Brendan M. Anderson, visiting assistant professor of geosciences, published the article “Body-size evolution in gastropods across the Plio-Pleistocene extinction in the western Atlantic” as first author in PLOS ONE, demonstrating different body-size responses in ecologically distinct groups of mollusks across a severe regional extinction event as part of an NSF funded project studying this event. Dr. Anderson also recently co-authored “Modern reconstructions of mean and seasonal-scale climate from coastal marine gastropods (Turritellidae)” in Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, which evaluated how isotopic data from modern marine snail shells reflects local average and seasonal climate conditions.
Osamu Miyawaki, assistant professor of geosciences, co-authored an article in Nature Communications Earth and Environment. The article, titled “Fast-get-faster explains wavier upper-level jet stream under climate change”, shows that climate change is making the jet stream faster and wavier.
D. Catherine Walker, associate professor of psychology, recently presented a talk for Albany Medical Center's grand rounds called "Weight in Healthcare and How to Practice Weight-Inclusive Care.”
D. Catherine Walker also recently published two articles in collaboration with Union alumni. An article, entitled "Weight stigma's effects on misdiagnosis of eating disorder among laypeople and healthcare professionals" was published in the International Journal of Eating Disorders by Natalia Garcia Moreno ('24), D. Catherine Walker, Nathalie Gullo ('20), and Conor O'Dea. An article, entitled "Borderline Personality Symptoms, Body Modification, and Emotional Regulation" was recently published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health by Victoria Avon ('24), Nathalie Gullo ('20), and D. Catherine Walker.
Jennifer Fredricks, professor of psychology, was quoted in "Tips for Easing Students Back Into Routines After Winter Break," an article for Educational Week.
Allison Malatesta ('24) and Jeff Corbin, Florence B. Sherwood Professor of Life Sciences, published a paper in the journal Urban Forestry & Urban Gardening entitled, "Legacies of past housing discrimination in the present-day urban forest of a moderate-sized US city." This work documented unequal street tree coverage across neighborhoods in Schenectady. Specifically, areas that were "redlined" by the Federal government in the 1930's have, to this day, fewer and smaller trees than other areas of the city. On the bright side, recent work by ReTree Schenectady has been successful in targeting areas with low tree cover.
Dong Cheng, assistant professor of economics, has recently published a paper titled "Early 20th Century American Exceptionalism: Production, Trade and Diffusion of the Automobile" in the top-field journal in international economics, Journal of International Economics. It is a joint work with coauthors from Purdue, The Fed Reserve Board and Florida International University. The paper shows that both price frictions and income differences are important factors to account for the massive automobile adoption gap between the US and the rest of the world during the early 20th century when the automobile was first introduced to consumers and diffused from dominant US producers to other countries. The study finds small impacts for tariffs but sizable impacts for user costs (e.g., gasoline prices), which has strong implications for the current diffusion of electric vehicles across borders.
In December students and faculty from geosciences and environmental science presented their research at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) annual meeting in Washington DC. Keith Lawless ('25) and Bayley Sbardellati ('25) presented their thesis research on arsenic contamination of rice in Cambodia (Lawless) and arsenic/uranium contamination of groundwater in the US (Sbardellati). Geosciences faculty Osamu Miyawaki and Mason Stahl and post-doctoral scholar Elizabeth Olson presented research on the ability of AI weather models to predict heat waves (Miyawaki), groundwater seasonal dynamics across the US (Stahl), and paleoclimate records from the Peruvian Andes (Olson). The presented research was coauthored by geosciences faculty David Gillikin, Anouk Verheyden, Donald Rodbell, and geosciences and environmental science students and alumni Alexander Forsyth, Kirsten Litchfield, Laura Piccirillo, Jacob Abbott, Devin Snyder, Beck DeYoung, Tyler Mar.
Keith Lawless presenting his senior thesis research.
Bayley Sbardellati presenting his senior thesis research.
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