Research

Featured research news

Artist's rendering of ruined building, surrounded by lighted panels with image of Emmett Till, as visitors pass.

Scholar inspires more plans to memorialize site of Emmett Till tragedy

Globe with detailed view of Europe, Atlantic Ocean, western Russian

Study finds giving pre-service social studies educators practice in teaching difficult topics boosts confidence

An overhead photo of two women playing soccer, both contesting for a ball.

Study gauges what affects professional women soccer players' social media brands

Nataliya Bredikhina of the University of Kansas led a study analyzing how factors like team, media and market affect European professional women's soccer players' online brands and social media following. All factors played a part, but not equally.

Science and Technology

Study of ‘spatial synchrony’ using long-term data exposes ecological trends and could boost conservation, farming

New research from the University of Kansas in Ecology Letters reveals study of spatial synchrony over a long enough timescale leads to better testing of ideas, improved statistical results and new conceptual realms for understanding ecology, conserving species and farming more profitably.

Galaxies at ‘cosmic noon’: Research gives deep dive into universe’s wild growth spurt

A new University of Kansas survey of distant galaxies using the James Webb Space Telescope reveals never-before-seen star formation and black hole growth at “cosmic noon,” a mysterious epoch 2-3 billion years after the Big Bang when galaxies like the Milky Way underwent an intense growth spurt.
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An image of KU graduate student Amrit Gautam standing in front of a mural at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.

KU graduate student completes prestigious fellowship at Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Amrit Gautam, a KU graduate student in the physics doctoral program, was among just 62 doctoral students nationwide selected for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science Graduate Student Research Fellowship. Gautam spent the fellowship conducting his thesis research at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.
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Health and Well-Being

Hybrid research symposium planned for Undergraduate Research Week

The Center for Undergraduate Research at the University of Kansas is hosting online and in-person research presentations through April 25 to celebrate Undergraduate Research Week, featuring the work of more than 150 Jayhawks.

KU, Kansas State faculty receive Higuchi-KU Endowment research achievement awards

Four faculty members at two Kansas universities were named recipients of the Higuchi-KU Endowment Research Achievement Awards, the state higher education system’s most prestigious recognition for scholarly excellence.
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Stock photo of hands of pharmacist and customer during consultation

Study reveals pharmacy care perceived differently by diverse populations, including patients with disabilities

In a new study, University of Kansas researchers found the most acute differences in perspectives on pharmacy interactions come from communication issues specific to hearing loss and “limited physical space for patients in wheelchairs” experienced by respondents.
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Teaching, Learning and Behavior

Hybrid research symposium planned for Undergraduate Research Week

The Center for Undergraduate Research at the University of Kansas is hosting online and in-person research presentations through April 25 to celebrate Undergraduate Research Week, featuring the work of more than 150 Jayhawks.

Study shows addressing working memory can help students with math difficulty improve word problem-solving skills

A study led by the University of Kansas addressed whether using interventions designed to improve working memory can help students solve math word problems. The study found that in working with more than 200 students with and without math difficulties, working memory plays a key role in word problemsolving and that interventions designed to improve it helped both students with and without math difficulties.
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Globe with detailed view of Europe, Atlantic Ocean, western Russian

Study finds giving pre-service social studies educators practice in teaching difficult topics boosts confidence

Four pre-service teachers designed and delivered a lesson on "Night," Elie Wiesel's seminal Holocaust survival memoir, in a University of Kansas study. The lesson, performed in a mixed-reality simulator, found the teachers did not have instruction on teaching difficult topics, but their confidence in teaching difficult material improved.
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Arts, Architecture and Humanities

Scholar inspires more plans to memorialize site of Emmett Till tragedy

Over the past decade, Dave Tell has become one of the nation’s leading academic experts on the commemoration of the 1955 lynching of Black teen Emmett Till in Money, Mississippi. Now, one of his scholarly articles has inspired a new collaboration titled “Artist’s Project: Memorializing a Site of Sensitivity in Mississippi: Redemption and Reconciliation in the Shadows of Emmett Till.”

KUIA awards 34 grants for research and collaboration abroad

Thirty-four scholars from KU will embark on global adventure through travel grants from KU International Affairs. Their projects will take them to 23 countries and range from forging global ties to unraveling mysteries of culture, health and history.
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Darren Canady

New play-within-a-play examines storytelling ethics of theatrical community

In a new play-within-a-play by Darren Canady, professor of English at the University of Kansas, a misguided director determines to put on an all-white production of Ntozake Shange’s 1976 play “for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf.”
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Business, Economics and Innovation

Profit motivation of social media companies may compel them to inject bias and create polarization, study finds

Social media companies thrive on the subtle influencing of users’ behavior. “It is of interest to social media companies to nudge users in such a way that their engagement level increases, but as a result, echo chambers are created and the level of polarization increases,” said Debabrata Dey, a professor of business at the University of Kansas.

Airlines can improve travel efficiency and resilience by incorporating passenger-level data, study finds

Mazhar Arikan, associate professor of business at the University of Kansas, explores how airlines that incorporate passenger-level data along with flight-level data could make modest adjustments in passenger itineraries that result in major travel improvements without significantly deteriorating efficiency.
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An overhead photo of two women playing soccer, both contesting for a ball.

Study gauges what affects professional women soccer players' social media brands

Nataliya Bredikhina of the University of Kansas led a study analyzing how factors like team, media and market affect European professional women's soccer players' online brands and social media following. All factors played a part, but not equally.
More Business, Economics and Innovation

Law, Politics and Society

Partisan politics proved most significant factor for speed of corporate shutdowns during pandemic, study shows

In a new study, Shradha Bindal, assistant professor of finance at the University of Kansas, investigates the speed with which U.S. firms shut down their headquarters because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It finds that the political orientation of the firms and their CEOs proved the most significant factor.

Limits of nation’s belief in manifest destiny explored in new ‘Borderlands’ book

In a new book, Andrew Isenberg, Hall Distinguished Professor of American History at the University of Kansas, offers a reconsidered history of manifest destiny that breaks from traditional narratives of U.S. territorial expansion.
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An image of a group of cameras and reporters at a news conference with a speaker or political candidate in the background.

Study finds engagement journalism training reduced 'horse race' political coverage, boosted more substantive content

A study co-led by the Universty of Kansas found that news outlets that took part in Democracy SOS engagement journalism training reduced the amount of false-binary "horse race" coverage of elections that focused solely who was winning, instead producing more substantive content. Researchers argue the training could help generate content for a less polarized, more engaged populace.
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