ANTHROPOLOGY ASSISTANT Professor Kelly Dixon stepped back in time and into the national media spotlight when she and colleagues unearthed a fire hearth at a campsite used by the ill-fated Donner Party. Analyzing charred bones and other artifacts — from buttons to condiment and pharmaceutical bottles — Dixon and other researchers plan to examine how Donner family members adapted to desperate situations, as well as provide a more humanistic interpretation of a story that has been overshadowed by cannibalism.

MARMOT RESEARCH in Washington state’s Olympic National Park has earned UM’s Sue Griffin a $78,000 scholarship to continue her work. A doctoral student in forestry and conservation, Griffin was one of only eight students nationwide to win the award sponsored by Canon U.S.A. Inc., the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the U.S. National Park Service. Griffin studies the marmota olympus, an endemic species found only in high-elevation meadows along the Olympic Peninsula.

RESEARCHERS BROUGHT in more than $65 million in external grants and contracts for another record-setting year in 2004. Top awards were posted in the schools of Pharmacy and Allied Health Sciences (left) and Forestry and Conservation, as well as the Division of Educational Research and Service. More lab space has been added to keep up with surging research efforts. Meanwhile, President George Dennison has challenged faculty to push the 2005 grant total to $70 million.

THE SCHOOL OF Pharmacy and Allied Health Sciences ranks seventh nationally out of 94 institutions for attracting biomedical research grants. Last year the school brought in $11 million in external funding, more than any other campus entity. As a result, the school has outgrown the Skaggs Building, constructed just four years ago. Federal grants and private donations have paved the way to build the Biomedical Research Facility and Science Learning Complex, a 59,000-square-foot addition.

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DAVE FORBES, dean of the UM School of Pharmacy and Allied Health Sciences, was invited to testify about financing higher education during a U.S. Senate Finance Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in July. Forbes highlighted how UM and the school he leads have benefited from federal support, allowing programs to expand and providing greater access to students. The hearing was titled “The Role of Higher Education Financing in Strengthening U.S. Competitiveness in a Global Economy."

FROM OUTDOOR enthusiasts to wheat farmers, weather plays a crucial role in everyone’s life. But Big Sky Country was one of only three states without a climatology office until UM stepped forward to start the Montana Climate Center (right). Operated by the College of Forestry and Conservation — specifically the Numerical Terradynamic Simulation Group, which designs software for NASA environmental satellites — the center provides a gateway to an array of information, including current satellite snapshots of Montana skies.