January 08, 2026, Bryan Gentry
A new grant from the National Institutes of Health will help USC faculty study fragile X-associated health conditions, which may affect thousands of people in South Carolina, and identify new ways to diagnose and treat the conditions.
December 19, 2025, Kristine Hartvigsen
No area of government, business, industry or law goes untouched by the latest technologies, whose benefits also come with risk. David Sella-Villa, assistant professor at the Joseph F. Rice School of Law, says the current system of privacy laws demands that a sense of “caveat emptor” accompany the choices we make with our data.
December 12, 2025, Chris Horn
An environmental chemistry research lab at USC at the forefront of efforts to find and identify disinfection byproducts in U.S. water treatment systems has discovered a new, highly toxic class of byproducts.
December 12, 2025, Chris Horn
USC chemistry professor Linda Shimizu has a long list of accomplishments, including recently being named a fellow of the American Chemical Society, one of only 36 chemistry professors worldwide to receive the honor in 2025 for scientific and professional accomplishments.
December 11, 2025, Chris Horn
Millions of times smaller than a grain of salt, nanocrystals have become extraordinarily useful in electronics, drug delivery, biological imaging and beyond.
December 10, 2025, Dan Cook
Heading into 2025, the field of higher education faced significant challenges. But at the University of South Carolina, all signs point to dynamic growth and institutional strength.
December 09, 2025, Collyn Taylor
Biomedical engineering professor Ehsan Jabbarzadeh became the University of South Carolina's fourth National Academy of Inventors fellow.
December 08, 2025, Page Ivey
South Carolina Honors College student Michael Pitre likes to get up around 3 a.m. on Tuesday and Thursday mornings to make the two-hour drive to Folly Beach to surf at the Washout before heading back to Columbia and his 11:40 a.m. class. It’s a regimen that aligns nicely with the Marshall Scholar finalist’s jam-packed schedule that includes earning his BARSC-MD degree in just three years, working as an emergency medical technician, and researching the circuitry of the brain on his way to becoming a neurosurgeon.
December 05, 2025, Chris Horn
Electrical engineering professor Guoan Wang got his first U.S. patent while in graduate school and now has more than 60 patents and more than 50 additional patents pending. He was elected to the National Academy of Inventors’ 2024 Class of Fellows, the highest professional distinction awarded to inventors.
December 04, 2025, Chris Horn
A common food additive used as a thickener in soups, salad dressings and ice cream has demonstrated high potential for another use — slowing dangerous erosion on overtopped dams and levees.
November 26, 2025, Alexey A. Petrov
Scientists working with the James Webb Space Telescope discovered three unusual astronomical objects in early 2025, which may be examples of dark stars. Alexey Petrov, a USC endowed chair in physics, writes for The Conversation on how this could alter scientists’ understanding of how ordinary stars form.
November 18, 2025, Golareh Jalilvand
Imagine an electric car that could go 600, 700 or even 1,000 miles on a single charge. Golareh Jalilvand, an assistant professor of chemical engineering at USC's Molinaroli College of Engineering and Computing, writes for The Conversation on how battery researchers are seeking options to lithium-ion batteries that have better performance, improved environmental sustainability and lower cost.
November 18, 2025, Laura Erskine
Heart defects affect about 1 percent of all babies born in the United States each year, making the cardiovascular system an important part of the nursing curriculum. To help students master this material, assistant professor Stephanie Schaller invented a new tool that lets students learn heart defects through hands-on activities.
November 13, 2025, Jennifer Springhart
Many Americans who lack or have insufficient health insurance seek health care from a network of safety net clinics called community health centers. Dr. Jennifer Springhart of USC's School of Medicine Greenville writes for The Conversation about how decreasing their capacity could destabilize other elements of local health care delivery systems.
November 12, 2025, Megan Sexton
USC Honors College student and public health major Hannah Brennen, who was a Rhodes scholar finalist, plans to attend medical school to pursue her interest in maternal health.
November 11, 2025, Valerie Weingart
South Carolina Honors College student Michael Pitre has been named a finalist for the 2026 Marshall Scholarships. If selected, he plans to pursue an MPhil in biological sciences to develop novel treatments for Parkinson's disease before returning to USC for medical school.
November 05, 2025, Page Ivey
Nikki Wooten was a soldier before she was a scholar — a fact that helps drive and inform her research dedicated to helping American’s military members and veterans access the resources they need for better mental health.
October 28, 2025, Kristine Hartvigsen
USC professor Chester DePratter has been sorting through archaeological evidence gathered over nearly four decades of investigation at the 16th century Spanish settlement of Santa Elena on present-day Parris Island. Here's what he and his team found.
