UofH Board Chairman Bradley M. Bloom has made a generous donation to launch the Bloom School of Graduate Studies, a university-wide initiative for a select cohort of PhD and postdoctoral students. This exciting new chapter will establish a pioneering new academic structure in Israel acknowledging that no one discipline alone can resolve the entangled issues of contemporary society. Prof. Irit Akirav (Head, School of Psychological Sciences) will serve as its founding dean.

Safety climate research - which examines how people perceive safety and its value in the workplace, particularly in healthcare, as well as organizational climate - is an important predictor of safety behavior and safety outcomes. University of Haifa is ranked sixth in a comprehensive review of safety climate research worldwide, and Prof. Gil Luria (Department of Human Services) was noted among the most influential researchers in the field. The "Whole Nine Yards of Safety Climate Research" survey, published in Journal of Hunan University Natural Sciences, reviewed over 2000 studies and abstracts in this field since 2005.

University of Haifa and Skoltech (The Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology) signed an academic agreement to partner in diverse fields of bioinformatics and genomics research, education, and cognitive neuroscience for the development of personalized medicine. The MOU was signed during an academic visit led by President Ron Robin, which included Prof. Abraham Korol (Institute pf Evolution), Prof. Roza Leikin (Dean, Faculty of Education), and Prof. Gal Richter-Levin (School of Psychological Sciences) who participated on Zoom. "We are delighted to partner with Skoltech, a young university which has emerged as the leading graduate research university in Russia. By working with other prestigious institutions around the globe , we will be better positioned to address the urgent issues of the 21st century."

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Prof. Adi Livnat (Department of Evolutionary and Environmental Biology) and scientists from Ghana made headlines when they called into question a central premise of Charles Darwin's evolutionary theory. Darwin believed that mutations are random and accidental, and natural selection favors such accidents. Using a new method of detecting de novo mutations - mutations that arise spontaneously in offspring without being inherited from either parent – Livnat and his colleagues found that a genetic mutation that protects against malaria was more prevalent in Africans in comparison with Europeans. This finding led the team to conclude that some genes may have adaptive properties in populations specific to regions where protection is needed. "The results suggest that … mutation-specific origination rates can respond in the long-term to specific environmental pressures," explains Livnat. The study, funded by the John Templeton Foundation, was recently published in the scientific peer-reviewed journal Genome Research.

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Dr. Einat Lavee (Department of Human Services and The Interdisciplinary Center for the Study of Poverty and Social Exclusion) recently submitted a comprehensive qualitative study on poverty in Israel. The study is part of an international project led by Stanford University to find new methods for assessing poverty. In this first-of-its-kind study, Lavee examined the risk factors leading to poverty in Israel among different population groups, as well as the social, economic, and psychological obstacles these groups face. Lavee's research aims to develop tailored solutions to break the cycle of poverty. She was interviewed in The Marker (in Hebrew), Israel's leading business magazine. The research was supported by Israel National Social Security Agency (Bituach Leumi) and the University of Haifa's Research Authority.

Excavating the floor of Brush Hut 1 at the Ohalo site. Credit: Dani Nadel

The remains found inside the oldest brush hut in the world at Ohalo II, near the Sea of Galilee, reveal its inhabitants had a diverse diet. A team of Israeli archaeologists, including Prof. Dani Nadel (School of Archaeology and Maritime Cultures), studied six brush huts, oval in shape and dating back to the Last Glacial Maximum. Their analysis of 20,000 faunal remains found at Brush Hut I indicates that its prehistoric inhabitants fished and ate a wide variety of birds and animals, as well as wild wheat, oats and barley. Studying the 'garbage' remains found on the floor of Brush Hut I led them to conclude that the consumption habits of the people living in it were driven by abundance rather than stress. The research was published in PLOS.

COVID-19 remains a disruptive and unpredictable part of daily life. Prof. Talya Greene (Head, Department of Community Mental Health) discussed her research on the high rates of distress and the traumatic effects of COVID-19 on frontline workers, particularly on healthcare workers, and the need for systemic change to protect them from burn-out. "Our study found that healthcare providers struggled with long working hours, fatigue and extreme psychological stress that included feelings of being stigmatized for their role, fear of infecting others, and anxiety over access to personal protective equipment; they were also afraid to express their concerns with their managers. It is crucial that we provide our 'carers' with a supportive environment that incorporates easy access to mental health support services in order to prevent a serious drain on this sector and consequently higher costs." Prof. Greene co-founded the COVID trauma response working group and is an Associate Editor for the European Journal of Psychotraumatology. The American Society of the University of Haifa hosted and coordinated the event.

The Weiss-Livnat MA Program for Holocaust Studies at UofH, Israel's only interdisciplinary graduate program in Holocaust studies, is dedicated to nurturing a new generation of Holocaust scholars and educators. Esther Renee Selman, a graduate of The Weiss-Livnat International MA Program in Holocaust Studies is involved in content creation for Holocaust educational programs across Europe. Her podcast Without the Footnotes  is creating opportunities to explore the future of Holocaust education and commemoration programs. Her message commemorating this year's International Holocaust Remembrance Day was posted on The American Friends Association of the University of Haifa Facebook page.