College of Science

The Charlotte community mourns the Sept. 12 death of UNC Charlotte Botanical Gardens Executive Director Emeritus Thomas Lawrence (Larry) Mellichamp ‘70, known by many affectionately as Dr. M.

Charlotte researcher Rosario Porras-Aguilar, whose work includes a focus on learning how cancers spread, is one of 21 early career scientists in the United States and Canada to win funding and other support through the Scialog: Advancing BioImaging initiative.

A new biomolecular anticoagulant platform invented by a team led by UNC Charlotte researcher Kirill Afonin holds promise as a revolutionary advancement over the blood thinners currently used during surgeries and other procedures. While blood clotting is important to prevent blood loss and for our immunity, coagulation also can cause health issues and even death. Anticoagulants used to reduce risks can also cause significant issues, such as uncontrolled bleeding.

For their exceptional teaching and student engagement, Michael Walter, Alan Rauch, Tiffany Morin and Katie Kutcher have received the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences’ 2022 Excellence in Teaching Awards. Five additional faculty were honored as finalists.

Longtime UNC Charlotte Botanical Gardens Director Larry Mellichamp ’70, who retired as director in 2014 after almost four decades directing the gardens, is the seventh person ever to receive the prestigious Flora Caroliniana Award from the North Carolina Botanical Garden.

Corals are keystone species for reef and marine ecosystems, but coral bleaching due to climate change and ocean warming is killing them. A new open access study led by researchers at UNC Charlotte and the University of California, Riverside aims to shed light on how to reverse the damage and save corals. Tingting Xiang, an assistant professor of biological sciences at UNC Charlotte, also is faculty with the university’s CIPHER research center.

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) is showcasing nanotechnology particles designed and produced by leading UNC Charlotte researcher Kirill Afonin’s lab on the cover of a document presented to the U.S. House and Senate appropriations committees. NCI is the principal federal agency for cancer research and training.

UNC Charlotte has been recognized for some of the best graduate programs in the nation by U.S. News and World Report, including the MPA program and statistics track in the Applied Math Ph.D. in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences.

UNC Charlotte’s Master of Science in Mathematical Finance program has soared to its highest national ranking ever. The program is No. 11 in the TFE Times’ 2022 Master of Financial Engineering program rankings.

For UNC Charlotte biochemist Andrew Truman, a quest for new and better treatments for cancers and neurological diseases drives his research into protein folding and the DNA damage response, along with his desire to advance science broadly. To fund his work, he has received three significant National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants expected to total $2M. “These are real things that affect real people. They are not theoretical,” Truman says.