2013

Dec 23, 2013

A Family’s Chemical Bond With NC State

For more than 80 years, the Satterfields of Raleigh have helped lead the NC State sciences family.

Dec 23, 2013

The Future of Science

Statisticians and geneticists using the power of data to keep us healthy. Physicists, mathematicians and marine scientists gaining new knowledge about how water flows through the ground. Chemists and microbiologists developing new therapies for infectious diseases. Collaborations like these will help society meet today’s grand challenges — energy shortages, illness, hunger, climate change and environmental…

Dec 23, 2013

Packapalooza 2013

About 45,000 students, faculty and Raleigh residents flocked to Hillsborough Street on August 24 to take part in the Packapalooza festival, which featured 270 vendors and eight musical acts. The College of Sciences had a table at which students and faculty taught passersby how to make Silly Putty. An event highlight was Chancellor Randy Woodson,…

Dec 23, 2013

5 Questions with the Dean

The College of Sciences has launched. What did it take to get to that point? NC State started getting ready for this huge event in spring 2012, when the Chancellor announced the creation of the new College. everything needed changing or updating — academic programs, fund­ing, grants, websites, offices and labs, and lots of surprisingly complex…

Dec 23, 2013

The Building Boom Continues

The strikingly redesigned Talley Student Center opened to students in late October. The center has been reimagined as a campus hub where students learn to build community and collaborate; it also employs students to manage day-­to-­day operations. The first phase of the new union includes lounge and gaming areas, information desks, four restaurants and a…

Dec 23, 2013

Great Snakes

Dean Dan Solomon takes a close look at one of the Herpetology Club’s slithering friends during the College’s Wolfpack Welcome Week event on Aug. 20. The event drew nearly 600 students and 15 student clubs to Lee Field for science demonstrations, food and games. The event was held for all students, not just first­year students,…

Dec 23, 2013

The Shifting Science of Sand

Ever wonder why you can pour sand out of a bucket like a liquid, but a sandy seashore supports your body like a solid? Sand can hold up huge buildings and stop bullets — yet it flows effortlessly through an hourglass. “So is sand more liquid or solid? Well, the grains themselves are solid, but…

Dec 23, 2013

Here Comes the Rain

There were the late­ summer floods of 2013 that devastated parts of Colorado. Seventeen inches of rain fell in just one week. There were the record Midwestern rains of 2011 that saw the Mississippi River rise to levels not seen in more than 70 years. Then there were the recent hurricanes — Sandy and Irene…

Dec 23, 2013

Saving Land to Save Species

Plant species are vanishing at an alarming rate. Around the world, 9,829 different kinds of plants are endangered, a number that’s been growing since at least 1998, when the International Union for the Conservation of Nature started publishing its red list of threatened plant species. Reversing that trend means protecting more spaces where many of…

Dec 23, 2013

The Office Space of a Thinker

2013 was good to Dr. Mark Hoefer. The assistant professor of mathematics won a National Science Foundation CAREER Award, one of the nation’s top honors for young faculty, and co-authored a paper that appeared in the top-­flight journal Science. The paper details the development of a magnetic soliton — a nano­-sized, spinning droplet first theorized…