Eberly News

For most, a forest is defined by its towering canopy and dense underbrush. But for Hannah DeHetre, a doctoral candidate in biology at West Virginia University, the real story lies beneath her boots. “The soil is the foundation of the forest,” DeHetre explained. “Without soil that can support the trees, there is no forest. It holds the nutrients, holds the landscape, and dictates what can grow there. It’s the very bottom building block of everything.”

With support from a prestigious NSF CAREER award, Subhasish Mandal, an assistant professor in the WVU Eberly College of Arts and Sciences Department of Physics and Astronomy, is working to discover new materials that can make high-speed quantum computing a reality.

Supported by an Early-Concept Grant for Exploratory Research from the National Science Foundation, Steve Kannenberg, assistant professor of biology in the WVU Eberly College of Arts and Sciences, is integrating AI directly into local monitoring sensors to help scientists track ecosystem health in near real time.

A team of Eberly College researchers is the recipient of a $749,990 U.S. Department of Energy Genesis Mission grant that will be used to develop an artificial intelligence platform that could transform scientists’ ability to predict and engineer microbial communities.

West Virginia University researchers are developing new laser-based techniques to observe plasma behavior in unprecedented detail, opening a window into interactions that shape technologies ranging from computer chips and spacecraft engines to next-generation fusion energy systems.

Backed by $5.9 million in National Science Foundation funding, West Virginia University researchers are using stars that function like celestial clocks to search for spacetime ripples known as gravitational waves. The sources of those ripples could be supermassive black holes. They could be “cosmic strings” — cracks in the universe that have only been theorized. They could even be reverberations from the Big Bang. “Or there could be a huge surprise,” said Maura McLaughlin, Eberly Family Distinguished Professor of Physics and Astronomy and recipient of the Shaw Prize in Astronomy.

Fowler, a research assistant professor at the WVU Eberly College of Arts and Sciences and a member of the WVU Center for Kinetic Plasma Physics, said MAVEN’s observations advance scientists’ understanding of how the sun interacts with the solar system and especially with unmagnetized bodies like comets, Saturn’s moon Titan, Venus and Mars.

Three Eberly College students,  Daniel Campa, Rebecca Ozbolt, and Samuel Stalnaker have joined the ranks of the nation’s top emerging researchers after earning prestigious National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships. 

Each year, Eberly College honors faculty members with its Outstanding Teacher Awards, Outstanding Researcher Awards and the Award for Outstanding Outreach or Public Service. Recipients in each category receive a stipend to help further their research, teaching and service efforts.

PE Limited is extending its partnership with West Virginia University to ensure students and faculty in the University’s geology and engineering programs have access to the company’s advanced energy production modeling tools.

The company’s latest in-kind software gift — worth more than $6.5 million — benefits academics and research within the geology program at the WVU Eberly College of Arts and Sciences. “Our graduate students will be able to learn how to carry out state-of-the-art modeling of subsurface structures in a way that enhances their understanding of the Earth processes and better prepares them for their future careers in science or industry,” Jaime Toro, professor of geology.