In Class: Fluid Mechanic
I focus on how air moves at high speed. Imagine a commercial aircraft with a gas turbine engine flying through the air. I teach my students how the air moves around the wing, how the...
Ingenious: The magician of BCL
When Heinz von Foerster was a child in Vienna, his grandmother hosted artists, philosophers and politicians, and von Foerster soaked it all in. He brought that same multidisciplinary spirit to Illinois in 1949 as...
Memory Lane: Not Your Dad’s Rec Room
It was an underground scene like no other. Young people, by the dozens—over time, by the hundreds and the thousands—stopping by between classes, skipping classes entirely to be there. Flowing in at all times...
Rapid Responders
THE COVID-19 ERA, Part 3 of 3 As the SARS-CoV-2 virus spread globally, scientists at Illinois leapt into action, collaborating across disciplines and continents and forging ahead at warp speed. Here’s a look at...
Better Days Ahead
THE COVID-19 ERA, Part 2 of 3 Where were you on Thursday, March 12, 2020? Rick Hazlewood, EDM ’85, was hunkered down in back of a tour bus outside of Sedona, Ariz., oblivious to...
The first of many celebrations
Commencement 2020 was like no other.For starters, the ceremony ran just seven seconds shy of 16 minutes—surely a speed record for a University that has, over 149 years, developed multiple Commencement celebrations and traditions....
The Big Picture: The “kids” are all right
Spring at the U of I brings rebirth to campus, just as it welcomes new life to the University’s College of Veterinary Medicine. Caring for the season’s onset of newborn farm animals is an...
In Class: Mixologist
Chemistry 232 has a reputation because a lot of pre-med students have to take it as a required class. On the first day, I am honest with them that organic chemistry takes a lot...
The Big Picture: Diwali on the Quad
Illini bask in the glow of enlightenment as UI’s Indian Student and Indian Graduate Student Associations celebrate Diwali—the festival of lights—on the Main Quad. An ancient and traditional holiday observed by Hindus, Jains, Sikhs...
Memory Lane: The Stunt Show
On a Homecoming weekend in the mid-1960s, Bill Lewke, ’66 BUS, gamely played an elephant before thousands of amused parents, students and alumni in Assembly Hall. His fraternity and a sorority staged a funny...
