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Sniffing for science
Melissa Hopkins leans over to give a treat to her dog Cedar as instructor Meghan Ramos and other class participants look on

Melissa Hopkins stands ready with a treat as her dog Cedar successfully locates a target scent during a class at Penn Vet’s Working Dog Center. One of the course’s instructors, Meghan Ramos (at left in blue), says the course allows owners to “help their dog contribute to society in a positive way.”

Sniffing for science

In the “Citizen Science” course at the School of Veterinary Medicine’s Working Dog Center, Meghan Ramos and Tessa Seales work with dog owners to enhance their pups’ scent detection skills, with an eye toward bolstering the Center’s research.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Getting science right in the fake news era
closeup of stack of newspapers
  • Q&A

    • Getting science right in the fake news era

    Over his career as a science journalist, Carl Zimmer has seen legitimate science reporting denied and illegitimate science news taken as fact. In advance of a talk at Penn, Zimmer discusses the problem of misinformation and offers tips for avoiding being fooled by bogus science stories.

    Katherine Unger Baillie

    Staging the plague
    Laurel Redding of the School of Veterinary Medicine writes on an easel as members of her table look on

    Gathered in Fagin Hall for a daylong disease outbreak symposium, students worked across disciplines to devise strategies for containing a fictionalized infection. Laurel Redding, a School of Veterinary Medicine faculty member and event facilitator, writes up her group’s thoughts during a brainstorming session. 

    Staging the plague

    Eighty-one students training in a diversity of health professions worked with regional and federal agencies to confront an imagined outbreak scenario centered around bubonic plague in Philadelphia.

    Katherine Unger Baillie

    Want to reduce emissions? Start in the gut of a cow
    Dipti Pitta examining cow feed

    Livestock like cattle produce 25 percent of methane emissions in the United States.

    Want to reduce emissions? Start in the gut of a cow

    As concern about climate change rises, Dipti Pitta of the School of Veterinary Medicine is working to develop innovative strategies to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

    Jacob Williamson-Rea

    Studying the players in immune regulation
    oliver-garden-and-sabina-hlavaty-wearing-latex-gloves-hold-up-a-plate-of-medical-cells-

    Dr. Oliver Garden and Sabina Hlavaty, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute/Burroughs Wellcome Fund Medical Research Fellow, view a plate of cultured canine bone marrow cells to compare conditions during an experiment. Photo courtesy of Penn Vet News.

    Studying the players in immune regulation

    Penn Vet's Oliver Garden Garden's lab is exploring new facets in regulating immune responses.

    Katherine Unger Baillie

    Multidisciplinary team to develop stem cell-based approaches to restore vision
    3-d-image-of-eyeball-anatomy

    Multidisciplinary team to develop stem cell-based approaches to restore vision

    Gene therapies have had success in treating blindness but can’t save areas of the retina where cells have already died. In a new effort, School of Veterinary Medicine scientists John Wolfe and William Beltran will attempt to develop a stem-cell-based approach that restores vision.

    Katherine Unger Baillie

    Immune cells involved in triple-negative breast cancer could offer future therapeutic target
    Chakrabarti teaser image

    Immune cells involved in triple-negative breast cancer could offer future therapeutic target

    New research led by Rumela Chakrabarti reveals how immune cells called myeloid-derived immunosuppressor cells contribute to the progression of triple-negative breast cancer, a particularly aggressive cancer. Pairing chemotherapy with a drug that blocks these cells may one day help stem its growth.

    Katherine Unger Baillie

    Making fossils move to build better robots
    Making extinct dinosaurs move to build better robots

    Making fossils move to build better robots

    Aja Carter, a Ph.D. candidate in paleontology, builds robots based on fossilized animals that crawled out of the sea about 300 million years ago. She’s pioneering a new field that she calls paleo-bio-inspired robotics.

    Jacob Williamson-Rea

    Seven Penn researchers receive NIH Director Awards
    Payne, Aimee and Mason, Nicola

    Aimee Payne (left) of Penn Medicine and Nicola Mason of Penn Vet are co-investigators on an NIH Director's Transformative Research Award that will support investigations into the use of immunotherapies to treat an autoimmune disease in pet dogs. Payne and Mason are among seven Penn researchers to win highly competitive NIH Director's awards this year.

    Seven Penn researchers receive NIH Director Awards

    Seven researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine, School of Veterinary Medicine, and School of Engineering and Applied Science are to receive National Institutes of Health Director Awards, highly competitive grants to support innovative biomedical research.

    Penn Today Staff