September

Mike Alonzo (Environmental Science) spoke with the Washington City Paper about how DC forest patches help mitigate the effects of warm summer days and large storms. 

Valentina Aquila (Environmental Science) participated as a speaker in a panel organized by the New York Center for Foreign Policy Affairs (NYCFPA) 

Laura Auketayeva (alum, History PhD program) started a new position at the Sandra Bornstein Holocaust Education Center. She was chosen co-editor of the Association for Jewish Studies AJS Perspectives magazine and is working on a book with LaNitra Berger. 

Will Barnes (Physics) received a $14,576 grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Modeling Energy Release and Beam Heating in NuSTAR Hard X-Ray Coronal Transients.”  

Naomi Baron (emerita, Linguistics) was quoted in an Axios article about artificial intelligence. She was also featured in a Québec Science article on the benefits of reading. 

George Berg (World Languages and Cultures) spoke with NPR about the origins of the zarf, an ornately decorated Turkish coffee sleeve that dates back to the 17th century. 

Kim Blankenship (Sociology, CHRS) received supplemental funding of $872 (new total: $3,488) from the George Washington University for the project “Latino Scholars in HIV/AIDS Research Education (SHARE).” 

Frederick Bruhweiler (Physics) received supplemental funding of $34,000 and $7,000 (new total: $251,725) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Development of the MeDDEA Instrument for the PADRE CubeSat Mission to Observe the Sun In High-Energy X-rays.” 

Luis Cerezo (World Languages and Cultures) co-edited Technology-Mediated Language Teaching: From Social Justice to Artificial Intelligence (Multilingual Matters, 2025). 

Thomas Hauser (History) published a new book, Seizing the Electronic High Ground: Transforming Aerial Intelligence for the United States Army (US Government Publishing Office GPO, 2023). 

Philip Johnson (Physics) received supplemental funding of $111,785.75 (new total: $245,404.75) from NASA for the project “Terahertz Heterodyne Spectrometer for In-Site Resource Utilization.”

Kelly Jones (Economics) received a $34,138 grant from the Georgia Institute of Technology or the project “the Potential Health and Economic Impacts of the Dobbs Decision.” 

Caroline Kuo (Health Studies) received supplemental funding of $254,348 (new total: $1,507,021) from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for the project “Testing the Efficacy of Safe South Africa: An Intervention to Prevent HIV Risk and Interpersonal Violence Among Adolescent Boys.”  

Peter Kuznick (History) spoke with Republic World Prime Time, Izvestia Newspaper, Republic TV, acTVism Munich, Project Censored, RTVI, and CGTN about a variety of topics ranging from nuclear weapons history to US foreign policy.  

David Leftwich (alum, MFA Creative Writing) has been selected Winner of the 2025 Omnidawn 1st/2nd Poetry Book Contest, by poet Daniela Molnar. 

Gabriel Mathy (Economics) was quoted in a Washington Post article about currencies and travel. 

Michael Robinson (Mathematics and Statistics) received a $133,572 grant from the Office of Naval Research (ONR) for the project “Local Acoustic Topological Estimators for Statistical Signal Tools (LATESST).” He also published a paper, which was accepted into NeurIPS 2025, titled “token embeddings violate the manifold hypothesis.”  

Nathaniel Roth (Physics) received a $21,325 grant from the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) for the project “Composition of an Interstellar Object — Unique Insights into Protoplanetary Disk Midplane Chemistry.” He also received a $75,645 grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) for the project “Collaborative Research: Elucidating the Composition of our Solar System's Most Primitive Materials — Comprehensive Chemical Analysis of a Halley-Type Comet.” 

M.J. Rymsza-Pawlowska (History) spoke with CNN about the political history of centennial celebrations in the US. 

Richard C. Sha (Literature) will receive a 2026 Keats Shelley Association of America Distinguished Scholar Award in Toronto in January 2026. He was also awarded a Distinguished Scholar in the Humanities Fellowship by the Centre L’Innovation et Création at the University of Grenoble in France. He published “An Early but Revealing Emotion Model: James Papez and His Emotion Circuit” in Circulating Now.  

Stacey Snelling (Health Studies) was featured in WalletHub's recent article “Best Cities for Vegans & Vegetarians.” She also spoke with WUSA9 about how American University's agricultural grants provide support to local farmers. The grants were also featured in the September 2025 issue of Hill Rag Magazine. 

Andrew Taylor (Arts Management) appeared on the Work Shouldn’t Suck podcast in the episode “Nonprofit Governance in Uncertain Times.”  

Mike Treanor (Computer Science) spoke with DC News Now about how the AI boom may have facilitated this year’s rise in tech industry layoffs. 

