Quoted: “Bringing her into the cabinet puts her in a position where she has to defend Obama’s ideas,” says UW Madison political scientist Charles Franklin. “A secretary of state has some autonomy, but ultimately is responsible to the president. At the same time, he doesn’t have much foreign policy experience.
Gordon “Gordie” Francis Mathias Littel has died at the age of 79. Gordie worked as a sheet metal worker, painter and custodian for the UW-Madison.
Wisconsin-based start-up Resilient Technologies LLC is working on a four-year, US $18 million project with the U.S. DoD (Department of Defense) and the University of Wisconsin-Madison to research and develop a non-pneumatic tire for use on heavy-grade military vehicles such as Humvees.
When Ben Granby ran for Dane County coroner a decade ago, he pledged to “demystify the office” and wanted to market key chains, T-shirts and caps with the coroner’s logo.
He lost that election to former coroner Ray Wosepka and after thinking about making another what he described as a “joke-candidacy” run for sheriff in 2000, Granby, who had founded the political student group Ten Fat Tigers on the UW-Madison campus, gave up local politics for an international perspective.
University of Wisconsin System President Kevin Reilly has halved his recommendation for faculty pay raises because of the growing financial strains on the state government.
Reilly said he is recommending annual raises of 2.5 percent for faculty and staff members rather than 5.2 percent to help address what could be the worst budget deficit in the state’s history.
European patent regulators have upheld an earlier rejection of a 13-year-old stem-cell patent filed by a UW-Madison affiliate, saying that inventions that exploit human embryos can’t be patented.
The board of appeals for the European Patent Office upheld the earlier decision on the patent request by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, which helps commercialize the university’s research. The rejection was based on a rule that forbids patenting of inventions that use or destroy human embryos for commercial purposes.
It’s time to put director Mike Leckrone and his UW Marching Band on notice.
Either Leckrone gets the band to stop the senseless, repulsive hazing of younger members, or UW officials replace Lekrone with somone who can.
It’s that simple.
Last summer, presidents of more than 100 colleges, including prominent schools like Duke and Ohio State, prompted a heated national debate by calling on lawmakers to rethink the national drinking age of 21. The group, called the Amethyst Initiative, argued current laws only encourage binge-drinking by driving it into the shadows. But beneath that debate was another contentious one about whether colleges and their presidents are really doing enough to combat alcohol problems.
European regulators on Thursday ruled against allowing a patent on developing human embryonic stem cells, a decision that could stifle research by stem cell companies for commercial purposes.
Quoted: Journalism professor Stephen Ward said Mr. Mason was essentially duty bound as a journalist to rebuff the police request.
“If you simply give the information over to the police, you start to become identified with the police and the justice system or at least the prosecuting side of the justice system and that’s not what we’re about,” said the James E. Burgess Professor of Journalism Ethics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The University of Wisconsin System announced Wednesday itâ??s responding to the stateâ??s financial crisis by scrutinizing employee out-of-state travel and looking for other ways to save, including possibly consolidating and eliminating unpopular programs.
â??While remaining focused on the stateâ??s critical educational needs, we must do our part to help balance the state budget,â? said UW System President Kevin Reilly in a prepared release.
QUoted: Retail expert Deborah Mitchell, of the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Business, said that for the first time ever, retailers have rolled out “pre-Black Friday” deals, offering steep discounts before what is historically the biggest sale day of the
University of Wisconsin System president Kevin Reilly has halved his recommendation for faculty pay raises because of the growing financial strains on the state government.
Reilly said he is recommending annual raises of 2.5 percent for faculty and staff rather than 5.2 percent to help address what could be the worst budget deficit in the stateâ??s history.
William A. Nathenson was the University of Wisconsin’s top Badger in Chicago, a two-time president of the local alumni club and an enthusiastic recruiter for the school’s football team.
An attorney who had a solo practice in the Loop for nearly 50 years, Mr. Nathenson, 96, died Friday, Nov. 21, in his Gold Coast apartment, said his nephew Lawrence Kosowsky. He had been suffering from several ailments, Kosowsky said.
Quoted: Barry Gerhart, professor of human resources at the University of Wisconsin Business School.
