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Making insights into ancient marine ecosystems with 3D-printed shells
Scientist looks at a 3D printer in a scientific lab

Erynn Johnson monitors the progress of the lab’s 3D printer in Hayden Hall as it produces a resin-based replica of a snail shell. Her research, which relies on mathematical modeling paired with paleontology, gives insights into how shelled marine creatures that lived hundreds of millions of years ago evolved to withstand the crunching jaws of predators.

Making insights into ancient marine ecosystems with 3D-printed shells

If you’re a snail hoping to survive an encounter with a hungry fish, it helps to have a strong shell. Paleoecology doctoral student Erynn Johnson is using 3D printing to understand how predator-prey interactions may have played out hundreds of millions of years ago.

Katherine Unger Baillie

With summer field course, students get their hands dirty learning about soils
Group of students with professor standing in a soil pit, five feet deep, with vegetation surrounding

Shoulder deep in a soil pit at Penn Vet’s New Bolton Center, Alain Plante (in red cap) and his students investigate the soil profile of this part of Chester Country farmland. (Photo: Hannah Kleckner/Penn Vet)

With summer field course, students get their hands dirty learning about soils

Taught by the School of Arts and Sciences’ Alain Plante, Field Study of Soils gives students skills and familiarity with different soil types, including some on University property.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Small horned dinosaur from China, a Triceratops relative, walked on two feet
adult dinosaur with frill on skull characterized by penn paleontologists is standing on two legs and flanked by two smaller dinosaurs on the water's edge

An artist’s rendering of Auroraceratops shows its bipedal posture as well as the beak and frill that characterize it as a member of the horned dinosaurs. Paleontologists from Penn led a team in characterizing this species, discovered in China. (Illustration: Robert Walters)

Small horned dinosaur from China, a Triceratops relative, walked on two feet

Auroraceratops, a bipedal dinosaur that lived roughly 115 million years ago, has been newly described by an international team of researchers led by Peter Dodson of the School of Arts and Sciences and School of Veterinary Medicine.

Katherine Unger Baillie

The beauty and nuances of Iceland, through a multidisciplinary lens
iceland class on site in iceland

The beauty and nuances of Iceland, through a multidisciplinary lens

Tracing a circular path around Iceland, the students in Alain Plante’s Penn Global Seminar saw firsthand the nation’s unique geology, culture, politics, energy, people, and wildlife.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Toxins from the tap
Gloved hands holding a syringe with groundwater with a background of a body of water
  • Q&A

    • Toxins from the tap

    In Pennsylvania and hundreds of other locations around the country, manmade chemicals known as PFAS have been found in drinking water. Howard Neukrug discusses the potential harm, how local and federal agencies are responding, and the many related questions that remain unanswered.

    Katherine Unger Baillie

    Contest fosters local solutions to global sustainability challenges
    A person in a pink button-down shirt leaning against a brick wall.

    Rising senior Richard Ling started a nonprofit, Collective Cause, and through that, ran a competition called Sustainable Solutions. The goal was to encourage high school and college students to brainstorm local solutions to meet the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.

    Contest fosters local solutions to global sustainability challenges

    SoleProvider won the Sustainable Solutions competition created by rising senior Richard Ling. The automated texting system offers Philadelphia’s homeless a simple way to request a particular need and for users to fulfill it.

    Michele W. Berger

    Keeping rain out of the drain
    A scientist kneeling on a lawn checks a well using electronic monitoring equipment

    David Vann of the School of Arts and Sciences heads up the research efforts around Shoemaker Green’s stormwater management system. Using sensors placed around the site, he hopes to be able to closely monitor how much water drains out of the system, and how quickly. 

    Keeping rain out of the drain

    From cisterns beneath Shoemaker Green to the green roof on New College House, special features of campus buildings and landscapes are helping manage stormwater to keep rain from the sewer lines, and scholars are using the infrastructure as a research opportunity.

    Katherine Unger Baillie

    A unique perspective on renewable energy
    Rachel Kyte stands at a podium speaking, the sign on the podium reads "Kleinman Center for Energy Policy."
  • Q&A

    • A unique perspective on renewable energy

    In a conversation with Rachel Kyte, the U.N. special representative and CEO of Sustainable Energy for All discusses how this energy sector has changed in the past decade and what happens when political will doesn’t match the science.

    Michele W. Berger

    Predilections of a destructive pest
    A person removes a sticky band covered with insects from around a tree

    At four areas around The Woodlands, Rohr will be checking weekly to see how many lanternflies he finds. The insect prefers ailanthus trees, but also feeds on dozens of other species.

    Predilections of a destructive pest

    The spotted lanternfly is emerging as a serious threat to agriculture and forested areas. At The Woodlands Cemetery near campus, Benjamin Rohr hopes to determine the types of trees the insect prefers to shape control strategies moving forward.

    Katherine Unger Baillie

    With unprecedent threats to nature at hand, how to turn the tide
    A frog resting on a rusting surface

    The report notes that declining biodiversity takes a toll not only on the species directly affected, but also on human livelihoods and health.

    With unprecedent threats to nature at hand, how to turn the tide

    One million plant and animal species are on the verge of extinction due to human activity, according to a U.N. assessment issued earlier this month. Here, experts highlight the report’s major messages and offer ideas for moving from inertia to action to stem threats to biodiversity.

    Katherine Unger Baillie , Michele W. Berger