Laetitia La Follette, associate professor and chair of the department of history of art and architecture, was elected to a three-year term as President of the Archaeological Institute of America (AIA) in January.
Professor Julie Brigham-Grette, geosciences, has been honored by Germany’s Alexander von Humboldt Foundation with one of its coveted Humboldt Research Awards, which will support her research collaborations there over the coming six months. 
Three startup companies with UMass Amherst ties earned cash prizes at the inaugural “Amherst Pitch Night” at AmherstWorks last week.
The event, hosted by representatives from UMass’s Berthiaume Center for Entrepreneurship, the Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce, AmherstWorks, Hampshire College Entrepreneurship and Valley Venture Mentors, consisted of five judges who collectively picked the top three places. The audience also voted for a fourth winner, given a $100 prize.
Assistant Professor of Chemistry Niya Sa’s expertise is in designing rechargeable battery materials, which is beyond the current lithium ion technology. Sa is the lead principal investigator of a $426,000 National Science Foundation-Major Research Instrumentation Program (NSF-MRI) grant, which she and her co-PI, Associate Professor of Chemistry Michelle Foster, have used to purchase a field emissions scanning electron microscrope. It’ll arrive in the Integrated Sciences Complex this spring.
24/7 Wall St. reviewed U.S. Department of Education data and determined that UMass Boston is the third most diverse four-year college in the United States. He authors of the report, published in USA Today, note that UMass Boston also costs far less than most other schools on the list.
BOSTON – University of Massachusetts President Marty Meehan announced today that he has appointed Katherine Newman to be the inaugural System Chancellor of Academic Programs, a position she will transition to as her term as Interim Chancellor at UMass Boston comes to a close.
AMHERST, Mass. – A University of Massachusetts neuroscientist will be featured in two television programs in February that will highlight her research on sleep.
UMass Amherst particle physicist Stephane Willocq has been interested in big-picture science since he was a teenager. Curious about the laws of nature and how they impact what we know about our world, he was drawn to study how things worked on a fundamental level and how the very small connects with the very large.
A seasonal, air-supported indoor facility to support UMass’s entire athletic department is complete and operational for team-use.
The completion of the 96,000-square-foot field and structure was made possible thanks in large part to a generous $5.58 million donation from Marty Jacobson, class of 1968, which served as the key component to the facility project.
George Corey, executive director of University Health Services, provided a statement updating the campus community on the Coronavirus and how to protect yourself during cold and flu season:
“The university continues to closely monitor the outbreak of novel coronavirus. There are currently no identified cases of infection at UMass Amherst and there are no members of the campus community who are under active investigation for the virus. The Massachusetts Department of Public Health continues to advise that the risk to Massachusetts residents is low.