Andressa Monteiro Venturini (Environmental Science) published the paper "Global hotspots of mycorrhizal fungal richness are poorly protected" in Nature. She also published the letter "Supporting scientists who study and work abroad" in Science. 

Aref Zahed (Computer Science) was able to expand the AI project known as “Iris” to understand, respond, and speak in any spoken language, enabling seamless human-AI communication.  

Perry Zurn (Philosophy and Religion) was named one of the inaugural Eames Institute Curious 100.  

Upcoming performances featuring AU Theatre/Musical Theatre Program faculty Aaron Posner and Meghan Raham appeared in the New York Times’ article “‘Purple Rain’ and 41 More Plays and Musicals to See in the U.S. This Fall.” Posner is directing The American Five at Ford’s Theatre, and Raham is set designer for The Great Privation at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company.  

The Washington Post covered The American Five, on stage at Ford’s Theatre and directed by Aaron Posner (Theatre) in “This actor has played MLK five times. The key is revelation, not imitation.” 

August

Valentina Aquila (Environmental Science) spoke on a panel organized by the New York Center for Foreign Policy Affairs (NYCFPA), “From Global Crisis to Local Action: Climate Justice and Resilience in DC.” 

Naomi S. Baron (emerita, World Languages and Cultures) spoke with the Sustainability Matters podcast about a chapter she wrote in “The De Gruyter Handbook of Robots in Society and Culture” (De Gruyter, 2024) . She also published an article in The Conversation about how AI is making reading books feel obsolete. She also spoke with El Pais about young adults’ use of AI chatbots. 

Joshua Bayer (Music) performed at the Kennedy Center’s Millenium Stage as part of DC Jazz Fest. 

Laura Beers (History) published an article about President Trump’s “Americanism at the Smithsonian” in The Conversation.  

Boncho Benev (Physics) received a $330,562 grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) for the project “Transformative studies of cometary volatiles in the era of modern near-infrared spectrographs.”  

Robert Blecker (Economics) spoke with The Washington Post about what consumers can expect following the latest round of US tariffs. 

Dale Broder (Biology) received a $557,547 grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) for the project “Collaborative research: The causes and consequences of adaptive radiation in animal communication, from individuals to communities.” 

Frederick Bruhweiler (Physics) received supplemental funding of $40,000 (new total: $417,924.82) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Continued Development of IR & Visible Spectrometer and Imaging Arrays for Ground-based & Space-borne Planetary Observations.” 

Anny Cardenas (Biology) received a $495,000 grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) for the project “BRC-BIO:The symbionts' symbionts: Dissecting the microbiome of the coral endosymbiont (Symbiodiniaceae).” 

Stephen Casey (Math/Stat) presented two papers at the 2025 International Conference on Sampling Theory and Applications (SampTA 2025) at the University of Vienna. The first Sampling Expansions for AFB Signals via Change Point Detection represents a new technique for signal sampling for Adaptive-Bandwidth (AFB) signals. The paper is joint research with Michael Baron (Math/Stat). The second Deinterleaving Periodic Processes introduces an algorithm (EQUIMEA) that analyzes multi-period data sets.. 

Leah Ding (Computer Science) received supplemental funding of $151,570 (new total: $300,000) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Enhancing Ice Cloud Retrieval Through Multitask Machine Learning.” She also received supplemental funding of $257,557 (new total; $386,335) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Integrating Explainable Machine Learning with Physics for Enhanced Wildfire Detection in Observation-Constrained Environments.” Additionally, she received an $867,245 grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) for the project “Advanced AI Framework to Improve Understanding and Prediction of Wildland Fire.” 

Molly Dondero (Sociology) received a $60,651 grant from the University of Pennsylvania for the project “Reproductive and Child Health Trajectories in Successive Novel Infectious Disease Crises.” 

Anton Fedyashin (History) spoke with CGTN about President Trump’s meetings with Russian President Vladmir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. 

Alex Godwin (Computer Science) received a $18,174 grant from the University of Washington for the project “Collaborative Research: HNDS-I: A global seafood trade network database for sustainable food systems, human health, and nutrition security.”  

Philip Johnson (Physics) received a $33,816 grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Improving Photochemical Models for Cold and Hot Planetary Atmospheres using New Ab Initio Reaction Rate Coefficients.” 

David Kearns (Psychology) received supplemental funding of $320,171 (new total: $1,280,955) from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for the project “Opioid and Psychostimulant Taking: Testing the Impact of Behavioral Economic Contexts.” 

Peter Kuznick (History) spoke with RTVI, WION News, Republic World, CGTN, Izvestia, CNN News 18, REN TV Russia, Colorado Springs Gazette, RT International, Newsmax, and Times Now about a variety of topics ranging from US foreign policy to nuclear weapons history.  

Mark Laubach (Neuroscience) received a $476,496 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for the project “Cortical actions of opioids on reward-guided decision making.” 

