Research

The soil in the ancient Cyprus field is the color of parchment paper and packed hard. On an early summer day with temperatures that creep toward 100 degrees, UNC Charlotte researchers Steven Falconer and Pat Fall carefully dig through centuries of archaeological sediments, inch by painstaking inch.

In the fragile pages of recipe books from the early modern period, UNC Charlotte researcher Jennifer Munroe and her students find traces of life and death. They decipher the words and absorb the daily struggles and joys of the women who created these chronicles of life between 1550 and 1800. These books are much more than repositories for recipes. Through the process of transcription, scholars worldwide are digitizing images of each page of old books, transcribing the vocabulary and script and publishing the content in online databases for the world to study and share.

UNC Charlotte Professor Emeritus Ted Arrington has won third place in Common Cause’s second annual Gerrymander Standard Writing Competition. Arrington’s paper presented criteria for determining when districting arrangements so distort the process of translating votes into seats in a legislature that the process or the redistricting plan rises to a constitutional violation.

One in every eight couples nationwide struggles to conceive or maintain a pregnancy. At least 4,000 people are seeking infertility treatment in Charlotte. As Charlotte emerges as a hub of knowledge and resources on the topic, two UNC Charlotte researchers are focused on improving how caregivers and patients communicate around this medical condition.

Hundreds of UNC Charlotte undergraduates have participated in the Charlotte Research Scholars initiative at UNC Charlotte in a 10-week summer program. Those chosen receive a scholarship to work closely with faculty mentors conducting research and participate in professional development sessions to better prepare them for graduate school and careers.

The drive to learn how the sun weathers rock has taken UNC Charlotte earth scientist Martha-Cary “Missy” Eppes to great lengths – to the arid deserts of the Southwest, the periglacial boulder fields of Pennsylvania and Virginia, and even to the surface of Mars. Mechanical weathering, the physical means by which rock is broken into smaller fragments, is one of the primary processes that defines Earth as we know it. Without it, there would be no erosion, no soil, no sediment from which resources like water and oil can be readily drawn, and no ready access to rock nutrients that are required by flora and in turn, fauna.

Jerusalem, rich in culture, history and historical conflict, is the spiritual capital of the Western world. Since 2007, a large, complex archaeological excavation has been conducted there under the direction of UNC Charlotte in an archaeological investigation perhaps unlike any other.

The phrase “putting your best face forward” takes on significance in the work of UNC Charlotte researcher Amy Canevello, an assistant professor of psychology who studies the dynamics of relationships

The groundbreaking research by UNC Charlotte psychologists Richard Tedeschi and Lawrence Calhoun continues to influence other researchers and to help people navigate contemporary challenges, such as terrorism, natural disasters, deaths and other crises. Tedeschi and Calhoun identified a concept they called Posttraumatic Growth.

In a significant contribution to research, teaching and engagement at UNC Charlotte, faculty in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences in 2015 published 30 scholarly and creative books that represented subjects as diverse as the College itself. Most of the books are intended primarily for classroom use or as resources for further research, while several of the books are intended for general audiences.