Research conducted by University of New Hampshire faculty, students and staff transforms lives and inspires innovation.
Previous editions of SPARK have featured research related to UNH’s land, sea and space-grant missions and focused on our interdisciplinary research on climate change. In this issue, our widest-ranging yet, we highlight stories that leave the labs behind and take you to the farms, libraries, galleries and even courtrooms where innovation thrives.
Yet even as we showcase how our research contributes to a brighter future — one where food is abundant and healthy, children are safe and people of all abilities contribute to the workforce — we also take a few glances back at UNH’s rich 150-year history. It’s an echo of the legacy we’re celebrating here on campus throughout this anniversary year.
In these pages, you’ll encounter some of the most influential, groundbreaking and colorful personalities from our past century and a half: a contributor to our understanding of the periodic table of elements, a Loch Ness monster hunter, the sociologist who first advised against spanking. You will also meet some current faculty, students and staff who make UNH an outstanding flagship research university, as well as our new provost, Nancy Targett, a distinguished marine biochemist who will help lead our university through the many challenges confronting higher education and the scientific community.
UNH got its start in 1866 as the New Hampshire College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts; like public land-grant institutions across the country, we are proud of our heritage and our founding mission to provide practical knowledge for the betterment of New Hampshire and its residents. We’re similarly proud of our scientific contributions that enable new economic ecosystems and improve the lives of people not only in our state but well beyond it. Our research and scholarship is borderless in its efforts to educate, reflect, create beauty and connect ideas across disciplines to solve complex puzzles and grand challenges.
Jan Nisbet
Senior Vice Provost for Research
University of New Hampshire
jan.nisbet@unh.edu
unh.edu/main/research
