1. Robotic space rovers keep getting stuck. UW-Madison engineers have figured out why.

    When a multimillion-dollar extraterrestrial vehicle gets stuck in soft sand or gravel — as did the Mars rover Spirit in 2009 — Earth-based engineers take over like a virtual tow truck, issuing a series of commands that move its wheels or reverse its course in a delicate, time-consuming effort to free it and continue its exploratory mission. While Spirit remained […]

  2. Recycling lithium from old electric vehicle batteries could be done cheaply with new electrochemical process

    Photo: Chemistry Professor Kyoung-Shin Choi’s research lab has developed an electrochemical method to recycle lithium that’s catching the attention of electric vehicle makers. Photo: Jeff Miller / UW–Madison

    With ever more electric vehicles on the road, regulators and automakers are considering what can be done with the millions of batteries that power EVs after they’re spent. Even when their useful life is over, EV batteries contain valuable lithium that could theoretically be recycled and used in new batteries, but coming up with a […]

  3. UW–Madison virologists are at the forefront of efforts to keep tabs on avian influenza in dairy milk

    Photo: Holstein Dairy cattle are brought into the milking parlor at the UW Dairy Cattle Center on Sept. 1, 2020. Today, researchers at UW–Madison are working to answer important questions about the risks that avian influenza poses public health and food-safety. Photo: Bryce Richter

    When H5N1 avian influenza made an unprecedented jump into dairy cattle in early 2024, the development prompted concern on multiple fronts. How would herds with infections fare? Would dairy workers be at risk? Could the virus potentially infect consumers through milk and other dairy products? Led by a team of virologists at the Influenza Research […]

  4. UW-Madison professor emeritus who paved the way for at-home colon cancer testing and other screenings earns national recognition

    Photo of James Dahlberg

    Millions of Americans have completed the at-home Cologuard screening test for early signs of colon cancer. Among the first people to thank for the widely accessible, potentially life-saving tool is James Dahlberg. The University of Wisconsin–Madison professor emeritus of biomolecular chemistry combined basic science discoveries with an entrepreneurial vision that has brought several types of […]

  5. UW-Madison biochemists engineered a poplar tree that produces a high-demand industrial chemical

    Photo of Brian Fox

    Brian Fox, the Marvin J. Johnson Professor in Fermentation Biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, tinkers with the way living things use chemistry to turn their own blueprints, DNA, into the processes that make a healthy organism go. Over more than three decades, federal agencies including the Department of Energy, National Institutes of Health and […]

  6. UW-Madison researchers develop personalized cancer vaccines that slow tumor recurrence in mice

    Photo of Quanyin Hu

    Using a newly discovered byproduct of dying cancer cells, University of Wisconsin–Madison researchers are developing personalized vaccines that could help keep aggressive tumors from recurring. Led by Quanyin Hu, a professor in the UW–Madison School of Pharmacy, the research team has already found success slowing the recurrence of tumors in mouse models of triple negative breast […]

  7. UW–Madison researchers find hidden genetic clues upping cardiovascular disease risk

    Photo: UW–Madison researchers studied smooth muscle cells like these, derived from induced pluripotent stem cells, to show that long-mysterious variations in an area of our genome harden blood vessels, puting some people at higher risk for cardiovascular disease. Image courtesy Lo Sardo Lab/UW–Madison

    Researchers at the University of Wisconsin–Madison have uncovered new evidence in a decades-old genetic mystery, discovering how a group of genetic variations in a long-mysterious region of the human genome can put people at higher risk of cardiovascular disease. Thanks to past studies of the whole human genome that drew associations between particular variations and […]

  8. The growth of esports at UW–Madison

    Photo of students competing in Valorant, a multiplayer video game, in the Esport Lounge at the Bakke Recreation & Wellbeing Center, Photo by Xiaomeng Shen/UW–Madison

    While esports isn’t usually the first thing that comes to mind when you think of athletics, there are a lot of skills that you need to be a good esports athlete. “There is a big mental aspect of esports, but part of it is just mechanical skills, like how well you aim and stuff,” says […]

  9. App under development at UW-Madison could make it easier, more affordable to ‘age in place’

    University of Wisconsin–Madison researchers are using augmented reality to make the homes of older adults safer. Their innovation will not only streamline a sometimes clunky process but also support a more affordable and community-based approach that can reach more people. It’s an urgent issue: Older adults in Wisconsin have the greatest chance of death after a fall. […]

  10. UW-Madison startup Ubicept secures $1 million investment in TitletownTech Startup Draft

    Logos for TitletownTech and Ubicept

    Madison, WI – Ubicept, a company with its foundational technology developed at University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has been selected as one of two winners in the inaugural TitletownTech Startup Draft, securing a $1 million investment from the Green Bay–based venture capital firm. According to TitletownTech, “the TitletownTech Startup Draft, launched […]