Travel Talks | Learn about the Aurora Borealis and Solar Activity
OSU Alumni Association

Are you dazzled by the mesmerizing beauty of the aurora borealis? Discover the science behind auroras and solar activity — and how can you give yourself the best chance to see them — with Laura Edson, project manager for the Aurorasaurus citizen science project, which maps the northern and southern lights via reports from the public. Edson will illuminate the natural phenomena of auroras, also known as northern or southern lights, so that you can become a citizen scientist tracking light shows on your travels around the world! It’s a Travel Talk that will prepare you to gather valuable data to share with scientists who study auroras and solar activity. About the speaker: Laura Edson’s background is in museum education, and she has worked at museums spanning subjects like history, space and horticulture. Now, she directs her efforts toward helping the public experience and understand the beautiful northern lights.

Date aired: May 6, 2025.

Travel Talk: The Collapse of the Bronze Age | Travel to the Ancient Mediterranean with John Larison
OSU Alumni Association

3,000 years ago, the Aegean Sea was a bustling hub of culture and trade. People lived in urban high-rises and coastal cities without fortifications. Artisans created elaborate pottery and figurines, systems of writing proliferated, and a purple dye extracted from shellfish was more valuable than gold. But a millennium of advancement came to a sudden and violent end near the year 1200 BCE, beginning a 400-year dark age in the region. What happened to bring about this sudden collapse of a vibrant and resilient civilization? How did the Greek dark age give us The Iliad, The Odyssey, and Percy Jackson? Join John Larison, novelist and OSU lecturer, for this fascinating look at the ancient Mediterranean.

Date aired: June 4, 2025.

Travel Talk | Traveling Through Time: Did Medieval People Go on Vacation?
OSU Alumni Association

Rome, Paris, London, Athens, Barcelona. Today’s top tourist stops on a European vacation share some key characteristics: they’re major cities with famous museums, resplendent historical buildings and world-class food. But what did medieval travelers look for when they went on vacation? In this Travel Talk with Associate Professor Tekla Bude, you’ll find out how, where and why people went on vacation in the medieval period, and how you can incorporate the top medieval vacation destinations into your own travels.

Date aired: Jan. 14, 2025.

Podcast Episode 51: The Purple Martin Show
College of Forestry

In this episode, Lauren Grand interviews Lorelle Sherman, Extension forester for Benton, Polk and Linn Counties, on the Purple Martin Pacific Northwest subspecies — North America’s largest swallow.

Date aired: Aug. 3, 2024. 

Starker Lecture Series: Innovations in Silviculture and Forest Management in a Changing World
College of Forestry

Technological, social, economic and climatic changes require innovations in forest management. In this lecture, Tom Fox presents an overview of current and future innovations in silviculture, including the use of technological improvements, as well as economic, social and ecological considerations. Fox is vice president of research, productivity and wustainability at Rayonier Inc.

Date aired: April 19, 2023.

Leadership Lessons From Medicine and Sport: Breaking Barriers, Building Futures
College of Health

Watch the 2025 Bray Lecture featuring Kimberly Harmon, M.D., a pioneering force in sports medicine. With 26 years of experience at the University of Washington, Dr. Harmon has shaped collegiate sports medicine through her groundbreaking research on sudden cardiac death in athletes and advisory roles with the NCAA, NFL, NHL and National Basketball Players Association. As a professor in family medicine and orthopaedics and sports medicine, she continues to advance athlete health and safety while serving as team physician for multiple UW sports programs.

Date aired: April 8, 2025.

College of Business Thought Leadership Series: AI and Employee Management – The Impact on Trust in the Workplace
College of Business

The OSU College of Business launched the Thought Leadership Series to deliver high-impact, thought-provoking insights grounded in today’s most pressing questions from research and industry. This event features Keith Leavitt, the Scott and Loni Parrish Chair in Business, whose research explores how AI tools are reshaping employee performance evaluation and trust in the workplace. Leavitt challenges us to consider both the promise and pitfalls of AI — from its practical uses to how we misjudge its power and limits. You’ll gain a sharper understanding of how machine learning is transforming management practices.

Date aired: May 2, 2023.

College of Business Thought Leadership Series: Tap into the Abilities of People with Disabilities — The Case of Employees with Hearing Loss
College of Business

The OSU College of Business launched the Thought Leadership Series to deliver bold, research-driven insights on today’s most urgent workplace issues. This event features David Baldridge, professor of management, whose work focuses on the persistent underemployment and marginalization of people with disabilities. His research spotlights the workplace experiences of individuals with hearing loss, exploring accommodations, career advancement and the diversity within the disability community. Baldridge shares current employment data and offers practical guidance for employees, employers, supervisors, coworkers and allies.