Liana Petruzzi (Health Studies) received supplemental funding of $122,796 (new total: $245,952) from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for the project “Improving Perinatal Mental Health Among Latinas through a Culturally Adapted, Multi Level Intervention.” 

Aaron Posner (Theatre) is directing the world premiere of The American Five at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C.  

Kara Reynolds (Economics) spoke with Barron’s about the economic impacts of Taylor Swift’s recently announced studio album The Life of a Showgirl. 

Thurka Sangaramoorthy (Anthropology) and Elise Ferrer (research coordinator, Anthropology) published “The recursive violence of reform: A century of failed interventions in migrant farmworker housing” in the Journal of Social Science and Medicine. 

Stacey Snelling (Health Studies) spoke with NBC 4 about how American University and the Franciscan Monastery Garden Guild are working to combat food insecurity in DC. She also spoke with Spectrum News about the importance of making EBT and SNAP transactions free for businesses. 
 
Andrew Taylor (Arts Management) spoke with Telemundo on President Trump’s recent statements regarding exhibits at the Smithsonian. 

Christopher Tudge (Biology) spoke with Slate about how the lifecycles of wild hermit crabs differ from those in captivity. 

Brenda Werth’s (World Languages and Cultures) co-edited book Bodies on the Front Lines: Performance, Gender, and Sexuality in Latin America and the Caribbean (University of Michigan Press, 2024) was selected as winner of the annual William M. LeoGrande Award for the best book or article in Latin American or Latino Studies published by a member of the American University community during the period 2023-2024. 

Aref Zahed (Computer Science) published Humanoid Dawn: How AI Robots Are Redefining Our World (2025). 

Alexander Zestos (Chemistry) received supplemental funding of $138,620 (new total: $290,110) from Spike Neuro, LLC, for the project “Dual-function Carbon Modified-Silicon Microelectrodes for Biomolecule Detection with Fast Scan Cyclic Voltammetry and Electrophysiology Recording and Stimulation.” 

July

Dan Arbell (Center for Israel Studies) spoke with CGTN and NewsNation about the proposed ceasefire in Gaza. 

Will Barnes (Physics) received a $21,864 grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Enhancing Consistency and Discoverability Across the Sunpy Ecosystem.” 

Lindsay Barr (Arts Management) was awarded the American Theatre & Drama Society’s Contingent Faculty Research/Travel Grant. Barr will use the award to conduct archival research at the New York Public Library’s Theatre on Film and Tape Archive for her monograph project Staging Stigma: Representations of Madness in American Musical Theatre. In addition, as the executive director of the Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas, she facilitated the organization’s bi-national conference. She was also awarded the Association for Theatre in Higher Education Research Grant for Contingent Faculty. 

Leah Ding (Computer Science) received a $128,778 grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Integrating Explainable Machine Learning with Physics for Enhanced Wildfire Detection in Observation-Constrained Environments.” 

Tara Giordano (Theatre/Musical Theatre) played the role of Pattie in Kimberly Akimbo at the Franklin Stage Company in Franklin, New York. 

Philip Johnson (Physics) received supplemental funding of $86,057 (new total: 244,894.17) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Revealing Primitive Material Preserved in Solar System Small Bodies.” 

Peter Kuznick (History) spoke with TVC, CGTN, Izvestia, WION News, acTVism Munich, Times Now News, and NHK Tokyo about a variety of topics ranging from current US foreign policy to nuclear weapons history.  

William Leap (Emeritus, Linguistics Anthropology) was quoted in a Washington Post article about President Trump being referred to as “daddy.”

Allan Lichtman (History) spoke with the Washington Post about President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the genesis of the “better off” question. 

Frankie Martin (PhD candidate, Anthropology) co-authored a working paper with SIS Professor Akbar Ahmed and Amineh Hoti at Cambridge University on Pope Francis' efforts to promote interreligious dialogue, peace, and human unity. 

Gabriel Mathy (Economics) spoke with the Washington Post about the push to reinstate gold as legal tender in the U.S.

Andressa Monteiro Venturini (Environmental Science) received the Master the Microbiome Grant from Zymo Research, and published “Elevating local perspectives for equity in ecological research” in the Journal of Trends in Ecology & Evolution;“Linking soil microbial genomic features to forest-to-pasture conversion in the Amazon” in the Journal of Microbiology Spectrum; and, “Evolutionary Trajectories of Shoots vs. Roots: Plant Volatile Metabolomes Are Richer but Less Structurally Diverse Belowground in the Tropical Tree Genus Protium” in the Journal of Plants.  

Aaron Posner (Theatre/Musical Theatre) directed King John at the Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington, DC.  

Meghan Raham (Theatre/Musical Theatre) was scenic designer for Dead Inside at the Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company in Washington, DC. 

