The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office summarily rejected three of five stem cell patents last week that the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation has held since 1998, after two watchdog groups accused WARF of patenting â??elementaryâ? stem cell propagation techniques.
James A. Graaskamp, the late and legendary UW-Madison real estate professor, will be honored April 25-26 when the UW-Madison Center for Real Estate is renamed in his memory.
Since 2005, almost 600 alumni and friends generated nearly $11 million in donations for the Center and its renaming. The support provides the critical resources to allow the Wisconsin Real Estate Program to remain competitive and to carry on the legacy of Jim Graaskamp, the UW said in a news release.
The recent spate of legal threats from the music industry against the UW campus community apparently has convinced few students to change their file swapping habit, but they’re also using a slew of other tools to find new music.
A stroll down State Street is all one needs to see the pervasiveness of the digital music culture: white wires disappear into students’ ears, an Apple iPod loaded with hundreds, even thousands, of songs on the other end — some tracks likely acquired illegally.
Vowing the Midwest can become “the Saudi Arabia of renewable energy — with Wisconsin at the forefront,” Gov. Jim Doyle today unveiled the new Office of Energy Independence and gave support to a regional renewable energy credit trading system.
“If an oil field in Iran has to compete against a farm field in Wisconsin, that’s a very good thing for the environment, for our economy and for the world,” said Doyle in remarks prepared for an event today on the UW-Madison campus.
MADISON — Harnessing the power of stem cells in previously unexplored ways, Stemina Biomarker Discovery, Inc. is one of the newest startups to spring out of Madisonâ??s thriving biotechnology sector.
Elizabeth Donley, the companyâ??s chief executive officer, presented Steminaâ??s scientific goals and business model at the recent Molecular Medicine Tri-Conference in San Francisco.
Donley explained that when human embryonic stem cells are grown in culture, they can be used for disease diagnosis, screening drugs for side effects and reducing development costs of pharmaceuticals.
Three Members of UW-Madison’s Students In Free Enterprise team will spend their spring break in the Appalachian region this year to help educate people in the area about personal finance and budgeting.
The team members were to leave the region this morning accompanied by six Madison-area high school students, two chaperones and Joyce Waters, a financial counselor from Debtscape, a Maryland-based non-profit that provides debt management and credit counseling services.
The UW-Madison School of Business is getting a little more respect, moving up two places to 29th in this year’s ranking of business schools by U.S. News and World Report.The ranking, which is eight places higher than two years ago, is the highest the business school has received from the magazine since 1990.
Given how strange the Barbara Hoffman murder case was in real life, it’s fitting that the movie version of the case should have its share of strangeness as well.
According to a story this week in the New York Post, strangeness recently invaded the Schenectady, N.Y., set of the filming of Madison author Karl Harter’s 1990 book on the Hoffman case, “Winter of Frozen Dreams.”
….THE LOS ANGELES Times on Friday had a substantial story about the ongoing attempt in the Wisconsin Legislature to get financial incentives for filmmakers — scheduled to begin Jan. 1 of next year — into effect immediately. The concern is that a $10 million film on the life of a Madison native, poker star Phil Hellmuth, will likely film in Canada rather than here if the incentives aren’t in effect.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison ranked about the same as last year in several of the U.S. News & World Report graduate school rankings for 2007.
The newly published issue of America’s Best Graduate Schools also includes ratings done in previous years, however, which raised UW’s overall prestige.
The UW just raised thousands of dollars through on online auction of an eclectic assortment of merchandise, much of which was donated by alumni.
Overnight getaways, celebrity-autographed guitars, lunch with football coach Bret Bielema and autographed sports jerseys and equipment made up a chunk of the sales roster, and bidding ended this week. There also was food: six months of ice cream from the Madison-based Chocolate Shoppe, a Fudge Bottom Pie party for 12 and a case of Mojo Organic Beef Jerky.
A case of beef jerky? What’s with that?
Net Nerds has a new leader and a new format, but it’s still about fixing people’s computer problems.
Kristen Berman, who founded Net Nerds in 2004 after she and her roommates bought beer for a neighbor who fixed their computer, graduated in December and landed a job in Silicon Valley working for Intuit, which produces TurboTax and QuickBooks.
