11-17-22 entire issue hi res

The Corne¬ Daily Sun

Tanksgiving Break Approaches

By MARISA CEFOLA Sun Staff Writer

With Thanksgiving break beginning next week, stu dents are excited to return to hometown routines, and those who are not going home are pleased to have some time off from classes.

Cornell students hail from across the country and world, with most students coming from New York, California, New Jersey and Massachusetts. Thanksgiving is the first extended break in the fall semester in which the majority of students will be trav eling home to see families.

Brenna Tosh ’24 from Newport Beach, California, is looking forward to visiting her favorite restaurants and attending a theater production with her mother and grandmother when she returns home for the break.

“The things that remind me of comfort and the things that comforted me in high school, such as my dog, very honestly that's a great thing for me to look forward to,” Tosh said.

Many students relocated to Ithaca from urban areas such as New York City, Philadelphia and Washington D.C., finding the adjustment a culture shock. Caroline Smiltneks ’26 from the D.C. metropolitan area takes advantage of the city each time she visits home.

“I think it’s nice to be back in a city after being in Ithaca,” Smiltneks said. “I’m looking forward to a change of scenery and seeing my family and friends.”

Ultimately, while students are eager to be back in their own homes, they find most comfort in getting to see their closest loved ones for the Thanksgiving holiday.

“Relationships here can be hard, so going back to something that’s constant back home is something that I know will be nice,” Tosh said.

To continue reading this article, please visit www. cornellsun.com.

Two Students Form Fundraisers for Ukranian Cities

By SOFIA RUBINSON and GABRIELLA PACITTO Sun News Editor and Assistant Sports Editor

As the Russo-Ukrainian War and destruction of Ukrainian cit ies continues, two Cornell stu dents, Kateryna Slinchenkova ’22 and Margarita grad, whose last name The Sun is withholding due to fear of retaliation from her home country of Russia, are orga nizing ongoing efforts to bring aid to Ukraine.

Slinchenkova was born in Dnipro, Ukraine, where she resided until a month before her ninth birthday when she moved to the United States. She would return to her home country each summer to see her family and childhood friends.

During her senior year at Cornell, Slinchenkova was on

the Ithaca campus when the war broke out. She remembered not knowing how to react to the news.

“I was very frustrated with people telling me how to feel before things started. And then after things started, I remember not really processing it, because people have been telling me I should panic. And now it’s actu ally time to panic,” Slinchenkova said. “There was a moment of like, is this even real? Do we even accept this?”

Margarita grew up in Siberia, Russia and completed her under graduate degree and masters in Moscow before moving to the United States in 2013 to attain her Ph.D. at Cornell. When news broke about the Ukraine attack, Margarita had a hard time pro cessing the reality and severity of

How to Navigate Cornell's First-Ever Climate Action Week

By ERIC REILLY Sun Contributor

This week is Cornell’s first Climate Action Week, coinciding with the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference, known as COP27. Climate Action Week aims to educate students about the University’s goal to be carbon neutral by 2035 and inspire them to get involved.

“Data from our annual Mission Sustainability course shows that 99 percent of Cornell students care about sustainabil ity,” said Kimberly Anderson, sustainabil ity engagement manager at the Campus Sustainability Office. “This week offers a variety of opportunities for students and

employees to learn more about global climate change and creative and exciting ways to take action right here on campus.”

From lectures and film screenings to conversations and sustainability work shops, this week includes several events centered around a call to action on climate change. A full list of events from before, during and after Climate Action Week can be found on the Sustainable Campus website.

On Tuesday, the Sustainability Office hosted a Cartooning for Climate event where attendees created their own climate cartoons. Participants were encouraged to narrate themes of climate change while exploring comical aesthetics.

Looking ahead, this Thursday marks

the second day of the Global Grand Challenges Symposium: Frontiers and the Future. Panel discussions will be held from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. in Clark Hall 700. Speakers will cover water quality, health research, space exploration and interna tional collaboration.

