Research, Scholarship, and Creativity

Highlights Include:

Vanguard of epigenetics research

WSU biologist Mike Skinner leads a world-renowned laboratory at the forefront of innovative research in the expanding field of epigenetics. Skinner and his team are providing new scientific  understanding with applications in the prevention of premature births and for avoiding a host of illnesses, including cancer and heart disease.

A world leader in radiochemistry

Led by internationally recognized researchers and faculty, Washington State University has one of the nation’s largest radiochemistry research and education programs. WSU scientists are working to develop creative solutions to global challenges in radioecology, nuclear energy, nuclear medicine, and nuclear policy.

Leveraging secrets of hibernation to defeat diabetes

Feeding honey to hibernating bears helped WSU researchers find potential genetic keys to the bears’ insulin control, an advance that could lead to a treatment for human diabetes. Their work to solve the molecular and cellular mysteries of hibernation could also advance research to combat obesity, heart disease, stroke, and cancer.

More than just numbers

When he’s not teaching mathematics – from introductory calculus to advanced numerical analysis of elliptic equations – WSU math professor Sergey Lapin might be working to speed detection of deadly disease or to expand understanding of European history, Russian language and culture, Chinese economics, or higher education in America.

Solidarity through music

WSU music professor Jacqueline Wilson (Yakama) elevates music featuring underrepresented perspectives and lived experiences, with a special focus on collaborating with Indigenous composers. Through her research and outreach project, Wya’uyɬá: The Music of Indigenous Solidarity, she is creating an album of works for the bassoon by Māori composers to bring new depth to the Indigenous representation in the bassoon repertoire and to combat monolithic racial depictions and promote artistic sovereignty.

A clean alternative to fossil fuels

A new energy-efficient method developed by a team of WSU scientists, including chemist Louis Scudiero, has the potential to make clean hydrogen fuel a more viable alternative to fossil fuels by locally producing hydrogen gas from ethanol and water.

The shape of imagination

Through art, sculptor and professor Io Palmer builds bridges for increased understanding across society. She brings art to those who have explored it—and to those who have not—and she shows how art can be life-affirming as well as a deep, rich vehicle for expression. Concept Clay, one of Palmer’s current initiatives, aims to create artist-led public art projects with local and national communities.

Food supply in times of climate change

WSU anthropologist John Blong is studying methods employed by prehistoric people in western North America to maintain food systems over millennia of climate change. Understanding how early people navigated change holds lessons for current and future generations faced with possible food supply challenges.

Combining dance, psychology

Through her recent collaboration with EcoArts on the Palouse, psychology graduate student Hannah Levy created “Staying with the Pause,” a dance documentary that touches on the struggles many people faced during the pandemic.

The art of writing about science

An innovative Professional Science Writing certificate, developed by the Department of English and delivered both on campus and online, provides focused training to help students and professionals effectively write about science and technology.