Kara Reynolds (Economics) spoke with ABC News about consumer prices under the Trump Administration. 

Theresa Runstedtler (History, CGRC) spoke with the Detroit Free Press about the social and cultural impact of early 20th century boxer Jack Johnson, the first Black world heavyweight champion. 

Kristin Stowell (Theatre/Musical Theatre) co-wrote a new play Endometriosis: The Musical, which had its world premiere at Theatre in the Round in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Stowell also served as the play’s music director. 

Ricardo Torres (Economics) spoke to the New York Times about the recent resignation of Marta Elena Feitó Cabrera, the Cuban minister of labor. 

Alanna Warner-Smith (Anthropology) published "Archival Pasts and Futures in Paleopathology" in the International Journal of Paleopathology. 

Guy Ziv (Center for Israel Studies) spoke with CBC News about the relationship between President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

June

Dan Arbell (History, Center for Israeli Studies) spoke with CGTN and NewsNation about the Israel-Iran conflict. He also authored an article for The Conversation about a “two-state solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Trump Administration’s approach to it.

Tamarys Bahamonde (fellow, Center for Latin American and Latino Studies) spoke with Agence France-Presse about public perception of Cuba’s “dollarization,” a shift away from the Cuban peso and towards the US dollar. 

Will Barnes (Physics) received an $18,020 grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “The Euv Snapshot Imaging Spectrograph (Esis) II.” He also received a $30,000 grant from NASA for the project “The CHIANTI Atomic Database — Essential Infrastructure for Heliophysics.”

Laura Beers (History) wrote an article for The Conversation about what “Orwellian” means and why it resonates today.

Juliet Bellow’s (Art History) book Rodin’s Dancers: Art and Performance in Belle Époque Paris was published by Yale University Press.

Robert Blecker (professor emeritus, Economics) spoke with the Washington Post about the impact of President Trump’s tariffs on the U.S. and global economy.

Katie Brescia, Ainsley Gallagher, and Grace Stevens, CAS students in the new Masters in Public Health Innovation and Practice (MPHIP) program, and Christian Coleman in SPA won first place in the NAELA (National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys) Foundation's nationwide “Elevating Voices” collegiate competition to research and propose policy changes to Medicaid Estate Recovery. This competition was part of a grant to NAELA funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Nathan Harshman (Physics) received an $800,000 grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “District of Columbia Space Grant Consortium Budget Proposal for National Space Grant College and Fellowship Program: Opportunities in NASA STEM FY 2025-2028.”

Natanya Khashan (alumna, Arts Management) was quoted in a Washington Post article about tourism in museums.

Peter Kuznick (History) spoke with Times of India, WION News, CNN, Times Now, Ria Novosti, Republic World, RT International, WPFW, Phoenix TV, Inter Press Service, TVC, CGTN, NTV, The Nikkei Newspaper, Izvestia, ACLU, RSI Switzerland, TASS, and RTVI about a variety of topics ranging from nuclear weapons history to the ongoing conflicts in the world.

Nathaniel Roth (Physics) received supplemental funding of $42,760 (new total: $61,614) from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) for the project “Subsurface Thermal Photometry of NEAs: Characterizing the Regolith.”

May

Mike Alonzo (Environmental Science) spoke with Washington City Paper about the ability of urban forest patches to lower neighborhood temperatures. 

Dan Arbell (History, Center for Israeli Studies) spoke with CGTN about Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s recent statements regarding military escalation in Gaza. 

Will Barnes (Physics) received a $30,329 grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Python Development for the Chianti Database.” 

Kim Blankenship (Sociology) received a $17,200 grant from Drexel University for the project “Measures of structural stigmatization and discrimination for HIV research with Latine sexual and gender minorities.” 

Robert A. Blecker (Economics) was quoted in a Washington Post article about consumer spending trends amidst tariff uncertainty.  

Richard Breitman (History, Emeritus) spoke with PolitiFact about the definition of the term “genocide.” 

Michael Brenner (History, Center for Israel Studies) published an article in Forward contemplating how his Holocaust survivor parents, who revered the United States as a symbol of democracy and safety, would be disheartened by the nation's current political climate. He also contributed to an article in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung about the 80-year anniversary of liberation.  

Frederick Bruhweiler (Physics) received supplemental funding of $10,055.65 (new total: $377,924.82) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Continued Development of IR & Visible Spectrometer and Imaging Arrays for Ground-based & Space-borne Planetary Observations.” He also received supplemental funding of $22,408 (new total: $44,816) from the Space Telescope Science Institute for the project “High Resolution Spectroscopic Mapping of Mass Loss in Luminous Blue Variables.” 

Ernesto Castañeda (Sociology, Center for Latin American and Latino Studies) spoke with Spectrum News about the Trump Administration’s approach to the Temporary Protected Status and how it will impact international refugees. 

