Experts in the News

Bacteria have no neurons or memories in the human sense. Yet in a new study, researchers at Georgia Tech and Carnegie Mellon University — including School of Physics Associate Professor Shiladitya Banerjee and Postdoctoral Fellow Josiah Kratz — found that individual E. coli cells carried traces of past hardship into the future. When nutrients repeatedly rose and fell, the cells changed how quickly they grew, suggesting that even simple microbes can use experience to prepare for what may come next. 

A new Georgia Tech study found the chemical plume from the 2024 BioLab fire in Conyers, Ga., released bromine, not chlorine, as its dominant compound in the immediate aftermath. This finding stands in stark contrast to early public warnings about the fire, which prompted 17,000 evacuations, closed portions of I-20, and led to overnight shelter-in-place orders for weeks. Nearly two years later, the U.S. Chemical Safety Board is still investigating the fire and chemical release. 

The Georgia Tech paper containing the study was published in the March 2026 issue of Environmental Science & Technology Letters and identified 26 different chemical species in the air following the Sept. 29, 2024, fire at the BioLab facility in Conyers. The authors wrote that the chemically complex plume "exposed millions in metropolitan Atlanta to numerous toxic compounds" and represented the first detailed study of a pool chemical facility fire.

M.G. Finn, a Regents’ professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology in the U.S., was among the team that coined the term click chemistry. It ‘was meant to call back that feeling that one gets when you snap together the two halves of a luggage strap – that satisfying click’, Finn recalls. He now shares his thoughts on how the field has changed over the past 25 years and what he thinks the next half a decade may bring.

Mountains are home to some of the most spectacular biodiversity on Earth, but mountain species are thought to be especially vulnerable to climate change-driven extinctions. However, mountains can also be refugia, providing a plethora of habitats and climates that allow species to persist despite climate change. In this piece published in Nature Reviews Biodiversity, researchers, including Benjamin Freeman and Jenny McGuire of the School of Biological Sciences, examine how mountain species have responded to past and ongoing warming to assess their vulnerability and resilience to climate change.

During an 11Alive interview, Regents’ Professor M.G. Finn explains global health preparedness and what people should know about Ebola and hantavirus risks.

A new study led by researchers, including School of Physics graduate student Julia Esposito and Associate Professor Gongjie Li, used 1,500 virtual planetary systems to examine how planet-planet scattering may have influenced the formation of Jupiter-sized planets.

Karl Lang, assistant professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, and Claudia Avalos, assistant professor at New York University, are among the eight research teams to receive an award through the 2025 Scialog: Sustainable Metals, Minerals, and Materials initiative. 

Supported by The Kavli Foundation, the collaboration will focus on monazite, a group of rare earth-bearing minerals essential for modern technology, including clean energy technologies. Using solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance, Lang and Avalos will examine how the mineral’s atomic structure responds to radiation damage and annealing. By observing the material at the atomic scale, they aim to uncover the fundamental mechanisms at work, uncovering insights that could lead to processing innovations and improved applications.

As the weather heats up, you may find the same jog that was comfortable outdoors a few months ago now leaves you drenched in sweat.

Sweating a lot can mean you’re working hard, but sweat alone isn’t necessarily a great indicator of workout intensity, said Mindy Millard-Stafford, an exercise physiologist at the Georgia Institute of Technology. “You can’t really compare one person’s sweat rate to another and say, ‘This person worked harder,’” she said.

But understanding how much you sweat can help you stay hydrated and safe while working out in warmer conditions. We asked experts, including Millard-Stafford, what to watch out for.

There are hives of activity on the roof of the ever-cool Kendeda Building for Innovative Sustainable Design. It’s a facility of technological marvel, creativity, and reclamation. The perfect place for urban honeybees to weave their environmental magic.

In this GPB interview, Jennifer Leavey of the School of Biological Sciences discusses her work leading the Georgia Tech Urban Honeybee Project, which studies how urban habitats affect honeybee health and how technology can be used to study bees. 

As spring wears on, there is hope the worst of this season will soon pass, and that relief is coming. In Florida, the rainy season begins on May 15, followed soon after by the start of the Atlantic hurricane season. But there's not much wet weather on the horizon in the Sunshine State — or, anywhere across the Southeast.

"We just can't seem to shake this," said Zachary Handlos, director of atmospheric and oceanic sciences at Georgia Tech. Until the current patterns shift, he said, "the risk is going to remain high."

Zachary Handlos, Georgia Tech atmospheric science educator, explains how drought, heat, and shifting weather patterns are fueling more intense Southeast wildfires.

Less than a month after the historic Artemis II mission began, a Georgia Tech researcher is being recognized for his work in helping keep astronauts safe in space.

Thomas Orlando, a Regents’ professor at Georgia Tech, designed the spacesuits worn by astronauts on Artemis 2. He said his team focused on protecting the suits from micrometeorite impacts and especially lunar dust.

“We realized that a bigger problem, at least from NASA’s perspective, is dust," Orlando said. “We don’t really want dust to be on spacesuits. It can get into the seals. It could, you know, cause them to leak.”

Orlando works with graduate students to study the challenges astronauts may face in space and on the moon.