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Author: Nathan Steagall

What can moments of lucidity teach us about Alzheimer’s?

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Science Friday

Watching a loved one with Alzheimer’s or dementia slowly lose their cognitive abilities can be heartbreaking. While the person you once knew seems to be slipping away, sometimes people with Alzheimer’s briefly seem like their old selves again. They may remember a long-forgotten name or suddenly regain the ability to have a fluid conversation. What do these moments of lucidity really mean for the progression of the disease? And what implications do they have for those living with the disease, and their caretakers?

This Common Gut-Bacteria Compound May Be Linked to Alzheimer’s Disease

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Sci Tech Daily

Nearly a decade ago, University of Wisconsin–Madison professors Barbara Bendlin and Federico Rey led research showing that people with Alzheimer’s disease have different communities of intestinal microbes than healthy individuals.

“Since then, we’ve been trying to figure out how this difference in the gut perhaps leads to changes in the brain,” says Bendlin, a professor of gerontology in the UW School of Medicine and Public Health.

Past colleagues praise Wisconsin AD Shawn Eichorst’s leadership

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Long before the University of Wisconsin’s athletic director position was within Shawn Eichorst’s sights, he had “Bucky.”

The backstory of “Bucky” goes back to 2018 – seven years after he last lived in Madison and eight years before his recent hire with the Badgers that he could have hardly predicted at that point.

Universities of Wisconsin announce proposed 2027-2029 tuition freeze

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NBC 15

The Universities of Wisconsin Regent President Kyle Weatherly and UWs President Renee Wachter announced Monday that the Universities of Wisconsin will propose to freeze tuition rates for 2027-2029.

The pledge, called the 4-Year Tuition Pledge, is a main focus of the UW’s 2027-2029 budget proposal.

The Pledge proposes freezing tuition for the 2027-2029 biennium, provided the state invests $190 million to support the cost of the freeze and other operating needs that preserve educational quality, officials said.

UW System wants $190M in state funds for 2-year tuition freeze

Posted on
The Center Square

The University of Wisconsin System is asking state lawmakers for $190 million in additional funding in order to freeze tuition for two years and cap the increase at the rate of inflation for the two next years.

The proposal is part of the university system’s biennial budget request from state lawmakers. UW leadership recently asked for an additional $90 million of funding to use toward training 35,000 new healthcare professionals over a 10-year span.

UW-Madison veterinary lab in Barron set to receive $19.5-million in renovations and expansion

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ABC 18 Eau Claire

Wisconsin’s State Building Commission approved roughly $374-million in building projects statewide last week and one of those projects include a nearly $20-million investment in Barron. The University of Wisconsin-Madison Veterinary Diagnostic Lab (WVDL) has been looking to renovate and expand its Barron location for several years. The lab’s current building was constructed in 1992, but since then its grown too small and its labs can no longer keep up with demand.

Universities of Wisconsin proposes 4-year tuition freeze in new budget request

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CBS 58 Milwaukee

Universities of Wisconsin leaders announced a proposal Monday, Aug. 17, to freeze tuition through the 2027-29 budget cycle, provided the state invests $190 million to cover the cost of the freeze and other operating needs.

Under the plan, called the 4-Year Tuition Pledge, the university system would also commit to keeping tuition increases at or below the rate of inflation for the following two years.

UW proposes $730 million in additional state aid

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WisPolitics

Universities of Wisconsin leaders are proposing to seek an additional $730 million in aid over the next two years with an offer to freeze tuition over that period — if the state comes up with the money to cover the lost revenue.

UW Board of Regents President Kyle Weatherly and interim system President Renee Wachter said yesterday if state lawmakers take them up on the offer for $190 million to fund the freeze, the system would also keep tuition increases at or under the rate of inflation for the 2029-31 biennium.

Reviled Humanities Building would finally go, new dorms would rise under UW capital budget

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Wisconsin State Journal

The Universities of Wisconsin is again requesting money to demolish and relocate UW-Madison’s Mosse Humanities Building and to build new residence halls.

The Humanities Building project tops the list of major requests included in the system’s $2 billion capital budget request for 2027-29, released Monday. The request seeks $463.5 million to cover the demolition of the entire building and a portion of the Art Lofts facility next to the Kohl Center, which houses a gallery for student and faculty artwork, though $46.8 million would be covered by donations.

UW system requests $730 million to fund 2-year tuition freeze, AI infrastructure

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Wisconsin State Journal

The Universities of Wisconsin is pledging to freeze tuition for two years and create thousands more workers as part of a $730 million two-year budget request it plans to submit to the state Legislature.

