University of Alaska Fairbanks

When you follow scientists in the Alaska wilderness, you'll almost certainly get alder-snagged.

The following people recently were elected to membership into The Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi, the nation's oldest and most selective collegiate honor society for all academic disciplines.

FAIRBANKS - Mikala Henderson and Tessa Onaga became the fourth and fifth All-Americans in Nanooks volleyball history on Wednesday, Oct. 10. They were both named

The University of Alaska Fairbanks Graduate School has selected seven Ph.D. students for the 2025 Mellon Foundation Troth Yeddha' Collective Fellowship. These fellows are established students whose work centers Indigenous knowledge in the arts and humanities, builds transdisciplinary connections, and responds to community needs through university-based research.

Instruments typically used to detect the ground motion of earthquakes can also be used to identify the type of aircraft flying far overhead, research by University of Alaska Fairbanks scientists shows.

The climate-driven spread of beaver ponds in Alaska's Arctic accelerates the effects of a warming environment by causing pond-adjacent permafrost to thaw and by increasing the amount of liquid water present during winter. Those are the key findings of the first comprehensive, on-the-ground assessment of the northward migration of beavers.

Cynphany Henderson was named the Great Northwest Athletic Conference Volleyball Offensive Player of the Week on Nov. 10. The honor marks her first career GNAC Player of the Week award.

Mount Edgecumbe volcano in Southeast Alaska sits in a place where a volcano shouldn't really be sitting. Research underway with new federal funding aims to solve that mystery.

For the first time since joining the Great Northwest Athletic Conference, the University of Alaska Fairbanks Nanooks will have a men's representative at the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division II Cross Country Championships. Dexter Delaney officially qualified for the 2025 championships on Monday, Nov. 10, with the NCAA announcement for all team qualifiers and individual qualifiers. Delaney, a freshman, will represent the Blue and Gold as an individual qualifier after placing seventh at the 2025 NCAA West Regional Championships on Saturday, Nov. 8, in Monmouth, Oregon, and earning All-Region honors. "Dexter continues to redefine what it means to run for the Nanooks," said head coach Conrad Haber. "He took the time to learn from the early season competitions to ensure he would be ready to seize the moment when it arrived. Dexter was patient, trusted his instincts, and executed his race plan to perfection." Prior to the regional race at the Ash Creek Preserve, Delaney finished eighth at the 2025 GNAC Championships, placing in the top 10 for a GNAC All-Conference finish and the GNAC Freshman of the Year honor. He became the first Nanooks men's racer to earn All-GNAC honors and was the first-ever men's racer to earn a GNAC end-of-the-year conference honor. Delaney had one other top 10 finish at the Western Washington University Bill Roe Classic on Sept. 27, taking eighth in the 8k classic on Sept. 27, 2025. In two head-to-head matchups with the Alaska Anchorage Seawolves, Delaney also added a third-place finish in the Seawolf Throwdown on Sept. 6 and his first career win on Sept. 13 at the Blue/Gold Race in Fairbanks. He was one of three individual qualifiers from the West, joining Alan Jimenez (Cal State San Marcos) and Noah Plaza (Concordia University Irvine). The championships will be held Saturday, Nov. 22, at Wayne E. Dannehl National Cross Country Course. University of Wisconsin-Parkside will serve as the host. The women's race will begin at 7 a.m. EST, followed by the men's race at 8:15 a.m. AKST. The championships will be livestreamed on www.NCAA.com from 7 a.m. AKST until the conclusion of the awards ceremony.

As Alaska's rivers begin serving as winter roads and trails, a new study from the University of Alaska Fairbanks helps explain why certain stretches of water never seem to freeze.

Eight members of the University of Alaska Fairbanks volleyball team have been named to the 2025 Great Northwest Athletic Conference Academic All-Conference Team.

Following a recent spike in Bering Sea killer whale entanglements, a simple addition to fishing nets has delivered positive early results for keeping the big marine mammals out of deep-water flatfish trawls. The net modification was developed through a collaboration between University of Alaska Fairbanks researcher Hannah Myers and the Alaska Seafood Cooperative, which coordinates a fleet that targets groundfish such as flounder and sole.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks School of Education has selected Elianna "Bair" Pinneta as the recipient of the 2025 Steve and Cynthia Holmberg Education Endowed Scholarship. The award provides $5,000 to support tuition and other educational expenses and will aid Pinneta in pursuing her degree in elementary education.

University of Alaska Fairbanks Nanooks guard Mike Miller has been named to the Great Northwest Athletic Conference men's basketball Preseason All-Conference team.

Thirteen of the 112 cross country runners named to the Great Northwest Athletic Conference Academic All-Conference Team, presented by Barnes & Noble College, are from University of Alaska Fairbanks Nanooks cross country teams.