Thomas Costello (Psychology) spoke with CBS News about his “DebunkBot” study and the utility of artificial intelligence (AI). 

Kyle Dargan (Literature) was one of five poets asked by the Washington Post to share original poems paired with nature images from five photographers in celebration of National Poetry Month.  

Ignacio González, Juan Montecino, and Vasudeva Ramaswamy (Economics) published a new report that quantifies the risk of President Trump’s cuts to federal aid for scientific research for the Institute for Macroeconomic and Policy Analysis (IPMA), which was featured in The New York Times.  

Aaron Grocholski (Physics) received an $8,400 grant from the American Physical Society for the project “APS-Simons Travel and Professional Development Award.” 

Silvina Guidoni (Physics) received supplemental funding of $31,491 (new total: $62,190) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Comprehensive Solar Eruption Models: Understanding Flare Arcades from the Global to Kinetic Scales.” 

Bernhard Gunter (Economics) gave a keynote address at the US Department of State’s International Visitor Leadership Program, covering issues related to globalization and trade strategies.  

Sarah Iverson (Sociology) received a $35,000 grant from the Russell Sage Foundation for the project “Investigating Race Concepts in the College Essay Production Process after the 2023 Supreme Court Ban on Race-Conscious Admissions.” 

David Keplinger (Literature) received the 2025 Joseph Brodsky Rome Prize in Literature and will spend five months in Rome.  

Chelsea Koch (Environmental Science) received a $24,299 grant from the World Wildlife Organization for the project “SEA-ICEotopes: Revealing Pacific walrus ecology in a changing Arctic.” 

Stephen MacAvoy (Environmental Science) received a $13,142 grant from the Cave Conservancy of Virginia for the project “Niche differentiation among cave versus spring amphipods and determining the trophic ecology of two Virginia cave/spring systems.” 

JP Merz (Performing Arts, Music) received the արդ եւս|in view grant from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation for his project Khazic Songs, a composition and website that addresses themes of displacement, resilience, and cultural continuity through an Armenian music notation system called khaz. 

Pamela Nadell (History, Jewish Studies) Spoke with Forward about how cuts in research funding under the Trump administration have impacted the rise of antisemitism. 

Dolen Perkins-Valdez (Literature) and her novel Happy Land (Berkley, 2025) were featured in a Washington Post article. 

Sybil Roberts (African American and African Diaspora Studies) was interviewed by DC Theater Arts about her play Ethiopia, which premiered Friday, May 16. She discussed the play’s relationship with history, and the women that inspired the piece. 

Stacey Snelling (Health Studies) received a $161,120 grant from the DC Department of Health for the project “Marketing Landscape Assessment Washington, DC.” She also received a $300,000 grant from CareFirst for the project “Resilient Food System to address Diabetes.” 

Tracy Weitz (Sociology) co-authored an article in The Conversation US about how abortion laws focusing on fetal viability miss the mark on women’s experiences.  

Alexander Zestos (Chemistry) joins a cross-disciplinary team tracking bee neurobiology funded by the Research Corporation for Science Advancement. The project, “Bee-ing Aware,” will monitor larval nutrition, chemical exposure, and neuro effects in honeybees.  

Guy Ziv (Center for Israel Studies) was interviewed on the “Background Briefing with Ian Masters” podcast and discussed how Netanyahu’s new plan to recapture Gaza is a threat to the safety of the remaining Israeli hostages. 

April

Valentina Aquila (Environmental Science) received supplemental funding of $96,585 (new total: $388,755) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Estimating the impacts of volcanic aerosol and pyroCb smoke on model forecasts and data assimilation using the GEOS Analysis Increments.”

Laura Beers (History) and her class on Winston Churchill were featured on C-SPAN. Additionally, her book Orwell’s Ghosts: Wisdom and Warnings for the Twenty-First Century (WW Norton 2025), has been chosen as the recipient of the Shorenstein Center's 2025 Goldsmith Book Prize and as a New Yorker Best Book of 2024. She was also awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship intended to support her work on her next book project, a comparative history of the politics surrounding IVF and surrogacy.

Michael Brenner (History, Center for Israel Studies) wrote an opinion article for Inside Higher Ed about the Trump administration’s use of antisemitism as a wedge issue in a broader assault on higher education and academic freedom.  

Rachelle Burks (Chemistry) was awarded the American University Provost Associate Professor title and inducted into this year’s cohort of new Provost Associate Professors.

Thomas Costello (Psychology) was interviewed on CNN’s Terms of Service with Clare Duffy about his study on AI chatbots.  

Zoltan Gluck (Anthropology) has been awarded a prestigious ACLS Fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS). The fellowship will support a year of leave for the completion of his book, The Long War on Terror: Decolonization and Recolonization in Kenya.