The request, released Monday, seeks to “address the state’s needs,” UW system Interim President Renée Wachter said.

Over the last few budget cycles, the UW system’s budget efforts have had mixed success, sometimes leading to significant increases in state funding and at other times resulting in hard-fought negotiations that yielded little.

Essay: My Brutalist Heart

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Madison Magazine/Channel 3000

Fifteen years ago, in the basement of the George L. Mosse Humanities Building, I stood in the hallway outside the stage doors to Morphy Recital Hall. I held my trumpet in my hands, nervously pressing the piston valves up and down, going over and over a difficult passage. I was about to perform in my junior recital.

Should you mow your lawn during a drought? What Wisconsin experts recommend

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NBC 13 Eau Claire

Western Wisconsin desperately needs rain, but if you’re looking at your lawn this weekend and wondering whether firing up the mower will help or hurt, experts say the answer may be as simple as taking a walk.

If your footprints remain visible in the grass for more than about 10 minutes, UW-Madison Division of Extension says your lawn is showing signs of drought stress.

And you probably shouldn’t mow it.

That’s one of several recommendations from Wisconsin lawn experts as drought conditions expand across the state and rainfall remains well below normal in Eau Claire.

Stoughton project aims to preserve hemp as part of Hmong traditions

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The Cap Times

The University of Wisconsin-Madison’s College of Agricultural & Life Sciences recently received a $5,000 grant toward the project. One year from now, the plot is expected to grow and be shared communally, allowing for elders and youth to learn more about hemp production and weaving through a Hmong cultural lens.

Working with Wisconsin-based multicultural and Hmong organizations, Shelby Ellison, a UW-Madison associate professor and hemp geneticist, applied for the grant following a meeting with an expert hemp weaver visiting Wisconsin from Thailand last year.

Wisconsin Farm Fatalities Report Urges Importance Of Safety

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Q106

Recent Wisconsin Farm Related Fatalities reports indicate that injuries and deaths remain a persistent issue.

“This is incredibly unfortunate, given the many other challenges farm families and farm workers are facing here in this day and age,” said one of the reports’ co-authors, John Shutske, University of Wisconsin-Madison Professor and Agricultural Safety & Health Specialist. “We saw a high of 41 deaths in 2017. And, then a low of 28 in 2020, but climbing back in these last three years, we looked at around 30-35 deaths.”

Throwback photos: Take a look back at the creation of UW-Madison’s Kohl Center

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Wisconsin State Journal

Fans are used to seeing basketball and hockey games at the Kohl Center, but that was only made possible after a large donation and lengthy construction project. On Jan. 17, 1998, the Wisconsin Badgers hosted Northwestern in the inaugural men’s basketball home game following completion of the new facility (UW won 53-33). Former U.S. Sen. Herb Kohl, who graduated from UW in 1956, donated $25 million toward the $76.4 million facility. Take a look back at archive photos tracing the construction process.

Dairy Students Receive Scholarship Support

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Q106

Summer Hammann of Barron, Wisconsin is majoring in dairy science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her goal is to become a herdsman, working hands-on with dairy cattle, focusing on herd health, reproduction and overall performance. Her guidance towards this goal has been her background on her family’s dairy, as well as highly relevant internships and leadership in extracurricular activities.

Two Indian American UW–Madison faculty receive research awards

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The American Bazaar

Two Indian American University of Wisconsin–Madison professors — Rishabh Kirpalani and Tulika Bose — are among 42 faculty awarded prestigious fellowships from the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research (OVCR) for 2026-2027 for people who drive discovery with bold ideas.

“These prestigious honors provide researchers with the recognition, flexibility, and support needed to pursue bold ideas, advance groundbreaking scholarship and address society’s most pressing challenges,” says Dorota Brzezinska, vice chancellor for research.

Universities of Wisconsin to ask for $330M to invest in state’s workforce, healthcare

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WPR

This week, the Universities of Wisconsin announced a slate of budget proposals aimed at boosting the state’s workforce, economy and access to healthcare.

The university system is seeking $240 million for programs that it says would train 300,000 workers and create 2,500 new businesses. Another $90 millionwould go to expand programs for healthcare professionals.

Niche ranked Wisconsin’s best universities. What do students pay to attend?

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The end of summer is approaching and in the coming weeks, students will begin returning to colleges all across Wisconsin.

