Skip to main content

Author: jplucas

Doug Moe: Hall of Fame induction will be a capstone to UW sprinter’s long journey

Wisconsin State Journal

When the phone call came, back in March, Dick Houden thought it was a joke. He has kids who are not above pulling pranks. When Houden realized it truly was Barry Alvarez, and that he was calling to tell Houden he had been selected for the University of Wisconsin Athletic Hall of Fame, Houden couldn?t help it. He wept. Houden was a sprinter who specialized in short distances, but he?d come a very long way. Friday evening, Houden will be one of six former UW athletes inducted into the hall, with Alvarez himself ? the winningest football coach in school history ? making a total of seven in the 2010 class.

UW praises stem cell ruling but wants law changed

Madison.com

Stem cell researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are relieved by a court ruling that will allow their federal funding to continue temporarily. Researchers had warned that studies on a range of diseases would come to a halt if a federal judge?s order blocking the funding stayed in place. An appeals court ruled Thursday the funding can proceed temporarily until the court rules on the Obama administration?s position in a lawsuit that calls the research illegal. UW-Madison?s federal lobbyist Rhonda Norsetter says the decision is terrific news.

Update: UW scientist praises court ruling that allows stem cell funding

Wisconsin State Journal

A leading scientist at UW-Madison praised a ruling Thursday lifting a recent ban on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research but said an ongoing court case still calls the future of the funding into question. “It?s good news; we hope this will allow the research to go on unimpeded,” said Dr. Tim Kamp, director of the university?s Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine Center. “The challenge is that it?s hard to plan for the future with this on-again, off-again situation.” A federal appeals court permitted federal funding of embryonic stem cell research to proceed while it considers a judge?s ruling last month that had temporarily shut off the funds.

Embryonic stem cell funding allowed — for now

Madison.com

The government may resume funding of embryonic stem cell research for now, an appeals court said Thursday, but the short-term approval may be of little help to research scientists caught in a legal battle that has just begun. It is far from certain that scientists actually will continue to get federal money as they struggle to decide what to do with research that is hard to start and stop.
Quoted: Dr. Norman Fost, director of the bioethics program at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, who was on the National Academy of Sciences committee that wrote the first national guidelines on embryonic human stem cells.

Stem Cell Ban Lifted Pending Court Appeal

ABCNEWS.com

Following an outcry from the Obama administration and the scientific community, an appeals court Thursday lifted the controversial Aug. 23 injunction placed on federal funding for human embryonic stem cell research by Judge Royce C. Lamberth.

Obama To Hold Rally In Madison

WISC-TV 3

Quoted: “It?s going to be great to have the president back in Madison,” said Evan Giesemann, chairman of the University of Wisconsin-Madison College Democrats. “He obviously has a lot of fans here, and it will be great to hear his message.”

Disagreeing Over Care After an Operation Fails

New York Times

Noted: With support from the Greenwall Foundation, researchers from the University of Wisconsin in Madison and the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee asked a small group of doctors involved in high-risk elective operations about withdrawal of life support, advance directives and informed consent and presented clinical scenarios that involved withdrawing care.

Early Warning for Endangered Species? (Science)

Ecologists have long wondered how to tell when a population of animals is about to slide toward extinction. A new study provides a statistical alarm that does just that. “The paper is an important test of early-warning signals,” says ecologist Stephen Carpenter of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who was not involved in the work. The result was based on a simple laboratory experiment, but if the technique works in the wild, it could help land managers know when they need to step up their conservation efforts.

Dalai Lama gives $50K to support brain research

Madison.com

The Dalai Lama is putting his money where his mouth is. The Tibetan spiritual leader has given $50,000 from his personal trust to support research into the science behind kindness and compassion at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The grant to the school?s Center for Investigating Healthy Minds comes after the Dalai Lama promoted its work during a visit to Madison in May.

Geology: A trip to dinosaur time

Nature

The key to answering all of these questions will be accurate dating of the core. This will help to correlate the Songliao records with their marine counterparts. “Without a precise timescale, the values of any other pieces of information that can be recovered from the core would be diminished tremendously,” says Bradley Singer, a geochronologist at the University of Wisconsin?Madison.