Philip Johnson (Physics) received supplemental funding of $150,047.64 (new total: $1,599,868) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Remote Sensing of Planetary Atmospheres in the Solar System and Beyond.” He also received supplemental funding of $32,439 (new total: $369,990.68) from NASA for the project “Spectroscopic Investigations of Processed Planetary and Astrophysical Ices with the Sublimation Laboratory Ice Millimeter/submillimeter Experiment.”

Pankaj Kumar (Physics) received a $36,280 grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Understanding Particle Acceleration in Coronal Jets.”

Peter Kuznick (History) spoke with HJ News, Goshen News, Viory Video News Agency, Kyodo News, TASS, WION News, Izvestia, Iran Daily, Asahi Newspaper, Russia24, Deep Focus with John Kiriakou, CGTN, and NTV about a variety of topics ranging from US foreign policy to the ongoing conflicts in the world. 

Nabina Liebow (Philosophy and Religion) was awarded the 2025 American University Faculty Award for Inclusive Excellence.  

MFA Literature alums published an impressive array of new work:

• Patricia Coral’s ('22) thesis collection Women Surrounded by Water was longlisted for the 2024 National Book Critics Circle Award.
• Moa Short’s haunting and powerful story “Deficiency” is out now in The Rumpus.  
• Jamie Hennick ('24) reviewed Women Surrounded by Water in The Colorado Review.
• Nico Penaranda ('22) published four poems in The Mid-Atlantic Review.  
• Caroline Hockenbury ('23) will be featured in Attached to the Living World, an upcoming ecopoetry anthology (Trinity University Press), alongside major voices like Ada Limón and Natasha Trethewey.
• Bailey Blumenstock ('20) published her debut poetry chapbook Leaving the Religion of Self-Harm with Cathexis Northwest Press.

Kara Reynolds (Economics) was featured in a Huffington Post article about the economics of Trump’s trade war. She also spoke with Marketplace about how automation may affect US manufacturing under the Trump Administration’s new tariffs, and with ABC News about the impact of the Trump Administration’s new tariffs in general.  

Nathaniel Roth (Physics) received supplemental funding of $86,948 (new total: $163,524) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Comet Chemistry Beyond the H2O Sublimation Zone: Interferometric Imaging and Spectroscopy of Distant Comets.”

Rebecca Rudolph (undergraduate student, Environmental Science) participated at the Closing Plenary of the Second Nature – 2025 Higher Education Climate Leadership Summit in Washington, DC.

Molly Springfield (Studio Art) has been named a 2025 Guggenheim Fellow in the Fine Arts and will pursue her ongoing project, Holograph Draft, inspired by Virginia Woolf's life and work. 

Lauren Strauss (History) spoke with Axios about the fear of Jewish people as President Trump invokes antisemitism to justify crackdowns.  

Hasset Tibebe (undergraduate student, Chemistry) was awarded the 2025 Scott A. Bass Outstanding Scholarship at the Undergraduate Level Award.

March

Dan Arbell (History, Center for Israel Studies) spoke with CGTN about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s incentives for resuming hostilities in Gaza.

Barbara Balestra (Environmental Science) received a $15,000 grant from the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) for the project “Spatial distribution and chemical characterization of microplastic and microbeads in river sediments in the DC area.”

Christine Van Berten (World Languages and Cultures) received a $2,000 grant from the Albertine Foundation for the project “Francophone Job Fair.”

Boncho Bonev (Physics) received supplemental funding of $58,886 (new total: $116,710) from Johns Hopkins University for the project “Disentangling natal and post-formation processing in comets through high-resolution infrared observations.”

Frederick Bruhweiler (Physics) received supplemental funding of $50,000 (new total: $367,869) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Continued Development of IR & Visible Spectrometer and Imaging Arrays for Ground-based & Space-borne Planetary Observations.”

Raychelle Burks (Chemistry) published "Forensic Analytical Chemistry for Minimizing Injustice: Advances and Challenges" in the Annual Review of Analytical Chemistry.

Orisanmi Burton (Anthropology) published "The Hidden War Fueling New York’s Prison Guard Strike" on Inquest.org.

Ernesto Castañeda (Sociology, Center for Latin American and Latino Studies) spoke with The National News Desk about how the Trump Administration’s forthcoming travel ban may affect international athletes. He also co-wrote a piece with Anthony Fontes and Melissa Vásquez for La Opinion about the differences between transnational criminal organizations (TCOs) and terrorist organizations.

Luis Cerezo Ceballos (World Languages and Cultures) published Technology-Mediated Language Teaching (Channel View Publications, 2025).

Bernhard Gunter (Economics) published "Income Inequality After Episodes of Globalization and Marginalization: Global Evidence from 1980 to 2018" in the International Journal of Interdisciplinary Global Studies. 