NEW YORKâ??European patent regulators have confirmed an earlier decision that inventions that use or destroy human embryos can’t be patented, turning down a patent application by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s research arm.
The board of appeals for the European Patent Office upheld an earlier rejection of a patent filed by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation. The rejection was based on a rule that forbids patenting of inventions that use human embryos for industrial or commercial purposes.
Quoted: “In this very tough economic time, the most important thing for folks is, ‘What does this mean to me economically? How does this affect my pocketbook?'” said Deborah Mitchell, associate dean of the University of Wisconsin-Madison enterprise MBA program.
Noted: The University of Wisconsin-Madison is one of many poster children for teaching woes at large universities. With nearly 30,000 undergraduates, introductory classes can be staggeringly large, a situation that does little to facilitate valuable student-instructor interaction. Hoping to chip away at the problem, four professors at Wisconsin started the Teaching Fellows Program in 2003 to prepare graduate students for their teaching appointments in the sciences. The program, though small, has been successful enough to warrant publication in the Friday edition of the journal Science.
Her hands are demonstrative. When Laura Elise Schwendinger talks about getting down to work, her hands mime the rolling up of sleeves. As she describes a violin composition, they play an imaginary violin in a manner that almost conjures it visible. Whenever she sits back up after doubling over in one of the delighted full-body laughs that consume her, they sweep her blond hair back over her ears and push her glasses back up to the bridge of her nose. It is as if the contemporary composer, in depriving her hands of the piano keyboard and whatever manuscript she is working on at the moment, has let them off-leash. They are restless, rambunctious, as if they can’t wait to return to the service of Schwendinger’s creative impulse.
A college research project gives a Chippewa Falls native an out of this world experience.
Luke Hunt is a senior at UW-Madison majoring in astronomy and math. During a research class, using the world’s largest radio telescope, he and his classmates stumbled upon what could be an unknown galaxy. More research is needed, but so far, the data has everyone looking up.
It’s time to put director Mike Leckrone and his UW Marching Band on notice.
Either Leckrone gets the band to stop the senseless, repulsive hazing of younger members, or UW officials replace Lekrone with somone who can.
A former Wisconsin football player accused of making threatening phone calls to a UW-Madison athletic department employee was arrested in Indiana Friday.
Leonard Taylor, 32, was taken into custody by police in Indianapolis.
Taylor was a defensive back for the Badgers from 1995 to 1998. He then briefly played on the Madison Mad Dogs professional indoor football team.
University of Wisconsin System President Kevin Reilly on Friday announced his recommendation for 2.5 percent annual pay raises for academic faculty and staff, but many professors said that increase falls too short.
Bill Tracy, a professor and chair of the UW-Madison Department of Agronomy, is active in university professor pay issues through the Faculty Senate.
“While (I’m) disappointed, I certainly wouldn’t say this (news) is unexpected,” Tracy said.
In the face of possible state budget cuts, the UW System is taking steps to reduce costs.
The Governor has said education is one area he wants to protect, as the state struggles with a major budget deficit. However, UW System spokesman David Giroux says he won’t be surprised if cuts are made. With the state facing a $5.4 billion deficit next year, Giroux says there’s only so much room lawmakers will have to protect resources for education.
A push for higher UW faculty pay meets resistance at the Capitol.
UW-Madison Regent David Walsh says faculty members are paid 10-percent less than their peers at comparable universities, and there’s a need to close that gap.
With control of the state Assembly now favoring Wisconsin Democrats, all committees â?? including the one most closely tied to the University of Wisconsinâ??s fate â?? will see new leadership.
According to Rep. Spencer Black, D-Madison, who sits on the Colleges and Universities Committee, the speaker will appoint a new committee chair within the next two weeks.
A Wisconsin stem cell pioneer expects the next president to help reduce some of the problems facing federal research funding.
Stem cell research has faced tight funding restrictions under the Bush administration. Dr. James Thomson expects that to change under President-elect Barack Obama.
The UW System is looking for ways to save money. This involves restricting travel for faculty, and could include letting some students earn a degree in three years, and possibly cutting some programs.
Last month, the UW System ordered chancellors to selectively approve new hires, as one way to accommodate the stateâ??s projected multi-billion dollar budget shortfall. Now chancellors are being directed to monitor and approve all out-of-state travel if it involves state money or tuition.
