In California’s Death Valley, where summer temperatures regularly soar above 120 degrees Fahrenheit, life seems almost impossible. Yet among the cracked earth and blinding sunlight, one native plant not only survives — it thrives. That plant, Tidestromia oblongifolia, has helped Michigan State University scientists uncover how life can flourish in extreme heat, revealing a potential …
Evolution is usually too slow to observe in a human lifetime. But in a Michigan State University lab, it plays out in days, years and now decades. Beginning in 1988, MSU Hannah Distinguished Professor Richard Lenski shepherded the rapidly growing model organism Escherichia coli, or E. coli, through 75,000 generations. Lenski and researchers in the Department of Microbiology, …
The Spark: A Seed in the Stacks Innovation often begins with a single question. For Mammoth Distilling, that question emerged during a routine research session in the Michigan State University (MSU) library: What happened to Michigan’s legendary rye varieties? While researching whiskey heritage in the MSU library, Ari Sussman, an MSU graduate and a Mammoth Distilling team member, stumbled upon a reference to Rosen …
The Breakthrough: Science Meets Urgency In the race to address climate change, the ability to measure and value nature with precision has become a critical need for companies, governments, and communities alike. Michigan State University (MSU) and IORA Nature Tech have forged a partnership that is redefining what’s possible in this space. Their breakthrough: a …
The world faces a growing threat from antibiotic-resistant bacteria, rapidly evolving viruses, and diseases for which traditional vaccines are ineffective or impractical. Existing vaccines often require multiple doses, cold storage, and complex manufacturing barriers that limit global access. At Michigan State University (MSU), Dr. Xuefei Huang, a professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering and …
The Family Law Navigation Model, a pilot project developed by a Michigan State University researcher, provides early intervention in family legal issues to keep them from becoming more complicated. Led by Brittany Rudd, an assistant professor in the Michigan State University Charles Stewart Mott Department of Public Health in the College of Human Medicine, the …
Dear Innovators, Collaborators, and Friends of MSU, Innovation is the driving force that shapes economies, elevates lives, and redefines the future. Thirteen years ago, the vision for the MSU Innovation Center was ambitious: to bring together brilliant minds, dedicated partners, and diverse communities to create an ecosystem where breakthrough ideas blossom into tangible solutions for …
Glaucoma is a painful eye disease that can cause blindness in both animals and humans. In Shiba Inu dogs, the condition is especially concerning because the breed is predisposed to narrow or closed iridocorneal angles from birth, making them more likely to develop the disease. While treatment can only slow glaucoma’s progression, researchers are working …
Michigan State University’s W.J. Beal Botanical Garden is officially internationally recognized. The garden recently earned accreditation from Botanic Gardens Conservation International, or BCGI, a UK-based membership organization representing botanic gardens in more than 100 countries around the world with the goal of linking the gardens together in a global network for plant conservation. With BGCI accreditation, Beal Botanical …
Researchers have revealed a previously unknown way plants shape their growth in response to light — a breakthrough that could better equip crops to handle environmental stress. In a first-of-its-kind finding, the team discovered how a compound that’s involved in plant metabolism can directly “reprogram” an unrelated light-sensing protein. This unexpected interaction, which was reported in the …