Berman…is retaining ownership of Net Nerds but has handed the operational reins to Chris Friederich, a UW junior finance major.
Gillware is a Madison company whose beginning was failure – specifically the failure of the hard drive on the computer of Tyler Gill, one of its founders.
The year was 2003.
The UW-Madison student was faced with what could be called the nightmare of anyone who uses a desktop or laptop computer.
Unable to discuss new business Monday, the Joint Southeast Campus Area Committee listened to a presentation by the East Campus Utility regarding the Peterson and Ogg Hall buildings, which are scheduled to come down this fall.
City officials gathered Monday evening to emphasize the need to bolster support for the UW Transportation Services Initiative and to start work on the East Campus Utility Project.
Though lawmakers and economic forecasters may disagree whether Wisconsin really suffers from a so-called â??brain drain,â? officials across the state are examining the challenge of retaining and recruiting college graduates.
With graduation looming for many University of Wisconsin students closing out their undergraduate careers, business recruiters across the nation begin to appear on campus looking for new employees.
HERE’S MILTON Griepp on Jay Kennedy, the King Features Syndicate editor-in-chief and former Madisonian who drowned at 50 in a rip tide off Costa Rica last week:
“He was pleasant, upbeat, optimistic and a great guy to be around,” Griepp was saying Friday. “Super smart, an encyclopedic memory and relentless in pursuit of his goals.”
Also in this column: ….An art review in Friday’s Los Angeles Times gave posthumous credit to a well-liked and respected UW-Madison art professor in the critical early development of the renowned artist Bruce Nauman.
The state Supreme Court has agreed to hear a challenge to Madison’s controversial ban on drink specials in bars.
The court will hear an appeal by UW-Madison students who claim that a 2002 agreement between city officials and the Dane County Tavern League to ban two-for-one drink specials after 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday nights constitutes an illegal restraint of trade.
Two UW students are proving their entrepreneurial spirit by running an online business while they work on their degree.
Quoted: Peter Carstensen, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School.
Farming can be somewhat isolating, says Chris McGuire. Especially during the growing season when there’s so much to do, farmers are in their fields a lot, and much of that time is spent alone.
McGuire knows what he’s talking about. He and his wife, Juli, are CSA farmers near Belmont. Their business, Two Onion Farm, is part of the Madison Area Community Supported Agriculture Coalition (MACSAC).
Community members, as well as business and property owners, will have an opportunity Thursday night to help determine the future of the Regent Street south campus neighborhood.
A new research institute will be established on the west side of the University of Wisconsin campus, the university announced Wednesday.
A University of Wisconsin alumnus or benefactor has an opportunity to help send a UW student to a summer internship at Google.
MIDDLETON — In the latest employment coup for the suburbs, the UW Medical Foundation is consolidating its administrative operations here in a new $20 million building in the Discovery Springs development.
Some 800 employees of the medical group could eventually be accommodated in 200,000 square feet of office and warehouse space west of the Beltline and north of U.S. 14. It includes 775 surface parking spaces.
The state Public Service Commission today denied a request by Dane County and the city of Madison for an independent study on the need for new power lines in the area.
….American Transmission Co., the power line company for Wisconsin, has proposed constructing a controversial 345-kilovolt line across southern Dane County, with one of the three possible routes going along the Beltline freeway.
Global warming is a threat second only to all-out nuclear war and America has to act now, a famed environmentalist and geneticist told a Madison audience Tuesday night.
To not take action against climate change would be un-American for a country that put a man on the moon, said David Suzuki, 70, who has hosted the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.’s natural science series “The Nature of Things” since 1979.
Suzuki spoke to crowd of about 500 in the Union Theater as the last speaker in the 2006-07 UW-Madison Distinguished Lecture Series and got a standing ovation when he finished.
A further foray into attracting “knowledge economy” businesses â?? biotech and computing, for example â?? to the state in the coming years and decades is one way for Wisconsin to become more successful economically in the future, the dean for the University of Wisconsin-Madison business school said Tuesday.
While that change won’t happen overnight, Mike Knetter, a Rhinelander native and dean of the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s business school, said the state needs to focus on finding those industries.
With the help of projections, hundreds of figures and statistical graphs, economic experts presented data at the University of Wisconsin Friday on the outlook for the economic future of the nation.
