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Peter Dunn is one of the country’s preeminent bird researchers. A distinguished professor of biological sciences, Dunn is part of a team that studied the common yellowthroat, which is a type of songbird found throughout much of North America.On this episode of Curious Campus, we talk with Dunn about the research that looked at the courtship preferences of the female common yellowthroat. Hint: It’s not just about the distinctive sounds of the male. For veteran birders, the study might help answer questions about why these songbirds have those distinctive black “masks” around their eyes. For those interested in getting into birding as a hobby, Dunn offers some tips on how to get started, too.

We know that obesity can be harmful to our health, but dieting and exercise for the single goal of weight loss can often be disheartening and may even be harmful. What will it take for the fitness industry — and society — to make fitness more inclusive for both body types and marginalized identities?On this episode of Curious Campus, we talk about research and activism around body image and fitness with Christy Greenleaf, a professor of kinesiology in UWM’s College of Health Sciences, and Chrissy King, a certified personal trainer and creator of the Body Liberation Project. Both are members of the Future of Fitness Advisory Board for SELF magazine.

The stresses of everyday life build up and can be detrimental to our health and sleep – and not just during the holidays. Two health psychologists say that more easy-access resources are needed to help people cope.On this episode of Curious Campus, we talk with Marcellus Merritt, an associate professor in UW-Milwaukee’s College of Letters and Science, and Matthew Zawadzki, an associate professor at the University of California-Merced. Their research has shown that tapping into leisure activities can be a powerful tool to manage everyday stress. Merritt and Zawadzki are studying why leisure activities can help protect our health.

For many of us, the holiday season is a time to go to the movies. But some people remain wary about returning to the cinema because of the pandemic. How have theaters responded? And what does the future hold for how we take in films?On this episode of Curious Campus, we talk about movie theaters and the movies with Jocelyn Szczepaniak-Gillece, an associate professor and director of the film studies program at UW-Milwaukee; and Andrew Mencher, director of programming and operations at the Avalon Theater in Washington, D.C.Mencher also is owner and operations director of The Cinema Club, a national organization that, in non-COVID times, offers sneak previews to new independent and foreign films. Szczepaniak-Gillece is a co-moderator of the Milwaukee chapter of The Cinema Club.

Jon Pearce got an internship with a startup while still in college, setting his path toward becoming a founder. Valarie King-Bailey spent more than 20 years working for other companies before starting one of her own. Despite different timelines, both found their calling.

Mo Faisal set out to build better and more energy efficient semiconductor chips. Lindsay Tjepkema wanted to update the business-to-business marketing playbook. Both founded startups to do it.

Niko Skievaski and his co-founders started building an interface for accessing health data so members of their coworking space could more easily grow their tech companies. But the interface itself turned out to be the basis for a scalable tech business that would provide a platform developers can use to build and distribute software that is revolutionizing healthcare.

Sridhar Deivasigamani knew the world was ready for smarter, more efficient water heaters. Zach Halmstad knew businesses needed more software tools to manage their Apple devices. It turns out that both of them were right.

Brian Wiegand started his first company in the early days of the internet, which he’s been mining ever since. Craig Markovitz found his success with medical technologies. They share one important characteristic: A willingness to take risks — over and over again.