Research
![Kent State Professor voices concerns about budget cuts to environmental research. Kent State Professor voices concerns about budget cuts to environmental research.](https://www-s3-live.kent.edu/s3fs-root/s3fs-public/styles/1_5_2_thumbnail/public/article/algae-wiki-ka.jpg?VersionId=3MnpYthgD2Riz7vPvIizl_OwcmiEhmIe&h=bde28bee&itok=IV_ZY07t)
Associate Geology Professor Anne Jefferson voices concern over proposed cuts to environmental research.
![immigrant women grocery shopping](https://www-s3-live.kent.edu/s3fs-root/s3fs-public/styles/1_5_2_thumbnail/public/article/immigrants920x600.jpg?VersionId=j8fYXLJSCeTwQrldLiU0_9UjL.CrXcyJ&h=0c60fa0b&itok=yqT048Ml)
![Gemma Casadesus Smith, an associate professor in Kent State’s Department of Biological Sciences, has been awarded a five-year, $1.8 million grant from the National Institute on Aging at the National Institutes of Health.](https://www-s3-live.kent.edu/s3fs-root/s3fs-public/styles/1_5_2_thumbnail/public/article/DA64_047.jpg?VersionId=LaCU_h4a92rHPSv0kSm.pL6X1xFLs8iV&h=2a71c125&itok=87OGdy6Q)
Kent State's Gemma Casadesus Smith is studying why women are more likely to develop Alzheimer's.
![Gemma Casadesus Smith, an associate professor in Kent State’s Department of Biological Sciences, has been awarded a five-year, $1.8 million grant from the National Institute on Aging at the National Institutes of Health.](https://www-s3-live.kent.edu/s3fs-root/s3fs-public/styles/1_5_2_thumbnail/public/article/DA64_047.jpg?VersionId=LaCU_h4a92rHPSv0kSm.pL6X1xFLs8iV&h=2a71c125&itok=87OGdy6Q)
Kent State's Gemma Casadesus Smith is studying why women are more likely to develop Alzheimer's.
![Kent State Uses Geospatial Technology to Map Violence Kent State Uses Geospatial Technology to Map Violence](https://www-s3-live.kent.edu/s3fs-root/s3fs-public/styles/1_5_2_thumbnail/public/article/Earth-ka.jpg?VersionId=I729PaVYkVbTjhc3QvniTXdVTV9XvzRL&h=bde28bee&itok=vQ6QqoSy)
Kent State University researchers use geospatial technology to study youth violence in Akron, Ohio.
According to the American Cancer Society, there will be an estimated 1,688,780 new cancer cases diagnosed and 600,920 cancer deaths in the U.S. in 2017.
These numbers are stark and sobering, and worse yet, we still do not know exactly why cancer develops in its victims or how to stop it.
An online publication in Nature Nanotechnology this week by Kent State University researchers and their colleagues at Kyoto University in Japan, however, may offer new understanding about what turns good cells bad.
![Jacob Barkley (left), associate professor of exercise science in Kent State’s College of Education, Health and Human Services, oversees research activities with several students in a classroom in the MAC Center Annex. Jacob Barkley (left), associate professor of exercise science in Kent State’s College of Education, Health and Human Services, oversees research activities with several students in a classroom in the MAC Center Annex.](https://www-s3-live.kent.edu/s3fs-root/s3fs-public/styles/1_5_2_thumbnail/public/article/1500x800_SOTMBarkley.jpg?VersionId=GUoSGHamHXXCAV1Pmveu9ijy6jFQu6pC&h=ec98a0f6&itok=4WqoupaB)
![Jessica Barness (right), assistant professor of visual communication design at Kent State, reviews a student’s work in the Art Building. Jessica Barness (right), assistant professor of visual communication design at Kent State, reviews a student’s work in the Art Building.](https://www-s3-live.kent.edu/s3fs-root/s3fs-public/styles/1_5_2_thumbnail/public/article/ScholarBarness.jpg?VersionId=pnXDY37pCndcOO1oI26GAkqrTZun0lQS&h=ec98a0f6&itok=OdkXlgWO)
Scholar of the Month
Jessica Barness
Assistant Professor of Visual Communication Design
College of Communication and Information
2012-present
The word “communication” likely makes you think of language, but November’s Scholar of the Month has spent her entire career researching design as a language of its own.
Across various media, Jessica Barness, an assistant professor in Kent State University’s School of Visual Communication Design, creates her own design-based research model that merges the making of artifacts with critical inquiry.