UCF in the News

Face masks and social distancing are both well-known ways to keep airborne pathogens, like COVID-19, at bay, but University of Central Florida researchers Michael Kinzel and Kareem Ahmed are working on a possible new one — a combination of food products that alters people’s saliva. The concept is based on new work from the researchers showing that food product ingredients can be used to thicken and reduce a person’s saliva, thus decreasing the transmission potential of airborne pathogens. The results were published recently in the journal Nature Scientific Reports.

U.S. News & World Report released its annual college and university rankings Monday. The list is one of the highest-regarded rankings in the nation, indicating a high graduation rate, strong faculty resources and student excellence. UCF was ranked No. 148 for overall top schools.

In late 2019, the UCF Business Incubation Program shifted strategy for its Lake Nona Business Incubator to attract more clients in line with the life-sciences industry of Medical City. This resulted in a nearly-full incubator that hosts companies that can directly benefit from the specialized resources UCF and other Lake Nona facilities offer. Plus, many of the companies are growing and creating local jobs. In fact, incubator companies in Lake Nona employed 10 people and generated $834,500 in revenue in fiscal year 2019, which leaped to 55 employees and $2.9 million in revenue in fiscal year 2021.

The augmented reality (AR) market is expected to generate global revenue of $152 billion by the end of 2030, making it the hottest selling mobile device, according to a new report by GlobalData, a data analytics company. The increasing interest in AR is a sign that the technology is maturing, experts say. AR allows users to see useful or entertaining virtual things in the real world around them, said Gregory Welch, an IEEE senior member and co-director of the University of Central Florida Synthetic Reality Laboratory. "An example of a useful AR application for an average personal user is turn-by-turn navigation," Welch said. "With a traditional (non-AR) navigation app on a phone, the user has to switch between looking at the map on their phone and the real world. In some situations, this can be cumbersome or inconvenient."

“This is a landmark day for anyone ever associated with UCF,” athletics director Terry Mohajir declared on Friday when UCF, along with Cincinnati, Houston and BYU, were invited into the Big 12. It was, in fact, the most significant day in UCF sports history; a day that Dick Nunis, the inaugural chairman of UCF’s Board of Trustees and one of the school’s biggest financial boosters, said, “We’ve all been working for and dreaming of for a long time.”

UCF researchers have developed a nanoparticle-based disinfectant that can continuously kill viruses on a surface for up to seven days — a discovery that could be a powerful weapon against COVID-19 and other emerging pathogenic viruses. The findings, by a multidisciplinary team of the university’s virus and engineering experts and the leader of an Orlando technology firm, were published this week in ACS Nano, a journal of the American Chemical Society. “Initially my thought was to develop a fast-acting disinfectant,” said Christina Drake, a UCF alumna and founder of Kismet Technologies. “but we spoke to consumers — like doctors and dentists — to find out what they really wanted from a disinfectant. What mattered the most to them was something long-lasting that would continue to disinfect high-touch areas like doorhandles and floors long after application.” Drake partnered with Dr. Sudipta Seal, a UCF materials engineer and nanosciences expert, and Dr. Griff Parks, a College of Medicine virologist who is also associate dean of research and director of the Burnett School of Biomedical Sciences.

The University of Central Florida is teaming up with Orlando Health to launch a national study to see how well video game-based training helps children learn to use prosthetic limbs. Limbitless Solutions, along with Orlando Health Arnold Parmer Hospital for Children, will work with families evaluating how well video games help children prepare muscles for using bionic arms created by students and the Limbitless team.

UCF and Boise State are eternal Thursday Heroes, the Sons of Zabransky and Kin of the Griffin Brothers. They’ve provided endless weeknight entertainment, last-call fodder and showcased time and again they’re capable of sabotaging the highest levels of the sport. In the past two decades, the long list of bowl games that UCF and Boise have won includes the Fiesta and the Peach. The programs they’ve toppled include Oklahoma, Auburn, Virginia Tech, Georgia, Baylor, Alabama, and Penn State. “This is a program that has a chance to be elite here in the near future,” Head Coach Gus Malzahn told Yahoo Sports after the game. “Everything is where you need it to be to be in the top 10,” president Alex Cartwright told Yahoo Sports in his office Thursday. He added: “We want to be a top 10 athletic program.” UCF’s Athletics Director Terry Mohajir embraces UCF’s role as a maverick and an upstart, saying, “When people compare us to the big school ... We are the big school.”

Carol Ann Logue and Rob Panepinto of UCF's Business Incubation program have been recognized among this year's list of people who make Orlando a better place to live. They are recognized for their work in helping to transform our economy, providing guidance to burgeoning entrepreneurs and fostering the creation of as many as 6,700 jobs in a single year.