University of Nebraska–Lincoln faculty member Carole Levin was interviewed for a Sept. 9 Forbes article on #AbolishTheMonarchy trending on social media following the death of Queen Elizabeth II. The article was among 30-plus national news stories featuring Husker faculty, staff, students, centers and programs in September.

Levin, Willa Cather Professor Emerita of history, said she doesn’t see the abolition of the monarchy happening soon but that doesn’t mean changes won’t be made.

“(King Charles III) has to show that he is economizing and understands the hardships the people are going through,” she said. “That could mean cutting back who is on the payroll.”

Levin, who specializes in European history and queenship and is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society, said the monarchy is important to the British people, providing a strong sense of identity and boosting tourism.

“The Royals play a huge role (in tourism), and it isn’t just London; it is Windsor, Scotland and throughout the country,” she said. “The British monarchy isn’t just historically important; it remains so today.”

Levin was also interviewed for three local stories after Elizabeth II’s death — on KETV, KFOR and KLKN.

More coverage:

The Wheat and Rice Center for Heat Resilience, of which the University of Nebraska–Lincoln is part, was highlighted in a Sept. 1 Guardian article. Arkansas State University and Kansas State University are also part of the collaboration. Harkamal Walia, agronomy and horticulture, was interviewed for the story.

PreLaw published a Sept. 1 article on the College of Law’s new Housing Justice Program. Ryan Sullivan, law, director of the Housing Justice Program and Clinic, was quoted in the story. KLKN and KOLN/KGIN ran similar stories.

The University of Nebraska–Lincoln and University of Illinois are teaming up to explore the development of a web-based application that would forecast localized soil moisture content and temperature conditions up to 10 days in advance. Successful Farming published a Sept. 3 article on the app.

Elliott Dennis, agricultural economics, was interviewed for a Sept. 6 RFD-TV story on consumers’ beef purchasing habits. He said inflation is the biggest challenge the beef industry faces and that price risk management measures should be considered. Consumers tend to make their decisions based on value, he said.

Dennis Ferraro, School of Natural Resources, was interviewed for a Sept. 6 Lincoln Journal Star article on a two-headed garter snake recently discovered in Clay Center. Ferraro, who took the snake for study in his lab, said he’s seen only a few in his 40 years as a herpetologist. Similar stories appeared in The Fence Post, International Business Times, Newsweek and more than 20 other media outlets.

In a new academic paper, Joe Louis, entomology, and colleagues explain their findings that a compound long identified with plant protection, jasmonic acid, has a more complex relationship to sorghum defense than anticipated. Seed Today ran an article on the research.

The Targeted Observation by Radars and UAS of Supercells (TORUS) project was featured in a Sept. 8 New York Times article. The 17-member, multi-institutional TORUS team crisscrossed the Great Plains this summer, using high-tech instruments to gather data on supercell thunderstorms, known to produce the most destructive tornadoes. Adam Houston, Earth and atmospheric sciences, team leader, was interviewed for the story.

Justin “Gus” Hurwitz, law, Menard Director of the Nebraska Governance and Technology Center, discussed major technology bills in Congress — including the American Data Privacy and Protection Act and the American Innovation and Choice Online Act — on the Sept. 12 episode of the Cyberlaw Podcast.

A new study co-authored by Ciera Kirkpatrick, advertising and public relations, shows that being confronted with images of “idealized motherhood” can increase a mother’s anxiety, envy and sense of comparison and put increased pressure on her mental health. Motherly published a Sept. 13 article on the research. KLKN aired a similar story Sept. 15.

With a five-year, $12.8 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy, Edgar Cahoon, biochemistry, will lead an interdisciplinary team representing eight institutions in exploring how camelina and pennycress, which contain the fatty acids necessary for producing biofuels and biomaterials, could help replace petroleum-based products and mitigate the effects of climate change. Stories on the research appeared in KLKN, the York News-Times, Biofuels Digest, The Fence Post, SeedQuest and Seed Today.

The Athletic published a Sept. 15 article on the Big Red Collaborative, the university’s first nonprofit name, image and likeness collective. Joe Petsick, management, a BRC adviser, was interviewed for the story.