Later that day, Stand Up For Climate Change will run from 3 p.m. to 4 p.m. on Zoom. Hosted by the Campus Sustainability Office, this virtual comedy workshop will allow participants to devel op climate-related sketch comedy acts and stand-up. Participants will consider how humor can be used to communicate cli mate change issues in engaging and infor

Shi Miao Dao Margaret Haykin '25 and Catherine Zhang '25 review this new Collegetown staple.

Cornell Wedding Two Cornell lovebirds said "I do" during their ceremony in the Willard Straight Hall memorial room.

Aid efforts | Kateryna Slinchenkova '22 and Margarita grad joined forces to aid Ukranians affected by the Russo-Ukranian War.

HANNAH ROSENBERG / SUN SENIOR EDITOR

Combat climate change | Climate Action Week programming looks to inform students and employees about global climate change.

COURTESY OF RYAN YOUNG / CORNELL UNIVERSITY

JULIA NAGEL / SUN PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

First snow | Ithaca saw its first snow of the season this week, and students were greeted with makeshift snowmen across campus made from its remnants.

Hint of the Holidays

Marisa Cefola can be reached at mcefola@cornellsun.com.

Cornellians Fundraise for Ukrainian Cities Climate Action Week in Full Swing

mative ways.

the situation.

“Even though people were talking about it in the U.S. and in the news, for me — and for many of my friends — it seemed like something com pletely impossible,” Margarita said. “Something that doesn’t make any sense and cannot possibly happen, because this is a neighboring country.”

Slinchenkova finally real

refugees hiding in subways. After assessing these photos, the organization can prioritize their aid towards more immi nent needs and risks that arise.

In an attempt to find sol idarity and support, both Slinchenkova and Margarita attended a Cornell protest in early March. They met, began discussing their projects and a collaboration between Scholars for Ukraine and the Dnipro Fund was formed.

During the month of October, Scholars for Ukraine dedicated efforts toward fund raising for Dnipro Fund’s two projects.

Also on Thursday, Prof. Lori Leonard, global devel opment, and the Campus Sustainability Office will host a clothing upcycling workshop, sustainable laundry discussion and clothing swap at 7:30 p.m. in Mews Hall. The event will cover eco-friendly laundry habits, and participants will receive complementary wool dryer balls, a sustainable alter native to liquid fabric softener.

coalition of over 300 environ mental, labor, justice and com munity groups. Consisting of five current state senate bills, the Climate, Jobs and Justice package would support sus tainability projects across the state, including here in Ithaca.

York. At Friday’s rally, CJC will gather with community mem bers around a commitment to make Ithaca a more equitable place.

ized the extent of the conflict when a bombing in Kyiv left her family friend was stuck in a metro station for three days. The war was giving Slinchenkova extreme anxiety, and she was constantly check ing the news for updates on her hometown.

Slinchenkova’s closest tie in Ukraine is her grandfather, an ICU anaesthesiologist who works in Dnipro’s Sixth City Hospital. At the beginning of the war, her grandfather told her that due to short supplies, patients were either going to be treated without anesthesia or would not be treated at all. They didn’t have saline solu tion, catheters or the medi cine they would normally be prescribing for standard pro cedures.

“It’s not even an issue of local pharmacies,” Slinchenkova said. “It’s an issue of stocking hospitals, because he was say ing that the Red Cross wasn’t doing anything — they were not able to get into contact with someone who was able to deliver supplies directly to them.”

Slinchenkova began send ing all of her spare money to her grandfather and soon began the Dnipro Fund to fur ther support her hometown. The Fund sends donations to her grandfather’s hospital, the Zdorove Pokolinya Clinic and to the restoration of an old university building that is being used as a shelter for refugees.

In March, during a American Physical Society meeting in Chicago, Margarita encountered other Russian and Ukrainian scientists who felt inspired by the desire to help and the solidarity expressed at the meeting. They went on to form Scholars for Ukraine, a nonprofit that directs funds and supplies to Ukraine in an effort to provide aid to smaller cities that are often neglect ed by large aid organizations. Scholars for Ukraine has raised over $25,000 at the time of publication.

