, AND ETHNIC STUDIES - Laura Pulido will deliver this year's Oregon Humanities Center's Clark Lecture, "'Surplus' White Nationalism and GOP Climate Obstruction," 4 p.m. Thursday, April 4, in the Knight Library Browsing Room. Pulido will focus on three historical moments to analyze how the relationship between U.S. white nationalism and the Republican Party has contributed to climate denial and obstruction on climate progress. Pulido is the Collins Chair and professor of Indigenous, race and ethnic studies and geography.

THEATRE ARTS - Costumes are an essential element in transporting audiences to a whole new world. The Department of Theater Arts in the College of Arts and Sciences provides experiential learning opportunities for students, teaching them industry standards in costuming, to prepare them for internships and careers in the theatre world. Read more about Grigorii Malakhov and Annika McNair and their time in the Costume Shop in the new issue of CAS Connection.

ENGLISH, THEATRE ARTS - Alumna and Tony-nominated playwright Heidi Schreck (English, theatre arts, '09) is collaborating with director Lila Neugebauer to stage a production of Uncle Vanya at the Lincoln Center Theatre in April. The play, originally written in 1897, will star Steve Carell and Alison Pill.

HISTORY - The federal government is ramping up domestic computer chip production, with roughly $106 billion in funding allocated by the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) and Science Act for semiconductor research and production. PhD student Adam Quinn offers four lessons the semiconductor industry should learn from its past.

HUMAN PHYSIOLOGY - Working with some of the world’s top marathon runners at Nike, human physiologist Brad Wilkins led the charge to break the 2-hour marathon barrier—an attempt that led to the National Geographic documentary Breaking2. Now head of the new Oregon Performance Research Laboratory, he’s using science to help athletes push past their perceived limitations and achieve new heights.

COMPUTER SCIENCE - Robotics champion and international women's education advocate Saghar Salehi escaped a certain death in Afghanistan to continue her fight for Afghan women’s rights as a computer science major at the UO College of Arts and Sciences.

GLOBAL HEALTH, GLOBAL STUDIES - Associate Professor Jo Weaver published research in the December 2023 issue of SSM-Mental Health that examines the mental health needs of women in India. Because of the gaps in mental health care that emerge from cultural mismatch, Weaver and her research team urge health workers to prioritize culturally informed methods of distress management and address the social and structural causes of suffering rather than delivering standardized clinical mental healthcare.

CHEMISTRY AND BIOCHEMISTRY - An assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Matthias Agne and his lab are using fundamental science—based on thermodynamics and microscopic physics—to improve solid-state battery developments. And his lab provides a space for students to tackle diverse technical and humanitarian problems.

HISTORY - Financial crises are somewhat regular occurrences today. But what can we learn from the first-ever stock market crash in 1720? On March 6, Daniel Menning, an associate professor at the University of Tübingen in Germany, will discuss in a lecture for undergraduate students about the South Sea Bubble and how people make decisions during financial crises.

ENGLISH, NATIVE AMERICAN AND INDIGENOUS STUDIES - A three-year endowment fund is supporting Kirby Brown's work on his family’s Cherokee oral history and material archives to better understand Cherokee Nation literature, history, intellectual production, and lived experience in the 20th and 21st centuries. Brown is an associate professor of Native American and Indigenous literary and cultural production in the Department of English and the director of Native American and Indigenous studies.

PHYSICS - Kayla Nguyen, assistant professor in physics, has co-led the development of a new approach that allows scientists to see individual atoms and the way they fit together under an electron microscope, without the multimillion-dollar price tag that such ability typically commands. Nguyen's research was published in the Feb. 22 issue of the journal Science.

CLASSICS, THEATRE ARTS - Directed by Tara Wibrew, the University Theatre’s production of Antigone opens March 1 and runs through March 17. The production is a product of College of Arts and Sciences students’ hands-on learning, applying concepts learned in classrooms to the stage in Robinson Theatre on the Eugene campus.

ANTHROPOLOGY - Feeling connected to one's community could alleviate the harmful health effects of chronic exposure to stigma for transgender and nonbinary people, according to new research from a team co-led by University of Oregon professor L. Zachary DuBois. “The implications of these findings highlight the importance of community connections as a buffer for supporting resilience,” DuBois said.