Executive Development Program Director Chuck Krueger organized the event and said the dozens of business professionals in attendance represented a cross section of people from Wisconsin and Illinois.
The State of Wisconsin Building Commission approved a slew of multimillion dollar University of Wisconsin System projects Tuesday, including UW-Madisonâ??s new Union South and a renovated Memorial Union.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison is defying a request from the music industry to pass along settlement offers to alleged copyright violators who use the UW’s computer networks.
Certain computer users have been pinpointed by the Recording Industry Association of America for allegedly violating copyright – that is, sharing music files on the Internet with others – for free – using peer-to-peer software.
Instead of trying to carry on with work as usual, offices across Madison showed their spirit by turning the afternoon into a chance for employees to celebrate their Badger pride.
For employees at Quarles & Brady law firm, the game was a chance to support both the team and the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure fund. The firm threw a pre-game pizza party to raise money, and, for $5 a person, employees could sport Badger gear rather than suits and skirts.
NimbleGen Systems — a Madison biotechnology company and UW spinoff that created a new way to make gene chips — plans to raise up to $75 million in an initial public stock offering.
Featured: Donald A. Nichols, UW-Madison professor emeritus of economics and public affairs and a member of Gov. Jim Doyle’s Economic Advisory Council.
You may think you know of all of the colorful characters who passed through Madison in the blur of the 1960s, but you don’t, at least you don’t if you haven’t heard of Harley Lewin, who might be loosely described as the Wyatt Earp of intellectual property attorneys.
MADISON — The U.S. economy is approaching the brink of recession and the stumbling housing market could drag it over the edge, UW-Madison emeritus economics professor Don Nichols said Friday during an economic outlook forum at the Fluno Center.
But Nichols said he could not predict what will happen with housing during the rest of 2007.And because Wisconsin’s economy is based more on the export of manufactured goods, the Badger State could have a “relatively good” year and even beat the national growth average if “the housing bust becomes huge,” he said.
University of Wisconsin basketball fans hope that Bucky Badger will be very busy in Chicago on Sunday afternoon.
But supporters of Columbus Mayor Dave Bomkamp, who is locked in a race with council member Nancy Osterhaus in the April 3 election, are disappointed that Bucky won’t also be in Columbus at that time to help them cheer on their candidate, which is something that the mascot apparently is not allowed to do.
The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, the body that controls UW-Madisonâ??s lucrative stem cell technology patents, has decided to play nice. Criticized for its high licensing fees even to other universities, the nationâ??s leading stem cell technology producer will now offer lower fees for universities and other non-profit research organizations.
Give Adidas the boot, Student Labor Action Coalition members cried throughout Bascom Hall Wednesday afternoon during the organizationâ??s second rally in less than a month protesting the universityâ??s deal with the athletic apparel company.
As state lawmakers move on legislation to provide incentives for using biofuels instead of gasoline, several University of Wisconsin professors said they are concerned corn-based ethanol may not be a practical large-scale fuel source.
A contract to manufacture DNA-based flu vaccine has been awarded to the Waisman Clinical BioManufacturing Facility at UW-Madison’s Waisman Center.
The vaccine will be tested first on animals, with human testing expected to begin early next year during the flu season, said Allen D. Allen, chief executive of CytoDyn of Santa Fe, N.M., which developed the vaccine.
High on the brick wall of the Psychology Building, a red and white sign proclaims the four tenets of University of Wisconsin-Madisonâ??s We Conserve campaign to students passing below: â??Efficient systems. Informed people. Realistic expectations. Responsible actions.â?
In spite of mounting pressure to sever ties with Adidas, Chancellor John Wiley announced Wednesday that the University of Wisconsin would not terminate its licensing contract with the athletic apparel company.
A local biotech company is eyeing major growth after acquiring platform technology from global pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline Inc.
….The UW-Madison spinoff, which was formed six years ago, now expects to become profitable within two years, although one giant deal could make it instantly profitable, according to GenTel CEO Alex Vodenlich.
The majority of professors at University of Wisconsin System institutions continue to earn less than their colleagues at nearby technical colleges, according to a report released Tuesday.
