Radical Collaboration

Cornell faculty are reaching across disciplines to tackle society’s most complex challenges and to make breakthrough discoveries. These radical collaborations—collisions of thoughts and perspectives from vastly different fields—lead to unexpected and unconventional solutions and deepen our thinking.


Tuskegee University joins Center for Research on Programmable Plant Systems (CROPPS)

Tuskegee University has become the latest partner of the Center for Research on Programmable Plant Systems (CROPPS), a Science and Technology Center funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation aimed at developing tools to communicate with plants and the associated organisms that make up their microbiomes.

Around Cornell

Students revive classic microchip fabrication with open-source tools

A unique project team enables Cornell undergraduates to use emerging open-source hardware to design, test and fabricate their own microchips – a complex, expensive process that is rarely available to students.

Hormone helps slow development of osteoarthritis

Applying a pretreatment of a parathyroid hormone, commonly used to increase bone mass to combat osteoporosis, can help improve cartilage health and slow the development of osteoarthritis, Cornell researchers have found.

Satellite images of plants’ fluorescence can predict crop yields

Cornell researchers and collaborators have developed a new framework that allows scientists to predict crop yield without the need for enormous amounts of high-quality data – which is often scarce in developing countries, especially those facing heightened food insecurity and climate risk. 

Grow as you go: ‘Peecycling’ helps plants and compost thrive

Human urine could be a handy resource in tending home gardens and compost piles, thanks to an interdisciplinary collaboration between two Cornell Engineering students and plant scientist Rebecca Nelson.

Student startups pitch innovations in Silicon Valley

Student teams from eLab, Cornell’s student startup accelerator, and Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute Runway Startup Program at Cornell Tech pitched their innovative ideas at San Francisco’s Autodesk Gallery on March 28.   

Around Cornell

New animal science facility supports methane reduction, climate resiliency

Cornell researchers and administrators joined industry and government partners to celebrate the opening of new animal respiration stalls in the Department of Animal Science.

CTI grant recipients build student confidence, connection

In 2023-2024 the Center for Teaching Innovation (CTI) awarded Innovative Teaching and Learning Grants to seven recipients. This year, two of those recipients' projects focus on building empathy into their courses to promote student learning.

Around Cornell

New book gives insider’s view of cosmic search for life

Clues about life on exoplanets could be as strange as a bioluminescent glow or a rainbow hue, astronomer Lisa Kaltenegger describes in her new book, “Alien Earths: The New Science of Planet Hunting in the Cosmos.”