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Sex crimes in the age of AI: Prevention and response as online schemes evolve

Nov. 6, 2025

In March 2025, Austin Police allegedly found more than 365,000 images of child sexual abuse material on the devices of Carl Innmon, then a fifth grade teacher at Baranoff Elementary in the Austin Independent School District.

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Chilling diaries of teens who wrote the exact same haunting three words over and over right before they died … despite never meeting

Nov. 1, 2025

On opposite sides of the country two teenagers made the same tragic decision to end their lives just months apart. They did not know each other, but they both engaged with AI chatbots from Character.AI prior to their deaths.

Eureycea salamanders (left, credit: Yaqing Li) and Ambystoma salamanders (right, credit: David Ledesma) feature in two studies from UT.

Vulnerable Salamanders, Key to Healthy Ecosystems, a Focus in Two Studies

Oct. 20, 2025

As rising temperatures puts pressure on living things in Texas, fossil records offer lessons on how salamanders have fared with similar changes in the past, according to a new study published in the journal Quaternary Research and supported by UT Austin’s Planet Texas 2050.

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UT researchers use AI models to predict storm surges, infectious disease spread

Oct. 16, 2025

A group of UT researchers is using AI modeling to create user-friendly tools that track storm surges and chart their effects on the spread of infectious diseases in the Rio Grande Valley.

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Artificial intelligence expert weighs in on fake home invasion TikTok prank

Oct. 8, 2025

Round Rock police are warning the community about a viral TikTok trend where users are creating AI-generated images of home intruders to prank roommates, neighbors and parents.

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AI to the rescue? UT research team develops multilingual emergency messaging bot

Sept. 29, 2025

Through a joint venture with the city of Austin, a team of UT researchers is nearing the end of a three-phase, interdisciplinary exploration of AI’s ability to provide immediate, accurate emergency guidance across a wide range of languages.

A brightly lit, orange-hued AI-generated pastiche, with the outline of a man on the left, in the background, and a DNA strand on the right, in the foreground

Mind Over Molecules

Sept. 23, 2025

A new study from Whole Communities–Whole Health researchers shows that when it comes to changes in your DNA, how stressed you feel may be just as important as how stressed your body actually is.

A male blue jay (left), a female green jay (right) and, between them, a rare hybrid bird identified in a suburb of San Antonio, Texas

So What Should We Call This — a Grue Jay?

Sept. 19, 2025

Biologists at The University of Texas at Austin, who have reported discovering a bird that’s the natural result of a green jay and a blue jay’s mating, say it may be among the first examples of a hybrid animal that exists because of recent changing patterns in the climate.

At the Crosswalk: Who Does AI See? A UT Austin research team is investigating how appearance affects driver behavior—and how those patterns could be replicated in autonomous vehicles.

Unyielding Bias

Ago. 25, 2025

A team of Good Systems researchers is using video footage and VR simulations to study driver behavior toward pedestrians — and how bias may influence future AI systems.

Rabinowitz in excavation pit

Digging Into the Past to Prepare for the Future

Ago. 20, 2025
How a UT Austin research team is uncovering ancient strategies for resilience — through science, stories, and interdisciplinary collaboration