UW System spokesman David Giroux says administrators understand that faculty use such travel to do research and network. (Second item.)
If tuition policy is a vexed question in normal budget years for public universities, it will be especially challenging to discuss public policy on the subject this year. States are facing record deficits and many public colleges are seeing enrollment and application increases â?? a formula that could combine to create large, unpopular tuition increases.
In a more normal year, the alumni fund-raising plea that turns up in the mail right about now seems perfectly in tune as the day for thanks gives way to a month of giving.
But this year is different. Huge numbers of people have lost their homes to foreclosure. Unemployment is on the rise. And a good chunk of the United States automobile industry could wither away within months, taking hundreds of thousands of middle-class jobs with it.
It didn’t capture banner headlines, but a news story that broke in mid-November suggests why private equity investors may finally be paying attention to companies working with human stems cells.
Beatrice Elizabeth Donaldson David, age, 96, passed away peacefully on Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2008. In 1952, she joined the faculty of the foods and nutrition department at the University of Wisconsin – Madison. Bea retired in 1978 as professor emeritus in the Department of Food Science.
John Nieman Stephenson, age 71, died at home on Nov. 24, 2008. In 1972, John moved to Madison and founded the Teenage and Young Adult Clinic, department of pediatrics, UW Medical School, where he served as medical director until his retirement in 1999.
Ian C. Loram, of Pasadena, Calif., born on Feb. 26, 1917, in Durban, South Africa, died Monday, Nov. 17, 2008, in Los Angeles, at age 91. Professor Emeritus Loram taught German at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1964 until 1979; he was also an associate dean of the Graduate School.
Norton John Urness, age 82, died on Thursday, Nov. 20, 2008. After farming for almost thirty years, Norton held jobs with Patron’s Mercantile Co-op and the University of Wisconsin Experimental Farms until retirement.
Dr. David Archbald died Oct. 27, 2008, with his family at his side. Born in Buffalo, N.Y., he earned a doctorate at the University of Wisconsin, and served for many years as director of the University of Wisconsin Arboretum.
Lt. Colonel William P. Adams, United States Army Retired, died on Saturday, Nov. 22, 2008. William was an ad hoc instructor for 14 years for the Extension Division of the University of Wisconsin Graduate School of Social Work.
When Chris Klundt began toying with the idea of starting an online academic network for students and teachers in 2006, he had few visions of entrepreneurial grandeur.
Klundt, who earned undergraduate degrees from UW-Madison in computer sciences and biomedical engineering in 2005, had simply become frustrated during his days as a student with how few of his professors used Learn@UW — a collection of software tools that allows instructors to create course-specific Web sites to enhance the learning experience and help improve student-instructor interaction.
When the University of Wisconsin Law Schools Mock Trial Team earned a second-place finish at a tournament in Los Angeles last month, it marked a noteworthy accomplishment for a program that, just over five years ago, didnt exist.
Noted: A study in the online Journal of Youth and Adolescence joined the conversation, with research by professors at the University of Wisconsin exploring why children of both genders have sex before they turn 15.
Quoted: We eat a type of corn called, appropriately enough, sweet corn. The maize that American Indians grew in the 17th century would have been more like the type we feed to animals now, said Bill Tracy, a corn agronomist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
In the sea of red that enveloped Union South on UW-Madison’s campus Saturday afternoon were guarantees of green.
The facility, built in 1971, is set to be torn down at the end of this year for a new, larger, and more environmentally friendly building.
Among those in Saturday’s last Badger Bash pregame festivity was Al Radliff, class of 1972. “It’s been a while since I’ve been here, but it’s great to be back and be able to see this place one last time before they tear this down for the new Union South,” he said.
MADISON â?? For people who suffer from epilepsy, current drugs donâ??t always control seizures. A startup company with ties to UW-Madison technology, NeuroGenomex Inc., is trying to provide a breakthrough medication.
Epilepsy affects more than 3 million Americans every year, with most new cases developing in children and elderly. Epilepsy is a central nervous system disorder whose main symptom is seizure caused by electric activity in the brain.
The University of California at Berkeley tripled the number of international students it admitted in this year’s freshman class and plans to enroll even more students from outside the state next year, in part to pump up tuition revenue during a difficult financial period for the state’s universities.