Date aired: May 21, 2024.

College of Business Thought Leadership Series: Prosperity with Purpose — The Promise of Sustainable Capitalism
College of Business

The OSU College of Business created the Thought Leadership Series to deliver powerful, research-driven insights on today’s urgent challenges. In this event, Senior Associate Dean Inara Scott tackled how capitalism — amid climate change and growing inequality — can be transformed into a force for good. She explored tangible strategies for reshaping capitalism, balancing profit with broader stakeholder welfare and empowering businesses to advance societal well-being.

Date aired: March 21, 2024.

Mapping the Deep: A Book Talk with Deepsea Dawn
College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences

Explore the depths of the ocean with Dawn Wright, aka Deepsea Dawn, chief scientist of Esri and CEOAS courtesy professor. In this captivating talk, Dawn takes you on an extraordinary adventure, reading from her new book and engaging in a lively conversation with the audience.

About the book: Mapping the Deep: Innovation, Exploration & the Dive of a Lifetime highlights the crucial importance of mapping the ocean and its profound impact on our planet’s future. Through a blend of history, fascinating facts and beautiful images, this book offers a unique perspective on the challenges and triumphs of deep-sea exploration.

About the author: Oceanographer Dawn Wright made history in 2022 when she became the first Black person to visit Challenger Deep, the deepest and most unexplored place on Earth — a trip that took her over 10,000 meters beneath the Pacific Ocean’s surface. We know less about the ocean floor than we do about the surface of the moon. To date, barely one-fifth of the seabed has been mapped in high resolution. As an ocean scientist and explorer, Dawn has made it her mission to change that.

Date aired: April 7, 2025.

Minerals for Green Energy: How Geology Dictates the Social and Environmental Impacts of Mining (2024 Thomas Condon Lecture)
College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences

Speaker: Elizabeth Holley, exploration and mining geologist and associate professor in the Mining Engineering Department at Colorado School of Mines.

From your cell phone to your electric vehicle, modern technology and the green economy are in need of critical minerals. Watch this talk to explore the future of these important resources and green energy.

As global communities work to transition to green energy to address urgent climate concerns, it is clear that these energy sources and the batteries to store it still require natural resources, such as cobalt, lithium and nickel. The demand for these critical minerals is predicted to increase dramatically to meet the net-zero by 2050 emissions targets. The geological environments in which these deposits form dictate how they are mined and the environmental and social impacts of that mining. Holley uses case studies from her research on lithium and nickel-cobalt to illustrate interconnections among geoscience, engineering, environment, people and policy.

Date aired: Oct. 25, 2024.

Newport Mural Project
College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences

CEOAS researchers partnered with Newport, Oregon artists and Latinx youth to paint a long-planned mural near Nye Beach. The project is funded by the NSF Cascadia CoPes Hub and explores collaborative art as a means of science communication and local engagement.

CEOAS and OSU Extension Service Assistant Professor of Practice and Principal Investigator Felicia Olmeta Schult, CEOAS graduate student Emma Gleeman, Newport artists Emy Daniels and Miguel Martinez, as well as collaborators from Arcoíris Cultural and OSU Extension Service, worked together to conduct four mural workshops with 15 local children (ages 5–11) in May.

The mural depicts activities chosen by the children — flying kites on the beach, building sandcastles, reading and eating snacks with friends. It also portrays coastal hazards such as tsunamis, landslides and sneaker waves. The bold colors are inspired by Mexican and Guatemalan textiles. The children painted most of the mural.

Date posted: Sept. 15, 2025.

Field work at the HJ Andrews Experimental Forest
College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences

“Not all fire is bad fire, and in fact the landscape needs fire.”

CEOAS graduate student Sarah Gwynn knows this is a hot topic. Gwynn is researching how natural disturbances like wildfire, as well as anthropogenic disturbances (like the creation of, and modification to, roads for firefighting operations) affect plant community structure on a landscape scale.

The 2023 Lookout fire, which started with a lightning strike and burned the majority of the H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest, is the perfect place for this disturbance study.