Two University of Alaska Fairbanks graduate students are among the 1,500 recipients of the 2025-2026 National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships. Willa Johnson and Xochitl Munoz will each receive three years of financial support, including a $37,000 annual stipend and funds to cover tuition and fees, in addition to professional development opportunities.

An ambitious new research project is aiming to better understand the lives of king salmon by focusing on their difficult journey from freshwater habitat to the ocean. The project, a collaboration between the University of Alaska Fairbanks and Alaska Department of Fish and Game, is using hundreds of acoustic tags and an array of underwater hydrophones to track young salmon as they navigate the Kenai River to Cook Inlet.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks College of Indigenous Studies has selected the inaugural cohort of the Leaders in Indigenous Food and Energy Scholars Program. The program is designed to support and cultivate emerging and current leaders in Alaska's Indigenous food and energy systems.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks has announced the students named to the deans' and chancellor's lists for the summer 2025 semester. The lists recognize students' outstanding academic achievements. Students receiving a 3.9 grade point average or higher are placed on the chancellor's list, while those receiving a grade point average of between 3.5 and 3.89 are named to the deans' list. UAF is a Land, Sea and Space Grant institution and is the leading doctoral degree-granting institution in the state of Alaska. Since it was founded in 1917, UAF has been internationally recognized for research relating to the Arctic and sub-Arctic in areas such as biology, geophysics, engineering, natural resources and climate.

The Alaska Nanooks women's cross country program had two student-athletes named to the 2024-25 Academic All-America Women's Track & Field/Cross Country Team, selected by College Sports Communicators (CSC). Rosie Fordham and Kendall Kramer both earned Academic All-America honors after standout seasons on the course and in the classroom. Fordham, now a two-time honoree, earned Second Team Academic All-America recognition, while Kramer was named a First Team Academic All-American - the first such honor in program history.

The Alaska Nanooks volleyball team has once again been recognized for excellence in the classroom, earning the 2025 AVCA Team Academic Award for the 2024-25 academic year. The Nanooks are one of 1,458 teams honored by the American Volleyball Coaches Association, marking a record-breaking total of collegiate and high school programs to receive the distinction. The award celebrates teams that maintain a year-long GPA of 3.3 or higher on a 4.0 scale (or 4.1 on a 5.0 scale). This is the seventh consecutive year-and the 11th time in program history-that Alaska has earned the AVCA Team Academic Award. The Nanooks first received the honor in 2008.

FAIRBANKS - The Alaska Nanooks rifle team continues to uphold its tradition of excellence-this time in the classroom. All nine student-athletes on the 2024-25 roster have been named to the Collegiate Rifle Coaches Association (CRCA) Scholastic All-American Team, announced following the completion of the academic year.

Samples of extremely small crystal clots, each polished to the thickness of a human hair or thinner, have revealed information about the process triggering the major 2006 eruption of Alaska's Augustine Volcano. Graduate student researcher Valerie Wasser at the University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute determined that the addition of hot new magma into Augustine's reservoir of cooler, older magma increased the pressure enough to trigger the 2006 eruption. Wasser's analysis of Augustine crystal clots was published May 29 in Geology, the journal of The Geological Society of America.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks honored the Class of 2025 during its 103rd commencement ceremony on Saturday, May 3, at the Carlson Center in Fairbanks. The university's first commencement took place in 1923, when the sole graduate, John Sexton Shanly, received a bachelor's degree in agriculture. This year, UAF conferred approximately 1,184 degrees on 1,110 students. Some students received more than one degree. The commencement ceremony included graduates from summer and fall 2024 and spring 2025.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks has announced the students named to the deans' and chancellor's lists for the spring 2025 semester. The lists recognize students' outstanding academic achievements. Students receiving a 3.9 grade point average or higher are placed on the chancellor's list, while those receiving a grade point average of between 3.5 and 3.89 are named to the deans' list. UAF is a Land, Sea and Space Grant institution and is the leading doctoral degree-granting institution in the state of Alaska. Since it was founded in 1917, UAF has been internationally recognized for research relating to the Arctic and sub-Arctic in areas such as biology, geophysics, engineering, natural resources and climate.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks Institute of Arctic Biology's Toolik Field Station has named five recipients of its 2025 Tundra Award for student and early career research.

UAF students John Davis, Kaylana Nations and Matthew Lesh were all recently awarded the Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship, which supports students studying abroad.

The UAF Office of Undergraduate Research and Scholarly Activity has named the recipients of the URSA 2025 Innovative Technology and Education Awards.

UAF civil engineering students placed fourth at the 2025 national Student Steel Bridge Competition, earning top honors in construction speed and structural efficiency with an innovative, student-led design.

FAIRBANKS - Gustavs Davis Grigals and Markuss Komuls were selected to Team Latvia for the start of the 2025 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship in Herning, Denmark.