Taisuke Izumi (Biology) has published "Targeting Latent HIV Reservoirs: Effectiveness of Combination Therapy with HDAC and PARP Inhibitors," which appeared on the cover of issue 3, volume 17 of Viruses. His students Hasset Tibebe, Dacia Marquez, and Grace Hillmer are co-authors.

Philip Johnson (Physics) received supplemental funding of $42,902 (new total: $337,551) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Spectroscopic Investigations of Processed Planetary and Astrophysical Ices with the Sublimation Laboratory Ice Millimeter/submillimeter Experiment.”

Chelsea Koch (Environmental Science) published a study in Frontiers in Marine Science on the use of DNA metabarcoding to investigate Arctic clam diets and harmful algal blooms. She also received a $24,599 grant from the World Wildlife Fund to conduct biogeochemical analysis on Pacific walrus tissues harvest by subsistence hunters on St. Lawrence Island in the Bering Strait as indicators of ecosystem changes underway.

Peter Kuznick (History) spoke with CGTN, RTVI, WION News, Channel One Russia, Izvestia, PBS, NTV, TVC, Kyodo News, Republic TV, Times Now, TASS, Press TV, and Okinawa TV about a variety of topics ranging from US foreign policy to the ongoing conflicts in the world. 

Dennis Lucarelli (Physics) received supplemental funding of $7,000 (new total: $103,291) from Dartmouth College for the project “Quantum Characterization and Model Reduction for Fault-Tolerant Qubit Networks.”

Steven MacAvoy (Environmental Science) received a $15,000 grant from the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) for the project “Investigation into the concentration and distribution of bisphenol A (BPA) in Anacostia and Potomac River sediments.”

Naomi Skiles (undergraduate student in Anthropology and Creative Writing) wrote for Smithsonian Magazine about the Native American Women Warriors (NAWW).

Nancy Snider (Performing Arts) received a $10,000 grant from the Koster Foundation for the project “Koster Foundation Summer Study Grant.”

Ricardo Torres (Economics) spoke with Reuters about how reduced freight traffic may indicate an economic crisis in Cuba.

Jonathan Tubman (Psychology) published "Parent–Child Relationship Characteristics and Psychiatric Symptoms as Predictors of Passive Suicidal Ideation among Adolescents in Outpatient Substance Use Treatment" in the Child and Adolsescent Social Work Journal. 

Brian T. Yates (Psychology) and Lilian Baeza-Mendoza (World Languages and Cultures) were selected as the winners of AU’s Green Teacher of the Year award by a committee of the Center for Teaching, Research, and Learning and the AU Office of Sustainability. 

February

Nicole Angotti (Sociology) received an $8,458 grant from the George Washington University for the project “District of Columbia Center for AIDS Research (DC CFAR).”

Barbara Balestra (Environmental Science) published Benthic foraminiferal Mg/Ca response across the Aptian-Albian Boundary Interval at DSDP Site 511 (Falkland Plateau) in Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology.

Madeleine Bartin, Evelyn Bristol, and Ally Friedman (Physics students) won first place for their presentation at the 10th annual Optical Sciences Winter School & Workshop at the University of Arizona.

Laura Beers’ (History) Orwell’s Ghosts: Wisdom and Warnings for the Twenty-First Century (W. W. Norton & Company) is a finalist in the LA Times 2024 Book Prize Awards.

Barbara Bernstein (Health Studies) published a guidebook on Latin dancing, Salsa Dancing & Rueda de Casino Guidebook for Beginner to Advanced Dancers. 

Kim Blankenship (Sociology) received supplemental funding of $6,864 (new total: $191,624) from Yale University for the project “The effects of rental assistance on type 2 diabetes self-management and control.”

E Dale Broder (Biology) published "Neural and behavioral evolution in an eavesdropper with a rapidly evolving host" in Current Biology. Also summarized in Atmos.

Orisanmi Burton (Anthropology) appeared on Democracy Now to speak about the New York prison guard strike.

Ernesto Castañeda (Sociology) was featured in WalletHub’s article about the Best Credit Cards without SSN Requirements.

Frederick Bruhweiler (Physics) received supplemental funding of $30,725 (new total: $210,725) for the project “Development of the MeDDEA Instrument for the PADRE CubeSat Mission to Observe the Sun in High-Energy X-rays.” 

Douglas Fox (Chemistry) received a $10,611 grant from Vireo Advisors, LLC, for the project “Migration through Cellulose Crystal - Polymer Laminate Film.”

Kim Blankenship (Sociology), Robert Blecker (Economics), David Culver (Environmental Science), Gregg Harry (Physics), and Nathalie Japkowicz (Computer Science) were listed on the 2024 Stanford-Elsevier Top 2% Scientists List.