With the help of her two summer interns, CEOAS undergraduate Emme Lurding and CEOAS alumnus Nigel Yarnall-Benson, the research team has identified dozens of roadside sites along the large road network in the H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest where they measure canopy cover, species abundance and soil disturbance, among other things.

What has been the most surprising thing about Gwynn’s research thus far? The abundance of native plants in these disturbed areas.

"The sheer number of them is just mind-boggling."

Date posted: Sept. 4, 2025.

How Does a Tidewater Glacier Melt? Making Measurements at the Face of an Actively Calving Tidewater Glacier
College of Engineering

Presented by Meagan Wengrove, associate professor of coastal and ocean engineering and the John and Jean Loosley Faculty Fellow. Tidewater glacier melt rates are a major uncertainty in projecting sea level rise, as current models may underestimate melt by up to 100 times. Measuring these rates is challenging due to the dangers and technical difficulties near actively calving glacier faces. Our team is using robotic platforms to collect groundbreaking data directly at the ice-ocean interface of Xeitl Sít’ (LeConte Glacier) in Southeast Alaska. These measurements are shedding new light on the physical processes that drive rapid glacier melt and helping to solve the mystery of the "missing melt."

Date aired: March 11, 2025.

Sustaining Agriculture and Food Production with Robotics and AI
College of Engineering

Presented by Joe Davidson, associate professor of mechanical engineering and robotics. American farmers are facing increasing uncertainty in securing farm workers and have struggled to adopt robots for labor-intensive tasks like pruning and harvesting. Biological systems such as orchards present complex challenges for robotics, especially when it comes to manipulating plants. Ongoing research at Oregon State University focuses on developing robots with advanced mechanical devices and sensors to better interact with crops. Recent projects aim to reduce fertilizer overuse and expand international partnerships to improve both agricultural efficiency and assistive technologies for workers.

Date aired: May 13, 2025.

Advancing the Environmental Forensics of Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances
College of Engineering

Presented by Professor Jennifer Field. Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) pose a challenge for environmental forensics due to their widespread presence and diverse sources, such as firefighting foams, biosolids, landfills and wastewater effluents. This research uses high-resolution mass spectrometry to develop chemical fingerprints for different PFAS sources within watersheds. By pairing these fingerprints with advanced machine learning, the project seeks to reliably identify PFAS origins in affected water systems. Ongoing work aims to further refine these forensic approaches for improved source tracking and mitigation.

Date aired: April 17, 2025.

Connectivity, Climate Change and the Clean Water Act: Evolving Protections of Oregon’s Headwater Streams
College of Engineering

This lecture was a part of the 2025 Oregon State University College of Engineering Faculty Lecture Series. The lecture was given by Adam Ward, professor and department head of Biological and Ecological Engineering at Oregon State. Headwater streams are essential habitat and provide clean water to downstream users. Their federal protection depends upon their connectivity to downstream waters, which is changing in response to climate and weather patterns. In this talk, Ward reviews both the science and policy that govern headwater stream protections. In particular, he highlights a 70+ year study at the H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest (near Blue River, Oregon in the Cascade Range) to document the changing flows, connectivity and protections that could be anticipated in the coming decades.

Date aired: April 8, 2025.

Fish Out of Water: Yelloweye Rockfish Gets CT Scan at Oregon State Veterinary Teaching Hospital
Gary R. Carlson, MD, College of Veterinary Medicine

A yelloweye rockfish from the Oregon Coast Aquarium visited our Lois Bates Acheson Veterinary Teaching Hospital for a CT scan to help determine why it's been having distension and fluid buildup in the abdomen.

Date posted: Dec. 5, 2024.

Saving Squirt: World First Procedure Fixes Lamb's Leaky Heart
Gary R. Carlson, MD, College of Veterinary Medicine

Squirt the lamb was diagnosed with patent ductus arteriosus, aka PDA. PDA is a condition where a blood vessel fails to close after birth. Dr. Kate Scollan, board-certified cardiologist, and cardiology resident Dr. Charlotte Donnan, are experienced with fixing PDAs in dogs (partnering with the anesthesiology team). They worked with large animal medicine specialist Dr. Kelly Sears and team and decided to perform the same procedure to fix Squirt’s heart. This procedure has never been reported in a lamb before, likely making it a world first!

Date posted: Feb. 27, 2025.

From Slow Heart to Steady Beat: Watch Dog Maximus Get a Pacemaker
Gary R. Carlson, MD, College of Veterinary Medicine

Maximus is a four-year-old German shepherd in need of a pacemaker to fix his slow heart rate. The surgery is performed by Dr. Charlotte Donnan and team at the Lois Bates Acheson Veterinary Teaching Hospital at the Oregon State University Carlson College of Veterinary Medicine.