Margarita and other mem bers receive pictures and videos from Ukraine of new disas ters, torn down buildings or

Dnipro is gaining more and more refugees as many families enter the city looking for safe ty, while lacking bare necessi ties, according to Margarita. Scholars for Ukraine is organiz ing the creation of survival kits for refugees to provide them with basic necessities and help ing the Dnipro Fund with the implementation of a heating system in the restored universi ty building.

Both Slinchenkova and Margarita stressed the impor tance of continued focus and donations for Ukraine, espe cially as the conflict escalation continues on for over eight months.

“The people in Ukraine, the volunteers, they are incredible. They are real life heroes. Many of them could have left, but many stayed and often use their own resources to keep helping people,” Margarita said.

To continue reading this story, please visit cornellsun.com.

Sofa Rubinson can be reached at srubinson@cornellsun.com.

Gabriella Pacitto can be reached at gpacitto@cornellsun.com.

Climate Action Week wraps up on Friday, when Climate Justice Cornell will launch its Climate, Jobs and Justice cam paign at a rally in Thompson Park at 5 p.m. in support of a new bill package pushed by New York Renews, a state-wide

“Ithaca has a myri ad of issues that need to be addressed in order to achieve the goals laid out in the Ithaca Green New Deal,” said Laila Reimanis, CJC social media chair. “Ithaca needs to reduce emissions from existing build ings, and it has a profound need to reduce emissions from the transportation sector.”

Ithaca also faces issues around environmental jus tice; based on data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau, Ithaca has the worst income inequality of any city in New

“We hope to leverage our position as a progressive city in order to advance environ mental justice policies at the state level, particularly by securing the support of our local Assemblymember Anna Kelles,” Reimanis said.

Moving forward, CJC will continue participating in opportunities offered by New York Renews, including a lobby meeting with Kelles next week.

To continue reading this story, please visit cornellsun.com.

Eric Reilly can be reached at er496@cornell.edu.

Cornell Lovebirds Renew Vows

By SURITA BASU Sun Assistant Managing Editor

Rebecca Bisland ’10 and Matthew Bisland ’09 met at Cornell as fellow students in the School of Industrial and Labor Relations. They were married in a small ceremony after graduation but decid ed, over ten years later, to return to Ithaca and renew their vows.

On Oct. 22, the Bislands held a vow renewal ceremo ny in the Willard Straight Memorial Room. The week end and the ceremony were full of Cornell touches from a performance by The Cornell Hangovers to a surprise appearance by Touchdown the Bear.

“We had always wanted to do a Cornell wedding and I remember seeing brides on

campus when I was a stu dent,” Rebecca Bisland said. “It seemed like the perfect way to celebrate our mar riage.”

The Bislands were origi nally married in 2010 and planned to hold a vow renew al ceremony at Cornell in 2020, but had to reschedule due to the pandemic.

According to Matt Bisland, it was important to the cou ple that their vow renewal ceremony occur close to their actual anniversary date.

“It’s more common to have weddings during the Fall Break,” Matt said. “Our anni versary is Oct. 24 so we want ed to do [that] weekend.”

Cornell’s Ithaca campus is a popular wedding destina tion, with some of the most popular venues being Sage Chapel, Anabel Taylor Chapel

and Willard Straight Hall Memorial Room and Terrace, where the Bislands held their ceremony.

The Bislands said they were excited to use Cornell’s other iconic locations for photos, especially since they had never been to any of these locations all dressed up.

“We had a lot of fun doing photos around campus actual ly, we did some at A.D. White library, which is just such a beautiful place,” Rebecca Bisland said. “We had a lot of fun traipsing around, me in my dress and Matt in his tux and then all of the students dressed casually for class!”

To continue reading this story, please visit cornellsun.com.

Surita Basu can be reached at sbasu@cornellsun.com.

“One thing the Cornell community can do is just staying involved.”

Kateryna Slinchenkova ’22

Dining Guide

Your source for good food

Shi Miao Dao A new Collegetown staple?

By MARGARET HAYKIN and CATHERINE ZHANG Sun Staff Writers

Yet another restaurant has joined the ranks of the heavily-populated East Asian food scene in Collegetown. Shi Miao Dao (recently added to Google maps) is located on 416 Eddy Street in between De Tasty Hot Pot Restaurant and Four Seasons, two local, coveted staples, so we were eager to see if it would meet our expectations.

