Research

A vision for a new central park in Reid Park Neighborhood on Charlotte’s west side is moving closer to reality. It is based on work by UNC Charlotte’s Dylan McKnight, who is pursuing master’s degrees in urban design and community planning.
The Reid Park Neighborhood Association, in partnership with Mecklenburg County Park and Recreation Department, will seek community feedback on the vision from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 17, at Reid Park Academy, 4108 West Tyvola Road.

UrbanEden, UNC Charlotte’s entry for the 2013 U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon, won the People’s Choice Award at the contest finals in California.
According to the U.S. Department of Energy, UrbanEden “has a variety of sustainability features, such as thermal mass, passive solar and radiant energy, as well as unique technologies that demonstrated true innovation, including radiant geopolymer concrete walls, movable photovoltaic shading and a nighttime radiation emitter.

The College of Education’s Urban Education Collaborative recently held its inaugural conference “Pursuing Extraordinary Outcomes in Public Education” at UNC Charlotte Center City.
This event, held in partnership with Sugar Creek Charter School, drew nearly 300 educators, students, community leaders and key stakeholders from across the nation. The three-day conference offered professional development, networking opportunities and a chance to discuss some of the most pressing issues related to urban communities.

When Joe Howarth started working with UNC Charlotte’s Charlotte Action Research Project in Charlotte’s most disadvantaged neighborhoods in 2011, he kept hearing about the City of Charlotte’s Neighborhood Matching Grant program.

O. Akinlolu Ige, a leading African geochemist and archaeometrist, is serving a one-month appointment as a visiting research scholar in the Department of Africana Studies in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences.

In excavating sites in a long-inhabited urban area like Jerusalem, archaeologists are accustomed to noting complexity in their finds – how various occupying civilizations layer over one another during the site’s continuous use over millennia. But when an area has also been abandoned for intermittent periods, paradoxically there may be even richer finds uncovered, as some layers have been buried and remain undisturbed by development.

Election into the International Academy for Production Engineering, or CIRP, is a very exclusive honor.  The total number of fellows worldwide is limited to 175 with a maximum of 20 per country.
Currently, there are a total of 15 fellows from the United States and five are faculty members at UNC Charlotte.  By comparison, major engineering schools like MIT, Berkeley and Purdue have one fellow.

Renowned Israeli archaeologist Gaby Barkay of Bar Ilan University will speak about his discovery of the two oldest fragments of a biblical text ever found at 7 p.m., Monday, Sept. 23, in Cone University Center, McKnight Hall.  

Balaka Basu, a faculty member in the English Department, is co-editor of the recently published “Contemporary Dystopian Fiction for Young Adults: Brave New Teenagers.” The book is the latest volume in Routledge’s Children’s Literature and Culture Series, and it includes a chapter by Basu titled “What Faction Are You In?  The Pleasure of Being Sorted in Veronica Roth’s ‘Divergent.’”
Basu joined the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences faculty in 2013. She earned a doctorate in English from City University of New York; her bachelor’s degree is from Cornell University.  

U.S. Rep. Richard Hudson (’96) visited his alma mater, UNC Charlotte, recently as part of his August recess from Congress.  He wanted to learn more about the University’s role in advanced manufacturing.
Hudson met with Chancellor Philip L. Dubois; Bob Wilhelm, vice chancellor for research and economic development; and other University officials.  After viewing Richardson Stadium, he stopped in at the Precision Metrology Lab and other high-tech industrial labs in Duke Centennial Hall.