Featured Stories
Q&A: Tips to protect against ticks
May is Lyme Disease Awareness Month, and Pennsylvania consistently ranks as one of the top states in the nation for reported cases of Lyme disease and other tick-borne illnesses. However, there are ways to protect people, pets and livestock against ticks and the pathogens they carry, according to Erika Machtinger, associate professor of entomology in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences.
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Dipanjan Pan named Huck director for innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystems
Penn State’s Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences has named Dipanjan Pan, Dorothy Foehr Huck & J. Lloyd Huck Chair Professor in Nanomedicine and professor of materials science and engineering and of nuclear engineering, to serve as the Huck’s first director for innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystems.
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Plant genes influence bacterial evolution in legume-bacteria partnership
In a recently published study, Penn State researchers described the complex relationship between plant host genes and rhizobial genes, and how plant genes strongly influence which rhizobial strains plants chose from a diverse mixture.
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News
May 19, 2026
New Beescape updates include county-level plant recommendations for pollinators
Penn State’s Beescape tool is gaining a new feature that allows users to download county-specific lists of pollinator-attractive plants, offering a more localized approach to improving pollinator habitats across Pennsylvania. The feature, developed by a multidisciplinary team of researchers at Penn State’s Center for Pollinator Research in the College of Agricultural Sciences, allows users to generate lists of plants tailored to ecological conditions at the county level.
May 18, 2026
$3M NIH grant to support research on memory and exaggerated fear responses
Experiencing a traumatic event sometimes produces long-lasting biological changes that can lead to an exaggerated fear response to future stressful events, such as what occurs in individuals with post-traumatic stress disorder. To better understand the regulatory mechanisms in the brain that produce this biological memory and exaggerated fear response, a team of researchers from Penn State and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee has been awarded a grant from the U.S. National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Mental Health.
May 18, 2026
Worker bumble bees help determine which baby bee will become queen
Every bumble bee colony has a queen, but a new study led by researchers at Penn State suggests the process of determining which baby bee reigns supreme may be less monarchal than the royal title suggests. The study explored why some bumble bee larvae become workers and others become queens, despite coming from the same eggs.
News
May 19, 2026
New Beescape updates include county-level plant recommendations for pollinators
Penn State’s Beescape tool is gaining a new feature that allows users to download county-specific lists of pollinator-attractive plants, offering a more localized approach to improving pollinator habitats across Pennsylvania. The feature, developed by a multidisciplinary team of researchers at Penn State’s Center for Pollinator Research in the College of Agricultural Sciences, allows users to generate lists of plants tailored to ecological conditions at the county level.
May 18, 2026
$3M NIH grant to support research on memory and exaggerated fear responses
Experiencing a traumatic event sometimes produces long-lasting biological changes that can lead to an exaggerated fear response to future stressful events, such as what occurs in individuals with post-traumatic stress disorder. To better understand the regulatory mechanisms in the brain that produce this biological memory and exaggerated fear response, a team of researchers from Penn State and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee has been awarded a grant from the U.S. National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Mental Health.
May 18, 2026
Worker bumble bees help determine which baby bee will become queen
Every bumble bee colony has a queen, but a new study led by researchers at Penn State suggests the process of determining which baby bee reigns supreme may be less monarchal than the royal title suggests. The study explored why some bumble bee larvae become workers and others become queens, despite coming from the same eggs.
May 15, 2026
Stretchy implants could stick to arteries to treat high blood pressure
High blood pressure, formally known as hypertension, is a leading cause of heart disease in the United States, impacting nearly half of all adults. Approximately one in 10 of these patients experience drug-resistant hypertension that can be difficult to address, but according to researchers at Penn State, tiny devices that gently shock one of the body's most critical arteries could offer effective treatment.
Events
Friday May
22
The 10th Annual Life Sciences Symposium
From Protocols to Pipelines: Connecting Bioinformatics with Experimental Biology
Wednesday May
27
Quantum Machine Learning and Life Sciences Workshop
Center for Mathematical Biology
Wednesday May
27
Genome-Wide Comparative Analyses of Herpesvirus Populations
Genomics Core Facility
Events
Friday May
22
The 10th Annual Life Sciences Symposium
From Protocols to Pipelines: Connecting Bioinformatics with Experimental Biology
Wednesday May
27
Quantum Machine Learning and Life Sciences Workshop
Center for Mathematical Biology
Wednesday May
27
Genome-Wide Comparative Analyses of Herpesvirus Populations
Genomics Core Facility
Thursday May
28
Center for Root and Rhizosphere Biology Mini-Symposium
Center for Root and Rhizosphere Biology , Plant Institute