Shi Miao Dao Yunnan Rice Noodle is a sit-down restaurant serving rice noodle soup, the specialty dish of the Southern province of Yunnan, China. They started as a successful chain in China with over 750 locations, and have since expanded to North America with shops primarily located in New York City and Toronto. Besides Ithaca, other New York locations include East Village in Manhattan, and Flushing, Queens. US locations span from Philadelphia and Detroit to Houston and Denver.

Shi Miao’s name, which means “ten seconds until crossing the bridge rice noodles,” is a reference to the time it supposedly takes for your noodles to be ready. Typically, “crossing the bridge” noodles consists of a bowl of broth brought out so the person indulging can then add the noodles and customize a selection of toppings. These include sliced meats, pickled vegeta bles, lettuce, quail eggs, etc.

Walking in for a casual, Friday afternoon lunch, on Nov. 4, we were pleasantly surprised to see the

establishment was quite busy. We were greeted and sat down at one of the few rows of wooden tables. We were then handed menus, much of which were in Mandarin. We noticed the waiters spoke Mandarin, the background music was in Mandarin and many of the students seated also seemed to speak Mandarin. It was an authentic environment, to say the least, but we could see how it could be overwhelming for some one’s first time.

We ordered the sour and spicy cucumber to start, which came almost immediately. They were marinat ed in chili sauce and tasted strongly of peppercorn at first in your mouth, but then leveled out to a tangy, sour finish. We both thoroughly enjoyed them, espe cially because the taste was quite dissimilar to any thing we typically eat on a daily basis.

Catherine ordered the Original Crossing Bridge rice noodles and Margaret ordered the tomato soup with rice noodles, which we were told were the two most popular items (the tomato soup being one of the only vegetarian options for Margaret).

To continue reading, please visit www.cornellsun. com.

Margaret Haykin is a sophomore in the College of Industrial and Labor Relations. She can be reached at meh369@cornell.edu. Catherine Zhang is a soph omore in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. She can be reached at cz456@cornell.edu.

Te Shame of the Greek System

could be better spent on academic work and more rewarding extracurricular activities, including community service.

Since I frst discussed this issue at length in my book How to Succeed in College and Beyond: Te Art of Learning, I have seen no signifcant change and am even more certain than before that the Greek system, while providing value to some individual members, has outlived its usefulness.

an antiquated, sexist, classist, elitist, discriminatory system that encourages excessive drinking, sexual abuse and dumbing down of the intellectual environment, even as it discourages interaction among diverse racial, ethnic and socioeconomic groups. I recently spoke to a group of fraternity brothers where I saw some ethnic diversity but very little economic diversity, in part because membership in the Greek system is expensive.

Prof. Dan Schwarz

Guest Room

More than a decade ago, in 2011, former Cornell University president David Skorton penned an op-ed for Te New York Times after a 19-year-old Cornell sopho more named George Desdunes “died in a fraternity house while participating in a hazing episode that included mock kidnapping, ritualized humiliation and coerced drinking.” Pledging to take action to “remedy practices of the fraternity system that continue to foster hazing,” Skorton noted that, at Cornell, “high-risk drinking and drug use are two to three times more prevalent among fraternity and sorority members than elsewhere in the student population.”

Scores of hazing deaths have been recorded nationally — accounting for at least one death on a college campus per year since 1970 — but that does not begin to tell the story of what is wrong with the Greek system. What befuddles so many students and faculty is why it continues.

Te Greek system encourages excessive drinking, abusive bullying under the guise of hazing, groupthink and sexism in various forms ranging from the objectifcation of women to sexual assault. Tus the Greek system runs counter to the values espoused by contemporary colleges and universities.