Seven Tips for Overcoming E-Mail Overload

ABCNEWS.com

Quoted: “Have certain messages go directly into folders that you can look at just when you want to,” said Joanne Cantor, director of the Center for Communication Research at the University of Wisconsin?Madison and author of “Conquer CyberOverload.”

English assimilation process not always speedy

Deseret News (Salt Lake City)

Noted: German immigrants to the Badger State between the 1830s and 1930s actually found little reason to master English, “appearing to live and thrive for decades while speaking exclusively German,” concluded Miranda Wilkerson, then an assistant professor of German at Western Illinois University and Joseph Salmons, a professor of German at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

GOP nomination for governor hard to predict

Wisconsin Radio Network

Quoted: UW-Madison Political Scientist Charles Franklin says the race has been a very difficult one to handicap, since there?s been almost no recent public polling directly comparing the two candidates. He says that creates a situation where conventional wisdom can ?run away? and we just don?t know what the outcome will be. 

Wis. governor says stem cell ruling could hurt

Madison.com

Wisconsin will “move forward on every legal front we can” to overturn a court ruling that has blocked federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, Gov. Jim Doyle said Tuesday.D oyle said the injunction entered by a federal judge in Washington last month could cripple Wisconsin?s growing bioscience industry and stop the search for cures for disease. Doyle spoke at the Waisman Center, where UW-Madison scientists using stem cells to study ways to treat eye disorders and Down syndrome expect to immediately lose grants totaling $400,000. UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin said two dozen university researchers have been affected by U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth?s decision, and jobs and millions of dollars are at stake.

State, university band together to fight for University of Wisconsin stem cell research

Wisconsin State Journal

With research grants on hold and dozens of scientists uncertain about ongoing experiments, Gov. Jim Doyle and UW-Madison officials said Tuesday that a recent federal court ruling that halts federally funded work with human embryonic stem cells is a serious threat that both the state and the university intend to fight. “There is an incredible amount of uncertainty,” Doyle said at a press conference at UW-Madison?s Waisman Center, where researchers are relying on stem cells to study maladies such as vision problems and Down syndrome. As they await the outcome of legal challenges, as many as two dozen UW-Madison stem cell researchers face costly disruptions in their efforts to test the cells? power to cure human ailments such as juvenile diabetes and spinal injuries, Chancellor Biddy Martin said at the news conference.

Bucky Badger head returned unscathed at UW-Madison

Madison.com

The head of Bucky Badger has been returned. A University of Wisconsin-Madison student who?s one of several who play the role of mascot Bucky Badger told police he and his roommates had a get-together with friends at their Madison apartment Sunday night. He said the 28-pound Bucky head was missing when he awoke Monday morning.

Best college towns (and cities) ranked

USA Today

Shopping for colleges? Location may be more important than you think, according to a new index of 75 “best cities” for college students. “The education and experiences you get extend beyond the walls of the campus,” says Kerry Lynch, senior fellow at the non-profit American Institute for Economic Research, whose 2010-2011 College Destination Index is out Wednesday.
Note: Madison is ranked #6 in its size category.

Brazilian Universities Find Challenges in Internationalization

Chronicle of Higher Education

Noted: Certainly, Brazil?s top universities find they have no shortage of suitors from abroad. A number of Brazilian institutions have signed deals recently with universities elsewhere. The University of São Paulo recently arranged a student- and faculty-exchange agreement with China?s Henan University. In April, the University of Wisconsin at Madison announced a plan to deepen its ties to Brazil and its higher-education establishment.”We have started a series of symposia about Brazil. We are identifying some strategic partnerships with universities in Brazil,” says Giles Bousquet, dean of international studies and vice provost for globalization. “It is a paradigm shift, and that paradigm shift is refocusing the university in educating graduates that are going to see the emerging powers as a key group of partners and Brazil as a key country.”

Madison Muslims Have Concerns

NBC-15

Madison?s Islamic Center is a busy place. Only a few blocks from campus many students pour in for prayer. They do it with a lot on their mind. Muslim Students Association President Rashid Dar says, “It gets kind of disheartening after a while.”