CAS Connection News

UO scientists rewrite eruption history of Oregon’s South Sister

EARTH SCIENCES - Graduate student Annika Dechert at the University of Oregon College of Arts and Sciences and a team of researchers are working on studying the eruption history of South Sister volcano in the Oregon Cascades. The results of the study will inform the way the USGS Cascades Volcano Observatory draws up hazards maps for Central Oregon and help shape the way scientists think about other similar volcanoes. The research team published their latest findings in August in the journal Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems.

New economics forum begins to tally costs of climate change for Oregonians

ECONOMICS - Wildfire smoke costs Oregon households $450 per day as they try to adapt by purchasing air purifiers, canceling trips and keeping children at home to minimize exposure. That’s just one of many economic impacts of climate change tallied up in a new report by a five-member nonpartisan group The Forum on Oregon Climate Economics, or FORCE. The group includes Keaton Miller, an associate professor of economics with the College of Arts and Sciences.

At the eye of the storm

MULTIDISCIPLINARY SCIENCE PROGRAM - When Clark Honors College and CAS senior Erin Morrison set out to witness the historic launch of NASA’s Europa Clipper mission in Florida in mid-October, she had no idea she’d also be facing a Category-5 hurricane. Morrison was there to be with Carol Paty, an earth sciences professor with the College of Arts and Sciences, who worked with a team of scientists to create some of the tools to help Europa Clipper study a moon 1.8 billion miles away.

Student-created app helps travelers stay connected and save money

COMPUTER SCIENCE - In a course where innovation meets real-world challenges, three computer science students took their classroom project beyond the grade book and put it into the hands of global travelers. Over the summer, computer science majors Adrian Heider, Raj Gill and Manu Shukla developed and launched a fully functional app: Constella, an iOS application aimed at reducing the cost of international phone plans.

The Ducks can dig it

ANTHROPOLOGY - Meet Gabi Gauthier, a UO student with a passion for Oregon history who studied at Connley Caves Field School this past summer under the mentorship of UO alum and Professor Katelyn McDonough. As a freshman, Gauthier was considering a STEM field. However, after taking classes with McDonough, BS ’14 (anthropology), Gauthier knew she wanted to officially major in anthropology with a focus on archaeology.

Space probe carrying UO research takes off for Jupiter moon

EARTH SCIENCES - Carol Paty, a comparative planetologist in the College of Arts and Sciences helped develop one of the scientific instruments aboard NASA’s Europa Clipper, which blasted off Oct. 14, on the world’s first mission to conduct a detailed study of Jupiter's moon Europa. Paty, an Earth sciences professor, is a member of the research teams behind two of the nine scientific instruments the spacecraft will use to confirm and measure what scientists strongly suspect is a vast sea of salty water buried under a sheet of ice enveloping the moon’s surface.