{"id":20930,"date":"2025-04-15T15:22:06","date_gmt":"2025-04-15T19:22:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/?post_type=story&#038;p=20930"},"modified":"2025-04-15T15:22:08","modified_gmt":"2025-04-15T19:22:08","slug":"fungal-armageddon","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2025\/04\/15\/fungal-armageddon\/","title":{"rendered":"Fungal armageddon"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Why We&#8217;re Drawn to \u201cThe Last of Us\u201d with Professors Betsy Huang, Ulm, and Javier Tabima Restrepo <\/h2>\n\n\n<iframe allow=\"autoplay *; encrypted-media *; fullscreen *; clipboard-write\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"175\" style=\"border:0;width:100%;max-width:800px;overflow:hidden;background:transparent;\" sandbox=\"allow-forms allow-popups allow-same-origin allow-scripts allow-storage-access-by-user-activation allow-top-navigation-by-user-activation\" src=\"https:\/\/embed.podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/fungal-armageddon-why-were-drawn-to-the-last-of\/id1608025510?i=1000703041983\"><\/iframe>\n\n\n\n<p>With season two of HBO Max&#8217;s &#8220;The Last of Us,&#8221; based on the acclaimed video game franchise created by Naughty Dog, hitting screens this month, we asked Clark University professors to unpack people&#8217;s fascination with post-apocalyptic stories and comment on the fictional science of the series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On this episode of <strong>Challenge. Change.<\/strong>, English Professor Betsy Huang discusses speculative fiction and the depiction of institutions in catastrophic tales; Becker School of Design &amp; Technology Professor Ulm explains how video games help players explore their fears; and mycologist and biology Professor Javier Tabima Restrepo comments on the depiction of <em>Cordyceps<\/em> in this wildly popular game and show.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Challenge. Change. <\/strong>is produced by graduate student Brenna Moore &#8217;24, MSC &#8217;25, and Melissa Hanson for Clark University. Find other episodes wherever you listen to podcasts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-buttons alignwide is-content-justification-center is-layout-flex wp-container-core-buttons-is-layout-a89b3969 wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link has-text-align-center wp-element-button\" href=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2025\/04\/10\/after-the-end\/\">&#8216;after the end&#8217;<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignwide size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" src=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Tabima-Lab-student-h.jpg\" alt=\"Javier Tadima interacting with biology student in the lab\" class=\"wp-image-20788\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Tabima-Lab-student-h.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Tabima-Lab-student-h-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Tabima-Lab-student-h-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Tabima-Lab-student-h-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Tabima-Lab-student-h-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Tabima-Lab-student-h-2048x1366.jpg 2048w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Tabima-Lab-student-h-1200x800.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Professor Javier Tabima in his lab with students.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns alignwide is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-28f84493 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"800\" height=\"1200\" src=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Ulm-portrait.jpg\" alt=\"Terrasa Ulm\" class=\"wp-image-20780\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Ulm-portrait.jpg 800w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Ulm-portrait-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Ulm-portrait-683x1024.jpg 683w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Ulm-portrait-768x1152.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Professor Ulm<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"800\" height=\"1200\" src=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Betsy-Huang-portrait.jpg\" alt=\"Betsy Huang\" class=\"wp-image-20776\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Betsy-Huang-portrait.jpg 800w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Betsy-Huang-portrait-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Betsy-Huang-portrait-683x1024.jpg 683w, https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Betsy-Huang-portrait-768x1152.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Professor Betsy Huang<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Why We&#8217;re Drawn to \u201cThe Last of Us\u201d with Professors Betsy Huang, Ulm, and Javier Tabima Restrepo With season two of HBO Max&#8217;s &#8220;The Last of Us,&#8221; based on the acclaimed video game franchise created by Naughty Dog, hitting screens this month, we asked Clark University professors to unpack people&#8217;s fascination with post-apocalyptic stories and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":18242,"template":"","meta":{"story_color":"#525250","story_headerImg":18242,"section_label":"Challenge. Change. Podcast","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[225,227],"displayed_author":[226],"featured":[],"topic":[238,244,117,144,176],"class_list":["post-20930","story","type-story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-humanities","category-science-technology","displayed_author-brenna-moore-24-msc-25","topic-becker-school-of-design-technology-at-clark-university","topic-biology","topic-english","topic-interactive-game-design","topic-podcast"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.4 (Yoast SEO v27.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Fungal armageddon | ClarkU News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2025\/04\/15\/fungal-armageddon\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Fungal armageddon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Why We&#8217;re Drawn to \u201cThe Last of Us\u201d with Professors Betsy Huang, Ulm, and Javier Tabima Restrepo With season two of HBO Max&#8217;s &#8220;The Last of Us,&#8221; 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