Peter Kuznick (History) spoke with TVC, Times Now India, WION News, Izvestia, CGTN, RT International, TASS, RTVI, CNN News18, Zvezda, Kyodo News, and NTV about a variety of topics ranging from nuclear weaposn history to the ongoing conflicts in the world. 

Liana Petruzzi (Health Studies) published Addressing Health-Related Social Needs During COVID-19 Through a Hospital-Based, Community Health Worker Program: A Case Study and The Role of Perceived Neighborhood Factors and the Built Environment on Depression and Stress Among Latinas on US-Mexico Border in the Journal of Community Psychology, and Effective Integration and Collaboration of Community Health Workers and Social Workers: Essential Strategies for Health and Social Service Systems in the Coalition for CHW-SW Collaboration.

Michael Robinson (Mathematics and Statistics) received supplemental funding of $22,000 (new total: $54,000) from Galois for the project “Emergent Risks.”

Eli Rockenbeck (student, Physics) won the “Piers J. Sellers Award for Interdisciplinary Science” from the organizers of a poster presentation event at NASA Goddard.

Nathaniel Roth (Physics) received supplemental funding of $14,514 from the Space Telescope Science Institute (TSCI) for the project “An Empirical Calibration of the NIRSpec IFU Point Spread Function to Enable High Contrast.”

Thurka Sangaramoorthy (Anthropology) spoke with the LA Times about the potential impact of increased immigration enforcement on workplace safety.

Richard C. Sha (Literature) has been asked to be one of three judges for the Marilyn Gaull Prize for the best book in Romanticism. He evaluated Franklin Grants for the American Philosophical Society last year.

Stacey Snelling (Health Studies) received a $45,000 grant from the DC Central Kitchen for the project “Healthy Corners Program Evaluation.”

Mike Treanor (Computer Science) and Nathan Harshman (Physics) were interviewed for Krzysztof Pietroszek’s (Film and Media Arts, SOC) Unorthodox Views podcast. 

January

Vladimir Airapetian (Physics) received a $53,737 grant from the University of Alabama at Huntsville for the project “Signatures of Coronal Mass Ejections and Energetic Particles and their Impact on Early Phases of Evolution of Low Mass Stars.”

Dan Arbell (History, Meltzer Schwartzberg Center for Israel Studies) appeared on a panel on CGTN’s The Heat to discuss the Israel-Hamas ceasefire.

Ernesto Castañeda (Sociology, Center for Latin American and Latino Studies) spoke with Newsweek about President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed deportation plan. He also co-authored an article for The Conversation about the U.S. immigration process.

Thomas Fauchez (Physics) received supplemental funding of $112,865 (new total: $225,278) from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the project “Detectability of water in the atmosphere of terrestrial habitable zone exoplanets due to exo-volcanism: a false positive for habitability.”

Jessica Gephart (Environmental Science) discussed the environmental impact of seafood with BBC News.

Peter Kuznick (History) spoke with NTV, WION News, WBAI, The Chugoku Shimbun, Eurasia Review, Tucker Carlson Show, CGTN, Zvezda, CNN News 18, The Times Now (India), CGTN’s The Point, WUSA9, The Asahi Shimbun, RTVI, REN TV (Russia), Channel One Russia, CGTN World Insight, RT International, acTVism Munich, RiaNovosti, NDTV, Al-Sharq News, Republic World, and TVC about a variety of topics including the passing of President Jimmy Carter, the U.S. election, nuclear weapons history, and the ongoing conflicts in the world.

Allan Lichtman (History) spoke with ABC News about President Joe Biden’s peaceful handoff of power and the historical significance of this approach.

Pamela Nadell (History, Jewish Studies Program) spoke with The Forward about programs to fight antisemitism.

Nathaniel Roth (Physics) received an $18,430 grant from the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) for the project “Testing Natal Heritage Among Comet Dynamical Families: A JWST Study of Parent Volatiles in Halley-Type Comets.”

Thurka Sangaramoorthy (Anthropology) authored an article for Newsweek about Sudan’s climate issues and the failure of the country’s health systems. In an article for LSE United States Centre, Sangaramoorthy wrote about why Trump's withdrawal from WHO threatens global health security and equity.

Alanna Warner-Smith (Anthropology) published "Global Mobilities, Intimate Movements: Embodying Nineteenth-Century Domestic Labor" in The Routledge Handbook of Feminist Anthropology, edited by Pamela Geller. The chapter examines domestic work, performed by women born in Ireland, as part of the urban labor regime in nineteenth-century New York City.

Alexander Zestos (Chemistry) received a grant and administrative supplement of $55,000 to participate in the National Institutes of Health (NIH) SEED I-Corps program to perform customer discovery for novel neural technology.