Fraternities and — perhaps to a lesser extent at some colleges — sororities impose a kind of conformity that stifes growth and creates anxiety about being diferent. In the form of shared social, ethical and political attitudes and behavior, members are expected to adhere to the accepted mores of their Greek houses. Membership in Greek organizations stifes student innovation and creativity. Greek life absorbs time that

While my most intimate knowledge necessarily comes from Cornell — where only a third of undergraduate students belong to fraternities and sororities — I have for over half a century been reading about the Greek system and talking to colleagues and students during campus visits across the country. Although two Cornell students have died since 2011 due to two separate fraternity hazing incidents that received national attention, comparatively little has been done to control the Greek system here. In fact, Sigma Alpha Epsilon, the fraternity that was the site of Desdunes’s 2011 hazing-related death and was disbanded for a decade, has recently been allowed back on campus.

Just this past weekend, the Cornell police issued alerts reporting that one student was sexually assaulted and at least four others were drugged at of-campus residences afliated with registered fraternities, prompting the temporary suspen sion of all fraternity parties and social events.

Tese temporary measures raise a more timeless question: Why are these organizations tolerated by universities? We know from studies that alcohol abuse is more common among those belonging to the Greek system than among other stu dents and that membership in residential Greek organizations is associated with binge drinking and marijuana usage through midlife. As if that was not bad enough, a recent New York Times article on the University of Alabama’s sorority rush highlighted the superfciality and frivolity of this system and the signifcant cost in dollars that membership entails.

To be sure, one can fnd alumni and students who believe fraternities and sororities do enrich the lives of young adults. Yet, virtually every current and almost all recent female sorority members to whom I have spoken about the Greek system over the past few decades think it is obsolete and should be termi nated. While not as close to unanimous, most of the fraternity members to whom I have spoken one-on-one — as opposed to in the presence of their fraternity brothers — have similar views. Most current students — and almost all of the women — do not think that men and women should be segregated by gender, as is the case with the Cornell Greek system, except for pre-professional fraternities which are not really part of the traditional Greek system and not the subject of this essay.

Te Greek system makes my university, Cornell, less than it should be. I know of no student or faculty member who thinks that the minor tinkering that has been done these past few years sends the necessary message. Cornell needs to abolish

Notwithstanding announcements of reforms, the per ception among present and former students is that nothing substantive has been done. I understand from reading and discussion with students and colleagues that the same is true at many other colleges and universities despite signifcant eforts to abolish the Greek system on many campuses.

It is fair to say that a great many students and faculty believe on this issue that their administrations have been rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

It is puzzling why college presidents and trustees ignore this community cancer, since they must know that the com bination of hazing, bullying, predatory sexual behavior and binge drinking contributes to long-lasting physical and emo tional injuries. One reason for inaction is pressure from older alumni donors who treasure their Greek days in hindsight. But we know from colleges that have abolished the Greek system — Amherst, Colby, Middlebury, Swarthmore and Williams Colleges, among others — that fundraising goes on just fne in absence of fraternities.

Another reason for inaction is that the Greek system sup posedly helps solve housing problems. But were the Greek system to be terminated, the national organizations could sell the houses to the university at a nominal price since they would have no reason to sustain them. Te result would be no loss of housing space.

Te principal reason given by students for joining the Greek system is to overcome loneliness and give students a sense of belonging. But now there are a plethora of clubs and activities from a cappella groups to juggling groups, adding up on Cornell’s campus to well over 1,000 opportunities for students to fnd friends and cohorts and to make networking connections for future employment.

At a time when there were few organized activities on campus, the origins of the Greek system developed from a need for male bonding and, later in the 19th century when women began attending college in numbers, female bond ing. Te Greek system fourished during the time of parietal rules governing relationships between men and women on campus. But now these rules are vestiges of the past and an irrelevant encumbrance to university goals. Te question is whether, in 2022, colleges and universities are better of with the Greek system, and my answer — shared here by the vast majority of students and faculty I’ve spoken with — is a resounding no.

Democracy on the Ballot From Now On?

Te current political climate hints to a democ racy in free fall, and we can watch it failing towards the center of the earth or begin to think up some sort of remedy.