Date posted: Dec. 16, 2024.

Believe It: College of Agricultural Sciences Capital Campaign
College of Agricultural Sciences

OSU’s College of Agricultural Sciences is seeking $170 million as part of the university’s $1.75 billion capital campaign to make a meaningful impact on the lives of all Oregonians who care about the environment, economy, community, and equity and access.

As a global leader in agricultural and natural resource sciences, our research, teaching and outreach helps save industries, create jobs and improve ecosystems. Our work strengthens communities and advances equity and access for a growing and diverse population. As we equip the next generation of leaders to continually build upon these efforts, we work with stakeholders across the state and beyond to make tomorrow better for everyone in everything we do.

Date posted: Feb. 15, 2023.

Grow With Us
College of Agricultural Sciences

As the founding college of Oregon State University, for more than 150 years we have lived out our land-grant mission in education, research and outreach. With renowned faculty working across interdisciplinary sciences, we partner with leading industries and organizations across the state and around the world to provide our students with hands-on opportunities to make a difference.

The research we lead impacts the health of our critical natural resources and ecosystems, innovates better understanding of food systems and access to food, improves the resilience and competitiveness of our agricultural communities and advances entrepreneurial ideas that change the way we grow and develop food to meet the needs of a growing and diverse population. We invite you to learn more about our mission, our work, and our people — in Oregon and around the world.

Date posted: Oct. 18, 2023.

Happy Finals Week
College of Liberal Arts

A comedic look at what finals week can feel like to students.

Date posted: Dec. 12, 2024.

Gameday fit check!
OSU Experience

We loved seeing your amazing school spirit shown through your outfit!

Date posted: Sept. 5, 2025

Won't Back Down
University Relations and Marketing + OSU Athletics + OSU Football

New commercial designed for the new football season to be played during TV broadcast and more.

Date posted: Aug. 30, 2025.

50 years of Black Excellence at OSU
University Relations and Marketing

A retrospective of what the Lonnie B. Harris Black Cultural Center represents today, with a special look back into where it came from.

Date posted: June 6, 2025.

Between the Trees
University Relations and Marketing

A special celebration that lets pairs of grads reflect with each other about the journey they've taken to reach the final step: being an OSU alumnus.

Date posted: June 12, 2025.

College of Forestry

At Oregon State University College of Forestry, we’re working to solve today’s most pressing issues — from climate change to affordable housing. Our programs and research go to the edge of what's known and beyond, to make the world a better place for future generations.

College of Agricultural Sciences Graduation 2025
College of Agricultural Sciences

Congratulations to all our College of Agricultural Sciences graduates! Your hard work and perseverance have led you to this moment of celebration. We cannot wait to see all that you accomplish in the future. Remember to stay in touch as OSU alumni, and Go Beavs!

Date posted: June 13, 2025.

We Speak Your Language at Oregon State University
College of Liberal Arts

Video trailer to introduce the We Speak Your Language video series, highlighting the wide variety of learning opportunities at OSU.

Date posted: Feb. 20, 2025.

When a college kid gets a real meal for the first time in months
College of Liberal Arts

A comedic look at student life when on a holiday break.

Posted Dec. 24, 2024.

This is CEOAS
College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences

The College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences is the center of Earth sciences at Oregon State University. Our scientists and students are on the frontlines of discovery, from the depths of the ocean to remote mountain peaks, and from the state-of-the-art labs that line our halls to the communities that we serve with the outcomes of our research. Students can study any aspect of the Earth system here, in one of our five majors: climate science, environmental sciences, geography and geospatial science, geology and oceanography. This video is aimed at undergraduate recruitment.

Date posted: March 12, 2025.

Public Health at Oregon State University
College of Health

This video highlights the College of Health's public health degree program, and its various offerings with student and faculty testimonials.

Date posted: Sept. 15, 2025.

Kinesiology at Oregon State University
College of Health

This video highlights the College of Health's kinesiology degree program, and its various offerings with student and faculty testimonials.

Date posted: Sept. 15, 2025.

Human Development and Family Sciences at Oregon State University
College of Health

This video highlights the College of Health's human development and famnily sciences degree program, and its various offerings with student and faculty testimonials.

Date posted: Sept. 15, 2025.