Skip to main content

December 7, 2020

Research

How the leading coronavirus vaccines made it to the finish line

The Washington Post

Some scientists believed from the start that it would be possible to repurpose this basic cellular function for medicine. In 1990, a Hungarian-born scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, Katalin Kariko brashly predicted to a surgeon colleague that his work would soon be obsolete, replaced by the power of messenger RNA therapies. That same year, a team at the University of Wisconsin startled the scientific world with a paper that showed it was possible to inject a snippet of messenger RNA into mice and turn their muscle cells into factories, creating proteins on demand.

Research inspired by COVID-19: ‘COVID toes’ likely a sign of successful viral response

The Capital Times

Over a few weeks, there was nearly a 300% increase of patients in Wisconsin exhibiting the condition compared to 2019, said Lisa Arkin, director of pediatric dermatology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Trends were similar across the United States. “This was a real pivot because there aren’t so many dermatologists doing COVID-19 research,” Arkin said. “Suddenly, in the spring, there was an avalanche of patients, many of whom had had symptoms for several weeks.”

Higher Education/System

Campus life

First-Year College Students Reflect On ‘Intense’ Pandemic Semester

Wisconsin Public Radio

University of Wisconsin System campuses are wrapping up their first full semester amid the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s been anything but normal, and for some first-year students, finding a sense of community on campus has been hampered by heavy restrictions on social gatherings. Mental health experts say that isolation is a problem and has contributed to a myriad of anxieties faced by students.

State news

Agriculture

Community

Dig deeper during this season of giving — Jeff Russell

Wisconsin State Journal

Column by Jeff Russell, Dean of the Division of Continuing Studies, UW-Madison. :The economic fallout from the pandemic has touched all of us, but very disproportionately. Witness recent market highs that will benefit a fortunate slice of society while many struggle mightily.”

Health

UW Health designated a hub for Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine distribution

WKOW-TV 27

“We are proud to play a role in helping our partners in the area get vaccine doses they need to protect their frontline workers as fast as possible so we can get on to the next group of people to be vaccinated,” said Matt Anderson, senior medical director ambulatory operations, UW Health.

Athletics

UW Experts in the News

The Easy Way to Quit Smoking

The Atlantic

“I am always a bit suspicious of silver bullets in public health,” Michael Fiore, one of the country’s leading experts on tobacco use and smoking cessation, told me. “Things are rarely silver bullets. But reducing the nicotine in cigarettes to near-zero is as close to a silver bullet as you get.”

Why Bridging the Urban-Rural Divide Might Save Our Lives

Mother Jones

Four years later, those divisions are as solid as ever, and a pandemic has shown us how deadly they can turn. Cramer, a political science professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison, watched the virus hit the state’s cities first. Amid a tornado of misinformation and political polarization, many people in more rural—and more conservative—corners of the state became skeptical about whether the pandemic response they were hearing about was designed for them.

Primer on Trump’s Visit to Georgia

FactCheck.org

Barry Burden, director of the Elections Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told us it is not possible to know how many Georgians voted for Biden and no other candidate. That “would require individual-level information from ballots, not aggregation information about ballots cast in each race,” he said.

No, that’s not a mountain behind Madison…

NBC-15

Researcher Tim Wagner at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Space, Science, & Engineering Center (SSEC) knew exactly what it was. All he had to utter was “Superior Mirage” and his wife grabbed his camera for him. He snapped a photo shortly before 8:30 Wednesday morning – showing what appeared to be a mountain behind the capitol city.

Obituaries

Kuczmarski, Thomas A.

Wisconsin State Journal

From 1969 to 1980, he was employed as a systems programmer at the University of Wisconsin’s Madison Academic Computing Center.

West, Richard Carroll

Wisconsin State Journal

Until his retirement, Richard was employed as the Senior Academic Librarian Emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Laxova, Renata

Wisconsin State Journal

In 1975, she moved to Madison, Wis., where she joined the faculty at the UW Medical School. During her tenure, Renata made foundational contributions to the fields of medical genetics, human developmental disabilities, genetic counseling and prenatal diagnosis. She established the Statewide Genetic Services Network in Wisconsin, instituted the University of Wisconsin Master of Genetic Counselor Studies degree program, and advocated tirelessly for genetics services in Wisconsin and at the national level.

UW-Madison Related