Te Space Between

Grammy was lamenting on the phone last night that this world is not one that she would want to be growing up in. Scanning the news, opinion colum nists seem to be questioning how much longer we will be waking up to democracy for breakfast. Recent New York Times columns titled “Dancing Near the Edge of a Lost Democracy,” “What Has Happened to My Country?” and “What’s at Stake in Tese Elections” capture society teetering on the edge. Looking at the New York Times archives the day before Barack Obama’s midterm elections in 2014 did not reveal such alarmist attitudes towards the future of democracy.

Every generation has diferent formative experiences that they carry throughout their lifetimes. Our current moment is one of intense cynicism, polarization and bitterness. Democratic backsliding defned as the decline of democratic characteristics of a political sys tem is often brought up in conversation and class. It’s not hard to come up with examples that demonstrate the phenomena: Donald Trump’s declaration of victory in the 2020 election before all the ballots were counted, the Jan. 6 Capital riot, the rollback of the federal protection of a woman’s right to an abortion in the Dobbs v. Jackson Supreme Court case, Trump’s storage of classifed documents at his Mar-a-Lago compound, the violent assault of Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, the rise and acceptance of political violence.

Democracy evolves throughout time shaped by our own ideas and perceptions. In western culture democracy goes back to ancient Greece, though women and slaves were not included in the political system. American democracy began quite similarly, only granting white men with property the ability to participate — excluding women and slaves. In a class I took on the United States Constitution we debated whether or not we consider the Constitution to be pro-slavery and anti-feminist. Te 3/5 com promise in article one, section two increased the political power of slaveholding states and is a glaring example of the racism baked into American democracy from the start.

Reformers like Frederick Douglas believed in the higher law of the Constitution which allowed for him to advance the democratic ethos that we must champion. Te great chal lenge of American democracy is the confict between white supremacy and the democratic ethos Douglas believed in.

Tere are many strands that exist in American democracy. When Barack Obama took ofce, he ordered the bust of Winston Churchill to be removed from the Oval Ofce due to Churchill’s egregious actions in Africa. When Trump took ofce, he requested that a painting of Andrew Jackson be hung on the wall. Tese past presidents place themselves amongst and align them selves within the patchwork of American democracy. Trump aligned himself with the strand of populism that Andrew Jackson and William Jennings Bryan promulgated. Trump’s populism spoke to those who felt left behind, particularly after the 2007 repres sion. Tough he coupled economic unrest with ideas of replacement theory, dog whistle politics and fat out racism — exposing an underestimated ideology in American politics and echoing the racist history of the country.

In Margaret Renkl’s “What Has Happened to My Country” Renkl discusses the themes concurrent with democratic backsliding and quotes a line from Yeats’s “Te Second Coming:” “Tings fall apart; the center cannot hold;/Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.” Tinking back to what my grandmother said on the phone, each generation has seen things fall apart. From hearing about relatives that died in the Holocaust to the rampant fear of the Cold War that entailed students hiding

under desks to protect one from all out nuclear war (which thankfully did not occur). Now we watch the phantasmagoria of politics play out, breathing a sigh of relief that Democrats won control of the Senate. Tough the outcomes in states with gubernatorial races are of utmost importance as states control elections. Without sensible governors, the foundation of democ racy which rests on a free and fair election sys tem is at risk if Trump runs again in 2024 and attempts to contest a loss. Te reverberations of Trump’s actions in 2020 were felt in Brazil’s past election cycle where Bolsonaro contested the election before accepting defeat.

With Renkl quoting Yeats’s famous line in reference to American politics, one must wonder whether there is a political or cultural center to America. Tere are multiple stands of belief in our democracy and multiple subcultures present that are continuously weaving together. Te American political tra dition responds to cultural pluralism through enacting laws that champion and increase diversity. Tough, the equality that Frederick Douglas believed in is consistently questioned as is evident when the supreme court hears arguments against afrmative action. My fellow columnist Gabe Levin ’26 discusses this at length in his most recent column. Cultural pluralism is expanded at universities by extending the canon taught in English classes, though it moves backwards in schools across the country when books and critical race theory are banned. One can consider this a side-efect of the culture wars, a cul mination of fear in society or the anxiety of a democracy with no center and a troubled past.

