All multicellular organisms use “innate immune” receptors to detect and mobilize defensive responses to invading microbes. This includes proteins recognizing lipopolysaccharides (LPS) of Gram-negative bacteria. LPS-recognizing defense systems have been characterized in both humans and horseshoe crabs that have inhabited the Earth for 300+ million years.

The ability of horseshoe crab LPS-binding protein to detect minuscule amounts of LPS has prompted pharmaceutical development of the horseshoe...

Post-event follow-up: Watch a video of the April 19 event.

Join this Zoom presentation to hear from Matt Degner, superintendent of the Iowa City Community School District, as he discusses the state’s new “voucher” system and how it will affect the public schools, the new magnet school, how well students are bouncing back from COVID, and more. 

Matt Degner has been superintendent of the Iowa City school district since July 2020. Matt was principal of South East Junior High for the 2013-2014 and...

Post-event follow-up: Watch a video of the Apr. 12 event. 

Basic needs, including food, housing, mental health, sleep, hygiene, and financial literacy, are critical to students’ success. When students are basic needs insecure, they do not have access to these essentials, adversely affecting their well-being, college persistence, and college completion. On our campus, the Food Pantry has been instrumental to fighting food insecurity. In fact, more than 40% of UI students are food insecure. We...

Stanley Sage is a new program at the Stanley Museum of Art where local older adults will tell their art story and connect them to the Stanley collection.

The inaugural event will be Tuesday, April 4 at 10:30 a.m. with Linzee Kull McCray.

Linzee is curious about everything! She’s been an art teacher, bartender, author of two books on textiles, curator of museum exhibitions, fabric designer, and writer. People’s stories and the opportunity to share them gets her up in the morning and keeps her...

Post-event follow-up: Watch a video of the Apr. 3 event.

This presentation discusses the history of women’s athletics at the University of Iowa and will celebrate the career of Dr. Christine Grant as a leader in the advancement of equality in women’s sport at Iowa and nationally.

Paula Jantz joined the University of Iowa Athletics Department in 1980 and retired in 2017 as senior associate director of athletics. As senior women’s administrator, she was responsible for individual sport...

When you reach for your smartphone, is your hand reaching for it, or is the device now reaching for your hand, with its alerts, beeps, vibrations, and suddenly glowing screen? Does your hand want it, or does it want your hand?

In this talk, I want to think about Walt Whitman’s most intimate passages, with his claims of a sentient physical book (codex) in mind—a kind of proto-smartphone—and see how his words work to evoke, to enact, the physical interaction between a living reader and a book...

Post-event follow-up: Watch a video of the March 1 event.

It has long been known that we sleep most when we are young, but we still don’t fully understand why. Mark Blumberg is the F. Wendell Miller Professor and chair of the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of Iowa. He'll discuss some of the big questions about sleep in developing animals, including humans, and the ways researchers in his lab are trying to answer them.

Blumberg received a PhD from the...

Post-event follow-up: Watch a video of the Feb. 21 event.

In the past, many Iowans grew their own food. But today most land is farmed for corn and soybeans—animal feed and ethanol. It is estimated that up to 90% of the food we eat is imported from out of state while many people have little access to fresh fruit and vegetables.

Field to Family (F2F) is a local nonprofit organization with a mission to create a more resilient, local, and healthy community food system. Its leadership and programs...

Post-event follow-up: Watch a video of the Feb. 14 event.

Discover the history and take an inside look at the Hawkeye Marching Band with the band’s 13th director, Dr. Eric W. Bush, who has led the band since 2018. Founded in 1881, the 265-member Hawkeye Marching Band is the sound of Kinnick Stadium and the heartbeat of our university. We present pregame and halftime shows at all Iowa home football games, and at one or two away games each season. As the most visible ensemble in the School of...

Post-event follow-up: Watch a video of the Feb. 6 event. 

The University's 10-Year facilities master plan will create much-needed academic space at the core of campus and modernize the delivery of education and patient care to Iowans. Projects in the master plan will evolve and change. They will be paid for with a combination of donor funding, state funding, hospital revenue, and other sources. Attendees will learn about planned specific new buildings, updates to current facilities, and more...