October 24, 2025, Jewel Scott
Emerging adulthood is a life stage where behaviors that diminish heart health—such as spending more time sitting, consuming more fast food and using more tobacco and alcohol—become more common. Jewel Scott, assistant professor of nursing science in USC's College of Nursing, writes for The Conversation about the power of habits on our behavior.
October 22, 2025, Collyn Taylor
The University of South Carolina had 140 total faculty members across 11 different colleges or schools honored on a recent list of the world’s top-cited researchers.
October 21, 2025, Michael Watson
While people’s actual feet are rounded on the end, women’s dress shoes often come to a sharp point at the toe. Many people find these pointy shoes uncomfortable. So why do shoe designers keep making them this way? Retailing professor Mike Watson, who researches and teaches fashion design, weighs in.
October 08, 2025, Rebekah Friedman
From improving outcomes for premature babies to nurturing research advancements in chronic illness to strengthening the next generation of nursing leadership, University of South Carolina faculty members Robin Dail, Cindy Corbett and Jeanne Cavanaugh have had careers worth celebrating. While these three center directors are retiring this year, their legacies will endure through their centers’ continued impact at USC and beyond.
October 03, 2025, Kristine Hartvigsen
Little-known ocean fungi are microscopic in size but make a gargantuan impact on subterranean life. Their superpower? They are the heavy lifters of carbon and nitrogen cycling, processes essential for life on earth. Nick Peng, assistant professor in the School of the Earth, Ocean and Environment, would like unsung ocean fungi finally to get the recognition they deserve.
October 03, 2025, Amanda Rebar, co-author
A new study shows that the majority of actions people take in a day are carried out on autopilot. Habitual behavior is made up of the things that we do without thinking, prompted by our environment and learned through repeated enactment. Public Health professor Amanda Rebar writes for The Conversation about the power of habits on our behavior.
October 01, 2025, Kristine Hartvigsen
USC philosophy professor Leah McClimans cares about how health care professionals gauge the quality of patient outcomes beyond traditional clinical metrics. Her research has helped improve survey instruments so they are more inclusive of the patient’s entire experience.
September 30, 2025, Chris Horn
It happened a decade ago, but lessons learned from the catastrophic flooding of Oct. 1-5, 2015, in the Midlands of South Carolina are still being reckoned by University of South Carolina researchers and former students who were involved in the flood’s aftermath.
September 24, 2025, Laura Morris
The University of South Carolina College of Pharmacy and Prisma Health Children’s Hospital announced a research collaboration on Sept. 24 aimed at redefining pediatric oncology care in South Carolina. The $5 million pledge from Curing Kids Cancer will fund research aimed at developing and providing access to innovative therapeutics for children with cancer.
September 24, 2025, Chris Horn
When Wenbin Tan pivoted his research a few years ago to better understand the effects of COVID-19 on the cardiovascular system, his efforts led to a hunt for natural compounds that could counteract the virus’ effects. Two natural compounds that show promise were known to be abundant in unroasted green coffee beans.
September 23, 2025, Chris Horn
Theater Professor Emeritus Sarah Barker learned a new way of thinking about the mind-body connection early in her career. She has been spreading the word ever since.
September 12, 2025, Thom Harman / photo by Kim Truett
Change is a constant in the field of visual design — and Garnet Apple Award winner Meena Khalili embraces it. It’s what allows her, and her students, to be at the forefront of their field and to be ready for multiple career roles.
September 10, 2025, Chris Horn
Since they first appeared on wristwatches in the early 1970s, liquid crystal displays have made the leap to TVs, smartphones, household appliances and automobile dashboards. Now an even more responsive type of LCD technology, called blue phase liquid crystals, is getting closer to commercial use, and a USC chemical engineering professor’s research in that field is attracting notice.
September 08, 2025, Rebekah Friedman
Cognitive decline is a significant problem for South Carolina’s aging population. That’s one reason the University of South Carolina has prioritized its efforts to improve brain health across the Palmetto State. In USC’s Arnold School of Public Health, researchers are leading the charge to better understand how diet, exercise and intervention factor into the solution.
September 05, 2025, Hadley McCollester
Snapping shrimp can create shockwaves strong enough to stun prey. But how do they survive each other’s blasts? USC biologist Dan Speiser and his team discovered that a special “orbital hood” — a helmet-like shield around the shrimp’s eyes and brain — protects them from these powerful shockwaves. Collaborating with biomedical researchers at the Molinaroli College of Engineering and Computing, the team is now studying the hood’s structure to design next-generation helmets that could protect human brains from shock waves and even reduce the risk of PTSD in military personnel.