A new study by Kenna Lehmann, a postdoctoral researcher in biological sciences, and colleagues has concluded that hyena whoops feature signatures unique to individuals. Earth.com published a Sept. 17 article on the research.

Dawn O. Braithwaite, Willa Cather Professor of Communications Studies Emerita, co-wrote a Sept. 19 blog post for Psychology Today with Muskingum University’s Shawn Starcher, featuring his research on how parents can talk about their mental health with their children. The article stressed that how parents address this topic could impact their child’s understanding for years to come and that certain strategies could be beneficial.

Danny Elfman Week, Oct. 5-8 at the Lied Center for Performing Arts, will include a performance by Third Coast Percussion, featuring the “Elfman Percussion Quartet”; a screening of “Beetlejuice”; the Nebraska premiere of Elfman’s “Violin Concerto”; and Elfman performing selections from his films with Tim Burton. Broadway World ran a Sept. 19 article on the special week.

Brad Lubben and Cory Walters, both agricultural economics, were interviewed for a Sept. 20 Dairy Herd Management article on nitrogen prices seeing a resurgence for fall. “Volatility is something producers are going to have to manage,” Lubben said.

The poem “The Widow’s Elegy” by Kwame Dawes was featured in The Atlantic on Sept. 21. Dawes is the George Holmes Distinguished Professor of English and Glenna Luschei Editor of Prairie Schooner at Nebraska. (This article requires a subscription.)

Jocelyn Bosley, research impact coordinator with the Office of Research and Economic Development, was featured in the Sept. 21 episode of the National Children’s Museum’s STEAM Daydream podcast. Bosley helped 12-year-old investigator Megha and the rest of the cast figure out how a magician uses science to zap people in “A Shocking Truth.”

John Fech, Nebraska Extension, wrote a Sept. 21 article for Golf Course Management offering tips on half-hiding unsightly objects on a golf course with trees, shrubs and ornamentals.

The Lied Center for Performing Arts and Johnny Carson Center for Emerging Media Arts have teamed up to create The Wilds, a mixed-reality performance experience playing Oct. 6-15 at the Johnny Carson Theater. Broadway World published a Sept. 21 article on the production. Jesse Fleming, emerging media arts, show co-creator, and Bill Stephan, the Lied’s executive director, were quoted in the story.

In 2019, the Nebraska Department of Agriculture began to offer two-hour workshops for community members to understand farm stress. The workshops are facilitated by Glennis McClure, associate extension educator with Nebraska Extension. The workshops were highlighted in a Sept. 22 KCUR story, which has been picked up by Nebraska Public Media and Kansas Public Radio.

Lisa Kort-Butler, professor and vice chair of sociology, was quoted in a Sept. 28 PolitiFact article on political campaigns using crime statistics in ads to try to sway voters. “Tough-on-crime messaging historically and tacitly represents something more than crime: that the candidate is on the side of ‘us’ and against ‘them,’” she said.

The university has announced three finalists for the College of Architecture dean position — Karl Daubmann, Ming-Han Li and Kevin Van Den Wymelenberg. Archinect ran a Sept. 28 article on the finalists.

A recent study co-authored by Kate Lyons, biological sciences, was featured in the fall 2022 issue of American Archaeology. The study shows that whether by the spear or the plow, humans have been homogenizing the mammal communities of North America for 10,000-plus years.

Nebraska is one of three universities taking lead roles in the multi-institutional Agricultural Genome to Phenome Initiative, which recently received a third round of funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. SeedQuest and Seed Today ran articles on the latest round of funding.

Jeffrey Stevens, psychology, director of the Canine Cognition and Human Interaction Lab, was quoted in a Sept. 30 Washington Post article on pet behaviors that humans might consider strange. Regarding “puppy dog eyes,” he said: “They want to be connected to us. Dogs evolved certain muscles around their eyes to manipulate humans. They look at us this way, and it changes our behavior.”

Faculty, administration, student and staff appearances in the national media are logged at http://newsroom.unl.edu/inthenews. If you have additions to the list, contact Sean Hagewood at shagewood2@unl.edu or 402-472-8514. If you have suggestions for national news stories, contact Leslie Reed at lreed5@unl.edu or 402-472-2059.