Rebecca Sparacio (she/her) is a junior in the Col lege of Arts and Sciences. She can be reached at rsparacio@cornellsun.com. Te Space Between runs every other Tuesday this semester.

Rebecca Sparacio

Dan Schwarz is the Frederic J. Whiton Professor of English Literature and Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellow at Cornell. Comments can be sent to opinion@cornellsun.com Guest Room runs intermittantly this semester.

DOUBLE

Fill in the empty cells, one number in each, so that each column, row, and region contains the num bers 1-9 exactly once. Each number in the solution therefore occurs only once in each of the three “directions,” hence the “single numbers” implied by the puzzle’s name.

(Rules from wiki pedia.org/wiki/ Sudoku)

I am going to be small

Mr. Gnu

by Travis Dandro

Mr. Gnu

by Travis Dandro

SC I ENCE

Human Centered Design Discuss Coperni’s Spray-On Dress

By MARIAN CABALLO Sun Staff Writer

After Bella Hadid walked the October 2022 Coperni runway in a sprayed-on slit dress, vid eos of the outfit garnered millions of views as the moment reached a media impact value of $26.3 million.

Hadid’s viral dress employed Fabrican’s spray-on fabric technol ogy, an invention created by Manel Torres in 2003. Fabrican is just one of many new innovative fab rics that have the poten tial to revolutionize the fashion industry, which now has a heightened focus on sustainability.

“I think Bella Hadid’s viral dress, made by designers Sebastien Meyer and Arnaud Vaillan, speaks volumes to the future of fashion and the future of technol ogy in general,” Devin Schneider ’23, president of the Cornell Fashion Collective, wrote in an email to The Sun.

“I thought it was defi nitely something new that the industry hasn’t real ly seen, which is always

refreshing to see,” Anna Paaske ’24, CFC Creative Director, wrote.

These innovative tex tiles embrace the fields of chemistry, fashion design and fiber science — a degree unique to the Human Centered Design program under Cornell’s College of Human Ecology.

“Our program focus es on many aspects of fibers and fabrics, from creating fabrics that can serve as sensors, to unique finishes to create sustain able textiles, to fashion design,” Prof. Hinestroza, fiber science and apparel design, wrote in an email to The Sun.

Hinestroza’s research group, the Textiles Nanotechnology Laboratory, is working on transforming waste tex tiles into valuable mole cules, such as anti-bacte rial compounds.

According to Hinestroza, Fabrican’s technology appears to involve the spraying of an elastomeric solution, a material which has elastic properties.

“A dissolved elastomer is forced through a small

nozzle creating a jet that upon contact with the air, dries,” Hinestroza wrote.

Composed of poly mer-bounded short fibers, the technology is mixed with solvents that keep the formula in liquid form. When it reaches skin or other surfaces, these solvents evaporate.

These spray-on fab rics can vary in texture if chemical compositions are altered. Users can also add additional materials to the fabric, including pigments and perfumes.

Hinestroza believed that Bella Hadid’s skin was most likely covered in an oily substance to keep the fiber from sticking to the skin, forming a non woven fabric. Nonwoven fabrics are distinct in that they are not composed of interwoven or knitted strands, instead relying on the thermal, chemical or mechanical binding of fibers.

Fabrican has started applying this technology to additional sectors like healthcare and design. Nonwoven fabrics are already being used in products like napkins, toilet paper, hygiene

products and masks.

But there are many challenges obstruct ing the every-day use of Fabrican. The prop erties of polymer may be altered due tohuman sweat and body tem perature changes.

Sprayon fabric like Fabrican is promising for sustain ability due to its recy clability and enabling of synthetic leather creation. However, Paaske would not pinpoint this as a top solution.

“The spray can use either natural or synthet ic fibers, both of which have their own caveats, and there are most likely microplastics in the spray as well,” Paaske wrote.

The fashion industry currently accounts for 8-10 percent of carbon

dioxide emissions, pro ducing 60 million tons of plastic each year.

“I think the main developments are now focused on reducing the amount of microplastics created by synthetic fibers as well as the repurposing and recovery of chemical compounds from waste textiles,” Hinestroza wrote.

