Curiosity-driven research at A&S builds the foundation for meaningful impact on our world. The interdisciplinary work of our faculty, postdocs and students – both undergraduate and graduate – explores the farthest galaxy, the smallest particles and the people across New York state and beyond.
Addressing a changing planet
A&S research across the sciences, humanities and social sciences offers innovative ways to solve the challenges of climate change.
Featured climate action
Agenlaku Indonesia/Unsplash
High-density polyethylene (HDPE) is ubiquitous in single-use applications such as packaging and containers, labeled with the number two inside the triangular recycling symbol.
Making Plastics Sustainable
Over 100 pounds of plastic is produced every year for every person on the planet. If we keep going like this, by 2050 there could be more plastic by weight in the ocean than fish. Cornell researchers are at the forefront of developing sustainable plastics and innovative ways to recycle the plastics we already have.
It’s easy to feel overcome by discouraging news about climate change. But humans have faced seemingly insurmountable challenges before. Humanists at Cornell apply lessons from the past to help us address problems in the present – such as using gallows-style humor to help people cope with today’s climate change woes.
Governments around the world have shown resistance to dealing substantively with climate change, and people who care deeply have struggled to make a difference. Social scientists at Cornell studying the issue offer new ways to look at the problem, and new approaches to effect real change – like working from the bottom up.
Distinguished Professor of Arts and Sciences in Classics
Anthropology, Classics, Medieval Studies Program
Exploring AI’s impact on Humanity
From jobs to government to health care and beyond, A&S researchers tackle the complexities of the AI revolution.
Janne Simoes/Unsplash
U.S. Capitol Building
Identifying AI risks
Democracies in the age of AI can feel more fragile than ever – how do we distinguish legitimate political messaging from malicious bots? What happens when elected leaders can’t distinguish AI-generated advocacy from human? Political scientist at Cornell are identifying where the dangers lie and what can be done to mitigate them.
Chris Kitchen
Marten van Schijndel, left, and Helena Aparicio
Teaching AI to talk
Neural networks use huge quantities of data to learn to communicate with humans, yet these models still have a long way to go when it comes to language. AI systems so far don’t understand the external factors involved in language and communication, A&S linguists are forging new paths in research and experimentation to improve the language abilities of AI models.
AI systems are built with tangled webs of algorithms and trained on increasingly large sets of data, making it difficult for humans to understand AI’s uncanny ability to recognize patterns in data and make scientific predictions. But understanding this complexity is critical to harnessing AI’s power to make scientific discoveries. A new $11.3 million center led by Cornell and A&S mathematicians focuses on human-AI collaborations that use mathematics as a common language.
A&S faculty push the limits of quantum computing and delve deeply into the quantum realm, making technology to shape the future.
Impactful quantum research
Preventing Quantum Computing Errors
Quantum computers could someday help us find new drugs, make better financial predictions and more – but not until they stop making encoding errors. Cornell physicists are pioneering new ways to create an error correction mechanism for quantum computers.
Sunghoon Kim
As the experimentalists changed the electric field, it is likely that different parts of the material underwent the metal-to-insulator transition at different values of the electric field because of a small number of inherent imperfections. Consequently, the flowing electrons must find a path through these “islands” of insulating regions, embedded in a “sea” of metal.
Solving Quantum Mysteries
Being able to control how metals become insulators – and vice versa -- could lead to new complex microscopic circuits, superconductors and exotic insulators that could find use in quantum computing. A&S physicists are exploring this mysterious kind of phase transition, discovering new ways to reconcile experiment and theory.
Provided
A confocal microscopy image shows a bicontinuous microstructure with well-defined spacing.
Creating New Materials
Quantum materials behave in strange ways, unlike normal matter. Harnessing their unique behavior will enable advances in a wide variety of applications, including making sustainable pigments, energy storage and filtration. A&S researchers are creating novel nanostructures that reveal the possibilities in the quantum realm for matter.
James A. Weeks Professor of Physical Sciences Director of the Laboratory of Atomic and Solid State Physics Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellow
Physics
Research Opportunities for Faculty and Postdocs
Arts & Sciences is a thriving environment for researchers to build on questions large and small, old and new. Faculty and postdocs in the College have the freedom to ask big questions and the resources to follow through to make lasting impacts.
High-impact seed funding: New Frontier Grants
Now in its third year, New Frontier Grants enable faculty members to pursue novel, bold ideas in research with potential for transformative advances in the arts and humanities, social sciences and natural sciences.
Chris Kitchen
Neil Cholli often goes to the white board in his Uris Hall office to "think things through" while analyzing data on social mobility
Premier postdocs: Klarman Fellowships
This premier postdoctoral fellowship program offers opportunities for early-career scholars of outstanding talent, initiative and promise to devote themselves to frontline, innovative research without being tied to specific outcomes.
Our faculty’s work has real impact on the world around us. From batteries to polymers to data insights, they share their discoveries through entrepreneurial ventures and licensing their technology.
As an undergraduate student in the College you will have unique opportunities to do meaningful research in places like state-of-the-art physics labs and ancient Greek burial grounds. Your opportunities are endless.
Simon Wheeler
Projects at the Art+Tech exhibit included visual and written works.
Milstein Program in Technology & Humanity
The Milstein Program in Technology and Humanity is a cross-disciplinary undergraduate cohort, trained in intersectional thinking, dynamic collaboration, and emergent technology, combining courses in the College with cutting-edge programs and courses at Cornell Tech, Cornell's graduate campus in New York City.
Chris Kitchen
Students Sneah Singhi ’26, left, and David Behdad ’25 work in the observation room at the B.A.B.Y Lab, which studies infant language acquisition.
Nexus Scholars Program
Applications are now open for the new Nexus Scholars Program, which connects and supports undergraduate students in the College of Arts & Sciences with opportunities to work side by side with Cornell faculty from across the College over the summer on frontline research projects.
Michael Goldstein/Provided
College Scholars Program students from the College of Arts & Sciences visit the Johnson Museum.
Robert S. Harrison College Scholar Program
In the Robert S. Harrison College Scholar Program, students design their own interdisciplinary major, organized around a question or issue of interest, and pursue a course of study that cannot be found in an established major.
