The Other Side of the Podium

Conducting classes in the UNC Department of Music offer students the opportunity to learn what it’s like behind the podium — gaining valuable insight into conducting methods while improving their skills as musicians.
an elderly man and two young girls hold colorful signs while walking down a street in Mexico

The P’urhépecha Podcasts

Through community radio and podcasts, Maria Gutierrez strives to preserve her ancestral language and identity — that of an indigenous people from Michoacán, Mexico, called the P’urhépecha.
Kay Youngstrom

Kay Youngstrom

Kay Youngstrom is a sophomore and Chancellor’s Science Scholar double-majoring in chemistry and statistics and analytics within the UNC College of Arts & Sciences. Through an internship with Med Aditus, she uses data analysis to address which of the company’s drugs are most accessible and least susceptible to counterfeits in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Jessica Wolfe sits at a table in Wilson Library

Curiosity Ignited

Jessica Wolfe has been fascinated by medieval and Renaissance culture for more than 30 years. She is drawn to obscure writers and scholars who have made critical and long-lasting contributions to the literary world, but are often overlooked. Their histories and works drive her creativity and curiosity — and have inspired her to write her first-ever biography.
Tenrikyo Church Headquarters in Tenri, Nara, Japan

Spiritual Evolution

Through study of a “new” Japanese religion called Tenrikyo and centuries of Japanese history, PhD student Timothy Smith strives to understand how cultural shifts morph belief systems across generations.

Sing Wai Wong

Sing Wai Wong is a third-year periodontology resident in the UNC Adams School of Dentistry. He studies how autophagy — the process by which the body cleans out damaged cells to regenerate new, healthy cells — affects bone loss in the mouth.
Suzanne Zaccardo holds an American flag in front of her computer to lead her online class in the Pledge of Allegiance

Learning As We Go

Teachers are stressed. Students are struggling. Parents are shouldering more responsibilities than ever before. While the controversy surrounding when and how schools should reopen has led to policy debates and changes in family dynamics, UNC epidemiologists and education researchers find hope in the lessons from this year.

Tracking SARS-CoV-2 Variants

SARS-CoV-2 variants may seem like a scary new chapter in the pandemic, but coronavirus experts expected their arrival. Scientists in the UNC School of Medicine and Gillings School of Global Public Health are tracking the variants to learn how they differ and affect the world’s chance of ending this pandemic.
Irene Manning

Irene Manning

Irene Manning is a PhD candidate in the Department of Chemistry within the UNC College of Arts & Sciences. She develops functional materials that capture PFAS — chemicals created in the production of goods like Teflon, stain-resistant fabrics, and food packaging — and remove them from water.
a graphic of a $100 where Ben Franklin has a thermometer in his mouth and an ice pack on his head

Taking the Economy’s Temperature

Millions of people are unemployed, many industries are struggling, and some businesses will never open again. Will we recover? UNC economists and financial analysts remain cautiously optimistic.
Rachel Woodul

A Public Health Prognosis

Graduate student Rachel Woodul spent two years researching what might happen to hospital capacity when the next pandemic strikes. When it arrived, she compared what her model — and others’ — got wrong to improve how we react to public health crises in the future.

In It for the Long Haul

For some COVID-19 patients, the initial infection is just the start of the battle. Post-COVID syndrome occurs when a person's symptoms continue long after their infection ends. A new clinic at UNC hopes to not only help these patients, but also provide researchers with valuable data about this strange syndrome.