Graduates celebrating in front of old main

Back in the Skydome: NAU honors 2021 graduating class in two ceremonies

Tuttle in cap and gown looking through camera

Campus & Community

Graduate Trevor Tuttle: Telling the tales of treasure

The legendary Superstition Mountains are full of just that—superstitions. Raised in Surprise, Arizona, Tuttle grew up with the lore of the Lost Dutchman Mine, and decided to devote his Honors capstone to capturing the history, mystery and passion of all those who have hunted for the fabled caves of gold.

Eduardo Moreno

Campus & Community

Graduate Eduardo Moreno: How NAU-Yuma prepared him to make health care available to all

Eduardo Moreno's experience in NAU-Yuma's nursing program encompassed a breadth of experiences—working in the COVID-19 unit during clinicals, educating the community about the stigma behind mental illness and substance abuse and spending a little time in the hospital as a patient. He did it all with the goal of increasing access to affordable and effective health care.

Trevor Irioin and his mother, Shari

Campus & Community

Graduate Trevor Irion: PT student finds inspiration in education through his mother’s accident

After his mother was hit by a car while running, Trevor Irion moved home, putting his future on hold while he cared for her. While working with physical therapists who had gone to school at NAU, he was impressed with their confidence and abilities and decided to apply. He’s since put everything he learned in classes to use doing at-home PT with his mother, which was especially valuable when the pandemic derailed her in-person appointments.

Research & Academics

map of world's biodiversity

NAU, partner institutions selected for international sustainability award

The recognition, coming at a time when the planet is facing global biodiversity, climate and public health emergencies, reinforces NAU’s leadership in producing top-tier scientific research that can support national policymaking, implementation, and reporting to address our planetary crisis.

DART spacecraft illustration

DART launch could be key step forward in planetary defense

Can NASA impact an incoming asteroid enough to move it out of range of hitting Earth? A test mission, which is being launched Tuesday, will do a practice run on an asteroid in the country's first planetary defense mission.

New experimental design

Decoding biological mysteries with algae: NAU team wins $3M from NSF to model microbiome

The tiny cosmos of organisms living on a streamer of algae in a river could help scientists learn what turns an environment from healthy to toxic and back again. A multidisciplinary team led by NAU has won $3 million from the NSF to translate the codex contained in the microbiome of common algae into computer algorithms that can predict a wide range of microbial interactions. The team will combine field experiments with high-tech molecular tools and machine learning to unravel the complex interactions among bacteria and algae into a set of predictive rules. The experiments they conduct and computer models they develop will illumine which interactions among micro-organisms have the power to change the health of a river or a human gut.

Campus & Community

Eduardo Moreno

Graduate Eduardo Moreno: How NAU-Yuma prepared him to make health care available to all

Eduardo Moreno's experience in NAU-Yuma's nursing program encompassed a breadth of experiences—working in the COVID-19 unit during clinicals, educating the community about the stigma behind mental illness and substance abuse and spending a little time in the hospital as a patient. He did it all with the goal of increasing access to affordable and effective health care.

Graduates celebrating in front of old main

Back in the Skydome: NAU honors 2021 graduating class in two ceremonies

For the first time in two years, NAU will celebrate commencement in the Skydome, with almost 2,800 students completing their degrees and President Cruz Rivera officiating his first commencement as president of NAU. With snow in the forecast, people traveling for commencement are encouraged to sign up for text alerts and leave extra travel time.

Tuttle in cap and gown looking through camera

Graduate Trevor Tuttle: Telling the tales of treasure

The legendary Superstition Mountains are full of just that—superstitions. Raised in Surprise, Arizona, Tuttle grew up with the lore of the Lost Dutchman Mine, and decided to devote his Honors capstone to capturing the history, mystery and passion of all those who have hunted for the fabled caves of gold.

Lumberjack Features

Three pinecone Christmas trees

DIY holiday decoration: Pinecone Christmas trees

Graduate Xinyue Tao: English learning to an English degree

English major Tao had a less-than-proficient understanding of the language when she began her two-year study abroad experience at NAU. Not letting these challenges stop her, she is graduating as a highly skilled speaker, reader and writer of English with plans to pursue a master’s degree in the subject.

Socializing during COVID

For another round of COVID and the holidays: Normalize asking

Medical anthropologist Lisa Hardy says we all need to get comfortable asking and answering questions this season: Are you vaccinated? Do you mask appropriately when you're out? Will you wear a mask in my house? This kind of communication, along with appropriate public health behaviors, will help us have a holiday season where both safety and socializing are a priority.