Microplastics, up to five millimeters long, have severe impacts on the environment and marine wildlife.

“Textiles and fashion

need very talented engi neers and scientists too as we face a major challenge with textile waste and massive pollution created by the fashion industry,” Hinestroza wrote.

Hinestroza’s Textiles Nanotechnology Laboratory hopes for fur ther development, much like Fabrican, to find alternatives to solve the problem of textile waste and pollution.

Marian Caballo can reached at mcaballo@cornellsun.com.

C.U. Proteome Research Shows Communication Within DNA

By CHRISTALYN AUSLER Sun Staff Writer

This month, Prof. Franklin Pugh, molecular biology and genetics, and researchers Chitvan Mittal grad, Olivia Lang grad, and William K.M. Lai grad, found that inducible systems work in conjunction with con stitutive systems to produce vari able outputs depending on the “on” or “off” state of certain cofactors — this highlights new understandings of how the epig enome impacts transcription within cells.

The team published their study “An Integrate SAGA and

TFID PIC Assembly Pathway Selective For Poised and Induced Promoters” in the journal Genes and Development.

The study used yeast as a model to ascertain the func tionality of inducible systems within the genome dedicated to gene expression. Inducible systems are systems that are typ ically turned on by environmen tal changes in the microenvi ronment. Pugh likened yeast as a simpler model to study the molecular machinery that regu lates genes in humans.

“Turns out that the molecular machinery that regulates genes in yeast is quite similar to the

ones in humans, so by study ing yeast at the molecular level, we get a better understanding of human gene regulation at the molecular level,” Pugh said. “But yeast is not human, so there are also many differenc es. The fundamentals are quite similar.”

With this yeast model, the researchers were able to define distinct mechanistic differences between types of inducible sys tems as compared to constitutive systems.

While inducible genes are genes that are only expressed under specific environmen tal conditions, constitutive

genes are genes that are always expressed and serve as a back ground for the functioning of the genome’s gene expression.

Within the subgroup of inducible genes are promoters specific to these types of sys tems that have to be engaged or “induced” to effectively turn on the instructions for the gene.

The researchers distin guished five pronounced classes of promoters specific to their research goals in their paper: RP, induced, poised, constitutive and condition-specific, such as being induced by heat shock.

Through complex characteri zations of these different types of promoters the researchers deter mined a dependency between specific cofactors, or general transcription factors, and induc ible promoters.

A cofactor is a molecule attached to a protein that allows it to function. A tran scription factor — a protein that participates in transcrib ing DNA into RNA — uses cofactors to transcribe DNA.

Transcription is vital for the expression of a protein in a cell, which determines how a cell functions.

The researchers elucidated a dependency of inducible promoters on a high concen tration of general transcrip tion factors to a more specific factor associated with TBP — called TBP-associated factors or TAF.

This dependency suggests

a compelling mechanism that could uptake TAF to create an environment capable of assem bling the necessary supplies to begin transcribing DNA into RNA, but this warrants addi tional follow-up, according to researchers.

“We would like to try to remove TAFs in other ways [mutations] to achieve this and see if we can get at least some transcription,” Pugh said.

Although this complex com munication and receptiveness throughout the epigenome of yeast and humans can never be fully assessed in one paper, Pugh points towards new directions of research from this novel paper with a quickly changing hori zon.

“What we found is that most PIC [pre-initiation complex] components like TFIIB, TBP [and] RNA polymerase II do not [contact or interact with specific transcription factors],” Pugh said. “However, we found one that does: TFIIA. While TFIIA is thought to be a general transcription factor, it behaves more like a TAF.”

Pugh said these findings will further our understanding of how small environmental chang es can impact our epigenome, opening further discussion into genetic disorders and other dis eases that arise throughout the life of a human.

S. Cerevisiae | A microscopic photograph of yeast, which was the model microorganism used to deduce gene expression functions of inducible systems within the genome.

Christalyn Ausler can be reached at causler@cornellsun.com.

Leather and lace | Model Bella Hadid wore an all black ensemble at the 2022 Met Gala.

COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

DAMON WINTER / THE NEW YORK TIMES