Niche, a school rankings website, compiled a list of the top-ranked universities in Wisconsin by analyzing academic, admissions, financial and student life data from the U.S. Department of Education, along with “millions of reviews from students and alumni.

Takeaways from David Crowley’s Wisconsin primary upset

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NPR Milwaukee

Tuesday’s Democratic gubernatorial primary win by David Crowley was a big surprise.

The Milwaukee County Executive narrowly defeated democratic socialist Francesca Hong. Crowley will face Republican Tom Tiffany Nov. 3.

Hong had a groundswell of grassroots support, while Crowley dropped out of the race in July. At that time, Crowley was behind in the polls.

He jumped back in a week later, after Sara Rodriguez dropped out due financial mismanagement by a campaign staffer.

UW-Madison political science professor Barry Burden spoke with WUWM’s Ann-Elise Henzl about Crowley’s turnaround.

Polling for Hong was dead on, Crowley not so much. Here’s why

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Wisconsin State Journal

Hong caught flak from national media about years-old social media posts about defunding the police and canceling Thanksgiving. Some of the posts were dredged up by Republicans, UW-Madison political science professor Barry Burden said, as part of their strategy to define Hong as being too liberal. It might have backfired, Burden added, giving moderate voters a reason to look elsewhere and prevent Hong from being their nominee.

UW says new initiatives focus on technology, entrepreneurs

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In Business Madison

In the latest roll out of its 2027-29 budget priorities, the Universities of Wisconsin unveiled two plans it says would affect career training, skill building and business formation.

The programs are Tech for Tomorrow to advance new technologies from universities to the world of commerce, and Accelerate Wisconsin to assist entrepreneurs and aid product development.

According to a report in the Wisconsin State Journal, the UW System says the initiatives would train 300,000 workers for careers and create 2,500 new businesses.

Torey Dolan on non-Native people owning land in reservations

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PBS Wisconsin

In the 19th century, Congress implemented this policy called allotment. The idea was that where tribes own things in common — meaning all members and the tribe itself owns the property — they decided to break up that communal title and parcel out individual parcels of land to different families, and then sell the surplus. The process of selling the surplus land within the reservation is what led to these checkerboarded reservations that we see today, where there are significant populations of non-Indians that own fee land within the exterior reservation boundaries.

A Stunning Loss in Wisconsin Shows the Limits of the Left

Posted on
The New York Times

Kathy Cramer, a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said Mr. Evers’s influence — even if it came near the end of a long campaign — could have turned voters away from Ms. Hong and toward Mr. Crowley.

“It could just be that there are lots of Democrats who just have an affinity for the guy,” she said of Mr. Evers, who has served two terms as governor. “That could have weighed heavily on their vote.”

UW system plan would train 300,000, create 2,500 businesses

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Wisconsin State Journal

The Universities of Wisconsin unveiled two initiatives Wednesday it says would prepare 300,000 workers for careers, give more than a million workers new skills for better jobs, and create 2,500 new businesses.

Tech for Tomorrow would help universities move new technologies from the research lab to commercialization faster. Accelerate Wisconsin would help entrepreneurs launch businesses and develop new products.

UW research and startups propel quantum innovation

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In Business Madison

Quantum innovation is nothing new to Mark Saffman — a physics professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who has conducted research on a key technology behind quantum computing for over two decades — but he believes the competition for capital and talent is hotter now than ever before.

Since 2018, Saffman has been on the leadership team of Infleqtion, a Colorado-based quantum company that went public in February and has offices in Madison, Chicago and across the globe. The company uses neutral atom technology, Saffman’s specialty, for quantum computing, networking, sensing and security.

Got a Brawny Build? You Might Be Able to Thank Your Neanderthal Ancestors, According to a New Study

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Smithsonian

Neanderthals lived across Europe and Asia between roughly 400,000 and 40,000 years ago. Before our stocky cousins went extinct, some of them interbred with modern humans, leaving traces of their genetic material in our gene pool. Today, most people of non-African ancestry have inherited between 1 and 4 percent of their genetic makeup from Neanderthals.

US Professor Uses AI To Solve Wireless Problem That Stumped Researchers For 25 Years

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NDTV

Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison say AI has helped tackle a decades-old problem in wireless communications involving MIMO, a technology widely used in modern mobile networks. The work was led by Dimitris Papailiopoulos, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor who is currently on leave at Microsoft Research. According to his account, GPT-5.6 and Claude Fable 5 were used to develop and verify possible solutions to the problem.