Some of the nationâ??s universities are trying to sell chunks of their portfolios privately as their endowments swoon with the markets.
Videotape obtained by 27 News of a woman fan who was subjected to a taser during a Badger football game suggests the incident created chaos.
John Harold Juhl, M.D., age 94, passed away on Sunday, Nov. 9, 2008. John taught radiology at the University of Wisconsin from 1949 until 1952, and again from 1954 until 1980. He served as Radiology Department Chairman for 10 years, and during his chairmanship he established the Medical Physics Department, which was the first of its kind in the country.
Imogene Weyer Smith Higbie, age 90, of Providence, R.I., died at the Miriam Hospital on Friday, Nov. 21, 2008. A retired professor of social work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, she became in recent years, an agent for change in care for the aging.
What if doctors could take a strand of your hair and use it to find out which drugs could best treat you for high cholesterol, for example, without giving you a bad reaction?
That may be just a few years away, says an official of Cellular Dynamics International (CDI), 525 Science Drive.
The Madison stem-cell company, founded by UW-Madison researcher James Thomson, has landed $18 million in financing that will help CDI expand operations and add staff, as it works to become a world leader in the field, said chief commercial officer Chris Kendrick-Parker.
All eyes are on President-Elect Barack Obama’s new economic team, and their plans to navigate unprecdented financial crisis.
Guest is Menzie Chinn: professor of public affairs and economics at the University of Wisconsin. He co-writes the Econbrowser blog.
Quoted: Dr. Patrick Remington has been studying the idea of self-limiting breast cancers since the early 1990s, when the introduction of breast screening programs showed a sharp and sustained increase in the incidence of the disease in the United States. He is convinced some invasive breast cancers do regress; they have become known as LMPs or cancers of “limited malignant potential.”
“I would say a very good guess would be about one out of three women have cancers detected today that would not have progressed otherwise,” said Remington, a professor of population health sciences at the University of Wisconsin. Remington was not involved in this study
Quoted: James Schauer, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, traced mercury from an incineration and metals reprocessing facility in the Port of Long Beach to the air in Riverside and the Los Angeles Basin.
The financial firms were first, now it’s the automakers. We hear estimates of anywhere from 1 million to 3 million jobs at stake, and other industries are lined up to make their own claims about their importance to the long-term health of the economy.
APPLETON â?? Gov. Jim Doyle faces his toughest budget decisions when he begins to work with a Democratic-controlled Legislature in January.
Working with majority members of his party will be a first for the two-term Democrat, but as he indicated Monday to The Post-Crescent editorial board, nothing is off the table as the state deals with a grim economic crisis that threatens to drive a $5.4 billion deficit by 2011.
Too much television, low self-esteem, disappointing grades and poor family relationships can be a formula that adds up to early teenage sex, according to a new study.
“If you add up all the factors, you get a much more powerful predictor of who has sex and who doesn’t,” said Dr. Janet Hyde, of the University of Wisconsin, who headed the research team.
Ron Dayne isn’t playing in the National Football League at the moment, but he’s still a huge star in the eyes of thousands of University of Wisconsin Badger fans, a couple of hundred of who turned out Monday evening at University Bookstore at Hilldale to have him sign all manner of paraphernalia.
U.S. scientists have revealed the genes that lead to an antitumor antibiotic. The team, led by Ben Shen at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, says the research could provide the tools to create new anticancer drugs.
Quoted: “A short sleeper may have a very efficient deep sleep even if they sleep only four hours,” notes Dr. Chiara Cirellia of the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Cellular Dynamics International, the Madison-based research company founded by stem cell pioneer Dr. James Thomson and three fellow UW-Madison professors, has merged with two sister companies and is getting $18 million in new financing.
The two companies merging with CDI are Stem Cell Products Inc. and iPS Cells, Inc.
Three companies founded by star University of Wisconsin-Madison stem cell researcher James Thomson are merging into a single entity that aspires to be a world leader in the field.
Under a deal announced Monday, Cellular Dynamics International is joining forces with Stem Cell Products Inc. and iPS Cells Inc. Backed by $18 million in private venture capital, the new company is keeping CDI (nyse: CDI – news – people )’s name and its headquarters in Madison.
