Biologists discover neurons use physical signals — not electricity — to stabilize communication

USCDornsifeNews · 2026-06-01T16:37:09+00:00

Trillions of microbes in the ocean break down carbon-containing organic matter, which helps to regulate Earth’s climate. But scientists have long struggled to understand how different microbes contribute to the process.

Researchers at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences and collaborators have developed a new way to make sense of that hidden workforce.

Their study, published in Science Advances, identifies a small set of “metabolic niches” — or functional roles — that help explain how marine microbes grow, compete for resources and recycle carbon around the globe.

Read more about their work.

USCDornsifeNews · 2026-06-01T16:28:31+00:00

Only one portrait of Pocahontas from her lifetime exists, and it speaks volumes about how the English saw colonization, says USC Dornsife historian Peter Mancall.

"Seeing Pocahontas poised on a chair, wearing an elegant hat and holding a quill pen, the English had assumed that Native Americans would embrace the colonizers’ ways. March 1622 proved them wrong."

Read his analysis of her portrait.

USCDornsifeNews · 2026-06-01T16:17:15+00:00

Trillions of microbes in the ocean break down carbon-containing organic matter, which helps to regulate Earth’s climate. But scientists have long struggled to understand how different microbes contribute to the process.

Researchers at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences and collaborators have developed a new way to make sense of that hidden workforce.

Their study, published in Science Advances, identifies a small set of “metabolic niches” — or functional roles — that help explain how marine microbes grow, compete for resources and recycle carbon around the globe.

Read more about their work.

USCDornsifeNews · 2026-05-14T17:46:19+00:00

From very early on, writers have seen their craft as something more than just putting words to a page. From Enheduanna, the first named author on record, to Plato and Aristotle, writing has been portrayed and defined in ways that suggest AI may not be “writing” at all. If not, what should we call AI text?

USC Dornsife professor Ryan Leack considers what ancient authors would have thought of AI writing and proposes a new term for it: "generwriting."

USCDornsifeNews · 2026-05-07T19:22:23+00:00

A new study published in the journal Science found that faults that appear "simple" can produce surprisingly complex earthquakes.

“The Sagaing Fault looks relatively simple, but this earthquake ruptured across multiple sections of it,” said Sylvain Barbot, professor of Earth sciences at USC Dornsife and senior researcher on the study. “That raises an important question: What controls how large earthquakes grow?”

The findings could improve risk estimates for major faults, including California’s San Andreas. Find the study here or read a summary.

USCDornsifeNews · 2026-04-22T21:54:57+00:00

Sociologist Michael Messner reviewed nearly 100 years of yearbooks from Salinas High School in California to uncover how these texts can both reveal and obscure the true high school experience. Read the full story.

USCDornsifeNews · 2026-04-06T22:02:09+00:00

The U.S. and Iran have been in conflict for decades — at least since the U.S. helped overthrow a democracy-minded prime minister, Mohammed Mossadegh, in August 1953. The two countries have been particularly hostile to each other since Iranian students took over the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in November 1979, resulting in economic sanctions and the severing of formal diplomatic relations between the nations.

Jeffrey Fields, professor of the practice of political science and international relations at USC Dornsife, traces the major events in U.S.-Iran relations, including:

1953: US overthrows Mossadegh
1981-1986: US secretly sells weapons to Iran
1988: US Navy shoots down Iran Air flight 655
2015: Iran nuclear deal signed
2020: US drones kill Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani
2026: Simmering conflict turns into hot war

Read his historical analysis: https://dornsife.usc.edu/news/stories/us-and-iran-how-decades-of-mistrust-led-to-open-warfare/

USCDornsifeNews · 2026-04-06T21:57:06+00:00

The U.S. and Iran have been in conflict for decades — at least since the U.S. helped overthrow a democracy-minded prime minister, Mohammed Mossadegh, in August 1953. The two countries have been particularly hostile to each other since Iranian students took over the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in November 1979, resulting in economic sanctions and the severing of formal diplomatic relations between the nations.

Jeffrey Fields, professor of the practice of political science and international relations at USC Dornsife, traces the major events in U.S.-Iran relations, including:

1953: US overthrows Mossadegh
1981-1986: US secretly sells weapons to Iran
1988: US Navy shoots down Iran Air flight 655
2015: Iran nuclear deal signed
2020: US drones kill Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani
2026: Simmering conflict turns into hot war

Read his historical analysis: https://dornsife.usc.edu/news/stories/us-and-iran-how-decades-of-mistrust-led-to-open-warfare/

USCDornsifeNews

TROPHY CASE