Will Francesca Hong be the latest democratic socialist to win a Midwest state?

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Wisconsin State Journal

University of Wisconsin-Madison Elections Research Center director Barry Burden said for Crowley’s argument to take shape, the Wisconsin polling would need to be farther off than polling showed ahead of the Michigan race.

“El-Sayed was leading Stevens by 10 to 15 points in public polling. He won by one point. Crowley’s memo shows he is losing in a standard poll question by an even larger margin, so the polls need to be farther off in Wisconsin for him to be victorious,” Burden said. “Maybe the wilder fluctuations in the Wisconsin primary make it more possible for this kind of error to happen, but it would be substantial at more than 20 points.”

UW-Madison researcher accused of poisoning colleague pleads not guilty

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

A University of Wisconsin-Madison researcher accused of poisoning his colleague in the lab pleaded not guilty to the charges in court.

Makoto Kuroda, 42, appeared Aug. 6 in Dane County Circuit Court for his arraignment. He was charged in April with second-degree recklessly endangering safety and tampering with products to cause harm. If convicted, he could face a maximum 16 years sentence and a maximum fine of $35,000.

All of UW-Madison campus now open after cooling issues

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NBC 15

All of the buildings on UW-Madison’s campus that were closed because of air conditioning problems opened back up on Monday.

Parts of the campus have been closed since June because a chilled water line broke during a stretch of extreme heat and humidity.

For now, UW has installed temporary chillers to help the buildings stay cool until the air conditioning is back to its full operating capacity.

Employees who have been working from home are able to return to their normal workplace arrangements.

Universities of Wisconsin wants to train 35K new health care professionals in next decade

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WPR

The  Universities of Wisconsin wants to train 35,000 new health care professionals over the next decade.

The $90 million proposal will be included in the 2027-29 budget that is presented to the Wisconsin state Legislature and governor in the fall.

The total budget proposal for the state’s public university system will be released next week prior to the Board of Regents meeting, said spokesperson Mark Pitsch.

After student athlete’s suicide, bill would mandate coach mental health training

Posted on
The Sacramento Bee

Sarah Shulze was a star athlete on the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s track and field and cross country teams. She was also a political science major with a passion for women’s rights. She loved travel and adventure, and was a role model to her two younger sisters. On April 13, 2022, Sarah died by suicide. From the outside, she was always smiling and looked like she had it all together, her mother Brigitte Shulze said. But inside, the 22-year-old from California’s Ventura County was dealing with anxiety exacerbated by an unhealthy team environment.

 

UW-Madison faces lawsuit over 20 race-based scholarships

Posted on
The College Fix

Young America’s Foundation, in conjunction with the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty, recently filed a lawsuit against the University of Wisconsin–Madison, challenging at least 20 taxpayer-funded scholarships and grants that contain race-based criteria.

One such scholarship is the Lawton Undergraduate Minority Retention Grant Program, which seeks “to provide financial assistance to statutorily designated minority undergraduate students,” according to the UW System website.

UW-Madison tech enables vibration sensing at ‘much lower cost’

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WisPolitics

UW-Madison researchers have created a technology for sensing vibrations at “much lower cost” than traditional systems, with possible applications in health monitoring, predicting natural disasters and structural testing.

WARF included the technology in its latest roundup of top licensing prospects among its portfolio of engineering and computer science university research.

Badgers fans, athletes see trade-offs on Big Ten’s expansion

Posted on
The Cap Times

Two years after the Big Ten expanded to 18 teams, the conference this year claimed national championships in the NCAA’s three most popular sports — football, men’s basketball and women’s basketball — and the Wisconsin Badgers advanced to both the men’s and women’s hockey championships.

Scientists Say Eating Less Protein May Help You Live Longer

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Sci Tech Daily

The protein boom may be pushing many people to consume far more than their bodies need, and new research suggests that excess could come at a hidden cost.

Protein has become one of the food industry’s favorite selling points. It is added to cereal, coffee, snack bars, desserts, and even water, often with the suggestion that more is automatically healthier.

Parasite Patrol Tour Coming to Wisconsin

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Q106

If you are a sheep or goat producer, you’ll want to save-the-date for this year’s Parasite Patrol Tour when it stops in Wisconsin. It’s your opportunity to sharpen your parasite management skills through this multi-state educational program.

The Iowa State University Extension and Outreach is working in partnership with the University of Wisconsin-Madison Division of Extension and will be in Outagamie County on Friday, Sept. 25.