Nine years ago, in the forefront of a national trend, the University of Wisconsin launched an initiative to combine many academic disciplines and create new collaborative fields of study.
Physically safe working conditions and fair employee treatment help make a workplace healthy, but some say another aspect needs to be confronted.
The on-the-job bully, who is usually but not always a boss, drains productivity, creativity and employee health, says Gary Namie of Washington, director of the nonprofit Workplace Bullying Institute, established in 1997 and financed by consultant work.
Quoted: Corliss Olson, a labor educator at UW Extension’s School for Workers
BusinessWeek Magazine ranked UW-Madisonâ??s School of Business undergraduate program 28th nationally and fourth among the Big Ten schools. The magazine ranked 93 undergraduate programs for 2007, compared to the 61 it ranked for 2006, according to BusinessWeekâ??s website.
For the second year in a row, the University of Wisconsinâ??s undergraduate business program ranked in the top 30 nationwide in BusinessWeekâ??s annual survey.
UW-Madisonâ??s Surplus With A Purpose Shop, a store featuring wares ranging from used computers to bar stools to bicycles, will move from its 2102 Wright St. location to a Madison suburb, the Wisconsin State Journal reported Saturday.
The MIT Club of Wisconsin, a state association for alumni of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is honoring a UW-Madison influenza researcher and a bioscience spinoff company.
The researcher, Yoshihiro Kawaoka, a UW virologist and professor in the School of Veterinary Medicine, has gained worldwide recognition for his research on how influenza viruses replicate and the genetic contributors to virulence.
Quintessence Biopharmaceuticals of Madison, a company that grew out of the research of UW chemistry and biochemistry professors Laura Kiessling and Ron Raines, is being honored in the small company category.
Women in Wisconsin have significantly increased their participation in the workforce but still suffer from gender and racial inequalities, according to a report released last week.
Eleven of the universities that are the most active and successful in commercializing their inventions issued a series of suggestions last week for how institutions can best license their patents while serving the public good.
Among the suggestions: sue only when necessary; avoid licensing patents to companies that do not seriously commit to developing the inventions; be more stingy about exclusive licenses; and, particularly for inventions related to human health, find ways to carve out protections in licensing deals so that poor people and those in developing nations are not barred by patent rights from gaining affordable access to life-saving cures.
Cellectar, a Madison biotech company developing a shot-in-the-arm treatment for cancer, is about to take a big leap forward, thanks to a healthy wad of cash, a one-of-a-kind machine and a new, well-credentialed chief executive with big hopes and plans. Cellectar is a UW-Madison spinoff company.
UW-Madison’s popular SWAP Shop, where bargain hunters can find everything from Badgers sportswear to test tubes, is moving to the burbs.
The UW Materials Distribution Services Center, which includes the Surplus With A Purpose (SWAP) Shop, will move into a new 102,780- square-foot building in Verona this fall.
Student demand for more entrepreneurial education and opportunity at UW-Madison are finally being heard as initiatives take form. Many on campus are familiar with the student-run businesses at UW-Madison such as netNerds, Sconnie Nation, ExchangeHut, and U-DUB, but until recently, there have been few resources for students such as these companiesâ?? founders who are interested in experimenting with entrepreneurship.
A report released Wednesday by the Association of American Medical Colleges was signed by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundationâ??among other large research universitiesâ??to establish guidelines for institutionsâ?? technology licenses.
Wisconsin women, as a group, are still earning smaller paychecks than men, according to a new report. The report, issued by UW- Madison’s Center on Wisconsin Strategy and the Wisconsin Women’s Council, was timed for release on International Women’s Day on Thursday.
Universities have plumbed a rich source of cash in recent years by aggressively patenting and licensing faculty inventions, but some schools now want to set limits on the practice. An elite group–11 top research institutions and the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC)–have signed a pledge to take a kinder, gentler approach to licensing intellectual property. Yesterday, they released principles on the sharing of patented discoveries, urging other universities to follow their lead.
Former state purchasing officer Georgia Thompson is appealing her federal conviction on charges that she steered a lucrative state travel contract to one of Gov. Jim Doyle’s campaign donors.
….In briefs filed in the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago, Thompson contends that she could not have violated federal law – that she enriched herself by betraying her official state duties – because she did not personally benefit from the deal.
