Research News

Sky & Telescope reports that a recent study by RIT suggests the dwarf galaxy Antlia 2 had a long-ago run-in with our galaxy, rippling and warping its disk. But not everyone agrees with that scenario.

Though direct observational evidence of Antlia 2 was not obtained until last year, one scientist has had a decade-long hunch that it was there. Sukanya Chakrabarti, an astrophysicist at RIT predicted in 2009 that an object packed with dark matter was causing tidal effects at the edge of the Milky Way.

Sci-News features new research, led by RIT, that shows the collision of the recently-discovered dwarf galaxy Antlia 2 with the Milky Way Galaxy hundreds of millions of years ago is responsible for ripples in the Milky Way’s outer gas disk.

Antlia 2, the "ghost of a galaxy" orbiting the Milky Way, is a dark horse in more ways than one. Not only is it so faint it was only just discovered last year, it may now be responsible for curious ripples in the hydrogen gas that makes up the Milky Way's outer disc.

The newly-discovered dark dwarf galaxy Antlia 2’s collision with the Milky Way may be responsible for our galaxy’s characteristic ripples in its outer disc, according to a study led by Assistant Professor Sukanya Chakrabarti. The Antlia 2 dwarf galaxy was discovered from the second data release of the European Space Agency’s Gaia mission, which aims to chart a three-dimensional map of our galaxy.

RIT senior scientists Aaron Gerace and Matthew Montanaro were presented with the USGIF Academic Achievement Award at the GEOINT 2019 Symposium for their work on the Landsat 8 satellite.

Jennifer Lynn Swartzenberg, a faculty member in NTID’s science and mathematics department, is the 2019-2020 recipient of the Ronald D. Dodge Memorial Faculty Grant and will receive $1,000 for her project to produce videos of established and new American Sign Language (ASL) signs for organic chemistry.

An RIT alumnus received a Fulbright U.S. Student Program award in computer engineering to help drones assist with search and rescue operations in difficult terrain such as dense forests or steep mountains where GPS might not be reliable. Andrew Ramsey ’18 (computer engineering), ’18 MS (computer engineering) will conduct research at Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt as part of a project to research innovative ways to determine the location of a drone in a low-cost and reliable manner.

RIT researchers are studying the genetic switch that could make cattle resistant to the wasting disease known as “sleeping sickness.” Bolaji Thomas, professor of biomedical sciences in RIT’s College of Health Sciences and Technology, is examining different immune responses to bovine trypanosomiasis within the same species of cattle in Nigeria.

WXXI reports on an RIT study that found a striking difference between political parties on the issue of legalizing recreational marijuana in New York state.

Forbes features a toilet seat developed by RIT that contains devices that measure blood oxygenation levels, heart rate and blood pressure to signal when someone is at risk for congestive heart failure.

RIT has received a grant from the National Science Foundation to help make artificial intelligence smarter and more inclusive. The grant creates the Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) Site in Computational Sensing for Human-centered AI and will allow a total of 30 undergraduate students from across the country to spend 10 weeks at RIT.