Max Lifchitz, alumni fellow (1974-77), composer, and professor of music at SUNY-Albany, to offer a recital featuring eight distinctive works inspired by diverse aspects of the natural world. Composers included in the event hail from Italy, Mexico, Nigeria, and throughout the US.
Event Time/Date: February 5, 2023 at 7:30 PM.
Congratulations to Peter Wilf, alumni fellow (1999-02) and professor of geosciences at Penn State University, on being named as one of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) 2022 fellows! AAAS is the largest general science society. This year it recognized 506 scientists, engineers, and innovators for their distinguished scientific and social achievements. Peter is recognized for his contributions to research in paleobotany.
The University Record spotlights wheelchair dancer, disability culture activist, and community performance artist Petra Kuppers, senior fellow (2021-24) and professor of English language and literature and of women’s and gender studies in LSA; professor of art in the Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design; and professor of theatre and drama, and of dance in the School of Music, Theatre & Dance. Learn more about Petra’s activism, methodology, and community events, like QueerCrip Pussy Poets’ Rest Stop and Turtle Disco, in the full feature.
Vaughn Cooper, alumni fellow (2000-03) and professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Pittsburgh, commented on newly spreading misinformation about the evolution of the SARS-CoV-2 variant XBB 1.5. “XBB did not evolve because people were vaccinated,” said Cooper, a professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Pittsburgh. “The way it evolved, let’s be straight, is because people were infected by multiple viruses at the same time.” Read the Washington Post article.
Climate change is changing winter weather patterns, both in temperature and in duration. Warmer and shorter winters are causing some species to sleep later, or not at all. Mammal expert David Polly, alumni fellow (1994-96) and biology professor at Indiana University, says that changes to plant hibernation can have far-reaching effects on ecosystems. “If their cycles get off sync, then the whole food web becomes involved in some of that complexity,” Polly said. “That’s probably what worries climate change biologists the most.” Read more on Indiana Public Media.
Alumni fellow Melanie Mitchell (1990-92), who is a professor at the Santa Fe Institute and an expert in artificial intelligence (AI), discusses machine learning, AI systems, superintelligence, and the ethical considerations needed to align these systems with human values, preferences, and goals in Quanta Magazine.
Read more of Mitchell’s comments on AI chatbot technology in Bloomberg, MIT Technology Review, Jordan News, and Mind Matters News.
As part of the H-Diplo essay series entitled Learning the Scholar’s Craft: Reflections of Historians and International Relations Scholars, Isabel V. Hull, alumni fellow (1976-77) and John Stambaugh Professor of History, Emerita, at Cornell University shares stories from her “formative years” as a scholar interested in international affairs. Read the complete essay entitled “Back to Square One” on H-Net.
A recent Nature article looks at the looming biodiversity crisis as the United Nations convenes negotiators and ministers from more than 190 countries to address the emergency and identify targets to protect nature. In the article, Shahid Naeem, alumni fellow (1989-92) and ecologist at Columbia University, responds to questions about what might happen if species disappear. Ecosystems with low biodiversity also have low resilience — they are not as able to bounce back after a perturbation or shock, such as a fire, as more-diverse systems are, Naeem says. Follow this link to read the full Nature article.
Citation: Gilbert, Natasha. “Can the World Save a Million Species from Extinction?” Nature (London). England, n.d. doi: 10.1038/d41586-022-04370-4.
Named among the favorite books of 2022, either by Southern writers or about the South, Virginia Living includes the latest publication by poet and alumni fellow Gregory Orr (1972-75). For more than a decade, Orr has been writing toward “the Book:” an imagined tome containing every poem and song ever written. Drawing from a rich tradition of lyric poetry, Selected Books of the Beloved (Copper Canyon Press) is the culmination of that project, and more—it is a celebration of the transformative power of poetry, and of our extraordinary capacity to feel and to love.
Lydia Beaudrot, alumni fellow (2015-18) and assistant professor of biosciences at Rice University, co-authored an article that examined whether community-level activity patterns differ among biogeographic regions, and explored the roles of top-down versus bottom-up processes and thermoregulatory (i.e. temperature influenced) constraints. The study showed that patterns exhibited by tropical forest mammals are consistent across tropical regions. The analysis also showed that herbivore and insect activity appears to be shaped by temperature influences whereas predator-prey interactions appear to be influenced by temporal behavior of their community members. Read the full paper in Nature Communications.
Abstract: An animal’s daily use of time (their “diel activity”) reflects their adaptations, requirements, and interactions, yet we know little about the underlying processes governing diel activity within and among communities. Here we examine whether community-level activity patterns differ among biogeographic regions, and explore the roles of top-down versus bottom-up processes and thermoregulatory constraints. Using data from systematic camera-trap networks in 16 protected forests across the tropics, we examine the relationships of mammals’ diel activity to body mass and trophic guild. Also, we assess the activity relationships within and among guilds. Apart from Neotropical insectivores, guilds exhibited consistent cross-regional activity in relation to body mass. Results indicate that thermoregulation constrains herbivore and insectivore activity (e.g., larger Afrotropical herbivores are ~7 times more likely to be nocturnal than smaller herbivores), while bottom-up processes constrain the activity of carnivores in relation to herbivores, and top-down processes constrain the activity of small omnivores and insectivores in relation to large carnivores’ activity. Overall, diel activity of tropical mammal communities appears shaped by similar processes and constraints among regions reflecting body mass and trophic guilds.
Citation: Vallejo-Vargas, A.F., Sheil, D., Semper-Pascual, A. et al. Consistent diel activity patterns of forest mammals among tropical regions. Nat Commun 13, 7102 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-34825-1