Despite suffering major flood damage in 2008, the original brick Art Building will be preserved. The building, which was planned a century ago and eventually built in 1936, included the studio of renowned artist and UI faculty member Grant Wood.

Pulitzer Prize winner and former Writers’ Workshop graduate and instructor Paul Harding will read from his new novel, "Enon," at 7 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 26, in a free reading at Prairie Lights Books in downtown Iowa City. The reading also will be streamed live on the University of Iowa Writing University website.

The University of Iowa School of Music will present a free performance by the UI Symphony Orchestra, conducted by William LaRue Jones, director of orchestral studies, at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 24, in the Main Lounge of the Iowa Memorial Union.

Two Emmy Award-winning writers. A space explorer with an asteroid named for him. A federal judge. An international choreographer. A battleship commander and presidential aide. What do they have in common? They're all UI College of Liberal Arts and Sciences alumni, and they're on campus this week.

Interstellar space, scientists now know with certainty, is dense with particles, and the place is literally hissing: “It’s almost a pure tone—like middle C, but slightly varying, like your piano is not quite tuned right,” says UI physicist Donald Gurnett.

On Thursday, scientists declared that Voyager I had become the first probe to exit the solar system, a breathtaking achievement that NASA could only fantasize about back when it was launched in 1977.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has selected the University of Iowa to receive one of six grant awards to identify modifiable maternal exposures in early pregnancy that may increase the risk of major birth defects. Each grant recipient will receive an estimated $3.5 million over the five-year project period.

The University of Iowa School of Art and Art History will present “Exuberant Politics,” a series of events involving Josh MacPhee, a printmaker, curator, writer, and activist who uses art to inject protest politics into public discourse, Sept. 23-28 in Iowa City.

The University of Iowa School of Music will present War and Patriotic Songs, a performance by Professor Katherine Eberle and students from her studio, at 3 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 22, in the University Capitol Centre Recital Hall. The concert, which will feature Jason Sifford on piano, is free and open to the public.

Voyager 1 didn’t get to interstellar space all on its own. The University of Iowa has been involved in the historic mission from the beginning, building a key instrument for the spacecraft that has produced many seminal discoveries on its 36-year journey—and counting.

University of Iowa space physicist Don Gurnett says there is solid evidence that NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft has become the first manmade object to reach interstellar space, more than 11 billion miles distant and 36 years after it was launched. Gurnett is principal investigator for the Voyager 1 Plasma Wave Instrument.

University of Iowa Professor of Physics and Astronomy Don Gurnett and research scientist Bill Kurth will present a free, public lecture on NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft and its historic encounter with interstellar space at 7 p.m. Monday, Sept. 16, in Lecture Room 1 of Van Allen Hall on the UI campus.