September 03, 2025, Hadley McCollester
Remote work has become more common since the COVID19 pandemic, however it might not be the best for every worker. The Family Inequality Research Lab led by sociology professor Jennifer Augustine investigated remote work through collecting data on remote work spaces. What they found may surprise you.
September 03, 2025, Megan Sexton
Chemistry professor Susan D. Richardson, the 2025 Carolina Trustees Professorship recipient, has spent her career researching water— from the safety of the water we drink to the quality of water for our ecosystems.
September 03, 2025, Kristine Hartvigsen
The pleasing pastoral landscapes across the former Semipalatinsk Nuclear Test Site in Kazakhstan hardly reflect its dark history. Generations of locals have lived near the site since it opened in 1949, and many remain today. USC researchers Timothy Mousseau and Magdalena Stawkowski are studying the impact of radioactive isotopes on the people, animals and plants of Semipalantinsk.
September 03, 2025, Kristine Hartvigsen
Project investigators from USC’s Baruch Marine Field Lab have been collaborating on a study into the impacts of warming coastal ocean waters on shrimp populations. They found that shrimp populations have been largely stable, and warmer water temperatures have led to longer seasons for shrimpers, often through January.
August 27, 2025, Megan Sexton
Zoie Horecny, who earned her undergraduate, master’s and doctorate in history from USC, is now the Digital George Washington Papers editor at the Washington Presidential Library at Mount Vernon.
August 22, 2025, Elizabeth Renedo and Andy Shain
USC's research funding again hit record highs this year, showing the resiliency and prowess of the university's students, faculty and staff.
August 20, 2025, Gregory Hardy
Rising temperatures are making heat stroke a serious risk in South Carolina and beyond, especially during outdoor activities such as youth sports, yardwork, recreation and even work. At USC’s Arnold School of Public Health, associate professor of athletic training Susan Yeargin debunks dangerous myths about treating this life-threatening condition.
August 13, 2025, Kristine Hartvigsen
Christopher Moore, research professor with the Institute for Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of South Carolina, recently led a team that analyzed sediment from the ocean floor in Baffin Bay, Greenland. Their efforts produced the first evidence — sourced directly from ocean cores — that a comet impact could have triggered an abrupt cooling of the atmosphere during a period known as the Younger Dryas 13,000 years ago.
July 31, 2025, Gregory Hardy
University of South Carolina researchers explore how artificial intelligence can be used for advancements in health care, education, manufacturing, energy, disaster management and transportation. They are also helping shape and inform the ethics and policies surrounding these emergent solutions.
July 30, 2025, Nicole Carrico
Integrating physical movement into a patient’s daily routine is an essential strategy to combat chronic illness and ensure a healthier future for South Carolinians. A new collaborative research study from USC Brain Health and the Arnold School of Public Health goes one step further by examining how consistent, physical exercise can also help combat cognitive decline and improve overall neurological health.
July 29, 2025, Chris Horn
A see-in-the-dark monitoring and navigational system intended to improve safety in underground mines is being developed by a University of South Carolina computer science and engineering team in collaboration with researchers in India.
July 24, 2025, Kristine Hartvigsen
As the birth of their baby approaches, women often turn to their mothers, sisters or close female friends for comfort and advice — a trusted and time-honored support system. Recent research conducted through the Women’s and Gender Studies Department at the University of South Carolina views this phenomenon through an anthropological lens, confirming the relevance of this bonded group and examining childbirth choices women typically face.
July 21, 2025, Faith Militello
Alexandria Carrico is an ethnomusicologist whose work explores the intersection of traditional Irish music and disability studies. She joined the University of South Carolina’s School of Music as an assistant professor in 2020.
July 09, 2025, Chris Horn
In about 18 months, the Carolina Institute for Battery Innovation at the University of South Carolina plans to open the first phase of its Battery Center, a research, manufacturing and teaching facility in partnership with several commercial battery manufacturers.
July 07, 2025, Page Ivey
Law professor Marcia Zug explores the history of marriage as a legal institution in her book "You’ll Do: A History of Marrying for Reasons Other than Love."
July 07, 2025, Chris Horn
A rechargeable battery system with lower component costs and higher energy density potential than commonly used lithium-ion batteries is the focus of an industry-sponsored study by a chemical engineering research team at the University of South Carolina.
June 25, 2025, David Sella-Villa
The Internet of Things includes any device that automatically sends and receives data via the internet. But the data from these devices can reveal a lot about the people who interact with them — and about other people near the devices, writes law professor David Sella-Villa for The Conversation.