Throughout history, the natural world has inspired important scientific breakthroughs. For example, the Wright brothers incorporated the concepts of lift and drag into airplane designs after they observed how birds in flight tilted their wings back and forth.
Mike Randall knows what it takes to spark children’s interest in science. On Thursday the former rocket scientist with a Santa Claus bearing donned a suit of chain mail and stepped between musical Tesla coils.
Vocal cords are small and complex — and, when badly damaged, they’re difficult to treat. Now, scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have engineered lab-grown vocal cord tissue for the first time.
A team of scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison has bioengineered vocal cord tissue capable of vibrating and generating sound as well as natural tissue. The feat is being hailed as a scientific first.
People with damaged vocal cords may one day sing again with the help lab-grown vocal cords.
Vocal cords are small and complex — and, when badly damaged, they’re difficult to treat.
For the first time, researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have grown this superhero-like tissue in the lab, using human vocal cord cells as their raw ingredients. Their hope is to one day implant these engineered vocal cords into patients so they can recover their voices.
UW-Madison scientists have grown human vocal cord tissue in a dish, which made sound when transplanted into voice boxes from cadaver dogs — a development that could lead to better treatments for people with voice disorders.
In an experimental first, scientists reported Wednesday that they have grown about 170 human vocal cords in a lab, starting from cells taken from four surgical patients and one cadaver. “We never imagined that we would see the impressive level of function that we did,” said study senior author Nathan Welham of the University of Wisconsin Medical School at a briefing for reporters.
What is happening inside the brain when a soldier experiencing post-traumatic stress disorder is badly startled by a loud noise?
From mom’s comforting croon to a shout of warning, our voices are the main way we communicate and one we take for granted unless something goes wrong. Now researchers have grown human vocal cords in the laboratory that appear capable of producing sound – in hopes of one day helping people with voice-robbing diseases or injuries.
Nestled in the northern Wisconsin woods, Peter Lake once brimmed with golden shiners, fatheads and other minnows, which plucked algae-eating fleas from the murky water. Then, seven years ago, a crew of ecologists began stepping up the lake’s population of predatory largemouth bass. Today, largemouth bass still swim rampant. “Once that top predator is dominant, it’s very hard to dislodge,” said Stephen Carpenter, an ecologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who led the experiment.
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Chancellor Mark Mone sent a campuswide email Tuesday to squelch a rumor that top-level discussions were underway to possibly drop research from the Milwaukee campus’ mission.
With concussions cut in half among high school football players in Wisconsin this year, a new study from UW-Madison is recommending athletic trainers be on the sidelines at games and practices, to better manage injuries.
The American Physical Society named a UW-Madison electron storage ring a historic site Friday, recognizing it as an imperative tool for many scientific studies over its 20 years of operation.
The electron storage ring, named Tantalus, was the world’s first source of synchrotron radiation in 1968, according to a university release. It used a powerful magnetic field to force fast-moving electrons to change direction, creating synchrotron light.
Interviewed: Irwin Goldman UW-Madison professor and vegetable breeder who develops new strains of beets and other vegetables.
Politicians spoke longer making statements that registered “false” or “pants on fire” on the Politifact truth-o-meter than did politicians saying something that registered as “true,” research conducted at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found.
Coauthored by Clif Conrad:
Visit an American college campus today and you’ll see a more diverse student body than ever before. Over the last 30 years, the number of Hispanic students has risen five-fold, Asian and Pacific Islander enrollment has tripled, black enrollment has risen 150 percent and Native American enrollment has doubled.But the graduation rate for minority students falls far below the nationwide average. Our colleges and universities are not succeeding at educating students with diverse backgrounds. In an increasingly competitive global economy, our country cannot afford this waste of time, money and talent.
DULUTH, Minn. — Scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have confirmed the phenomenon of rogue waves on Lake Superior — waves double the size of others at the same time and which have been named as a potential cause of the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.
Meditation has long been used to induce calm and physical relaxation. But research on its potential uses for treating medical problems “is still in its very early stages,” and designing trials can be challenging, said Richard J. Davidson, a neuroscientist who founded the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at the Waisman Center, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “So it’s not surprising the scientific literature is filled with mixed findings at this point in time.”
John Hawks is the Vilas-Borghesi Distinguished Achievement Professor of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin—Madison. He talks about his role in the recent discovery of Homo Naledi in the caves of South Africa!
Radiolab, an award-winning radio show and podcast based in New York City, has an unexpectedly strong tie to Madison.
Noted: Steve Ackerman and Jonathan Martin, professors in the UW-Madison department of atmospheric and oceanic sciences, are guests on WHA radio (970 AM) at 11:45 a.m. the last Monday of each month.
Soren Wheeler, the senior editor at Radiolab, will be on campus all week to work as UW-Madison’s Science Writer in Residence in an effort to help students improve their science writing in a new age of journalism.
Noted: Since 2014, the UW-Madison chemistry department has been conducting crystal growing contests among high school students in the state of Wisconsin. In 2016, the contest will be for both middle and high school students.
Craig Schuff’s heart and academic journey carried on more than four years after he was paralyzed in a Lake Monona diving accident that damaged his spinal cord. Schuff, 30, a quadriplegic since 2011, died Oct. 24.His advisers at UW-Madison said he was less than a year from finishing his doctorate in engineering, focusing on innovative nuclear research that deserves to be continued.
Karin Swanson found a group of UW scientists willing to go to the ends of the Earth to find clues into the planet’s past, present and future.
Noted: The Portage Daily Register reported that Amy Kerwin founded Primates Inc. after seeing the need for monkey sanctuaries more than a decade ago in her work in the primate lab at University of Wisconsin-Madison. She got to know 97 research monkeys and learned there were no plans to retire them.
Science seems obsessed with creating tiny objects that can do big things. Like a team at the University of Wisconsin-Madison which has created a new microlens with a 170-degree field of vision.
(Video) Karin Swanson found a group of UW scientists willing to go to the ends of the Earth to find clues into the planet’s past, present and future. Quoted: Jay Johnson, Drill Operations Engineer for IDDO.
There are sounds reasons to believe Exact Sciences’ non-invasive test for colon cancer will one day be a widely-recommended preventive procedure. But there is no doubt the announcement last month that a federal health task force gave the test an initial designation of “alternative test,” just as company officials were wrapping up plans for an ambitious expansion at Judge Doyle Square was about the worst timing possible. Very simply the implications for the company’s financial performance, short term as they might be, made the move downtown too risky. It’s too bad, but company CEO Kevin Conroy’s decision to grow the company at its current UW Research Park location is the right thing to do.
Quoted: “We need to evolve as well and create an environment where companies can interact easily and where they can spill over into these third spaces and have casual encounters and lunch meetings and coffee meetings,” Research Park Managing Director Aaron Olver said.
Research Park has already brought in food carts to the heart of its campus on a daily basis, but Olver said they hope to bring in restaurants and coffee shops to help facilitate a more collaborative atmosphere, which is an idea Exact Sciences is on board with.
Dan Vinmont, a University of Wisconsin climatologist shares projections for how el niño will affect Wisconsin this coming winter.
Exact Sciences CEO Kevin Conroy says a chance to move its campus downtown “was appealing”, but says the company is expanding at its current location at the University Research Park in west Madison.
Business leaders and city officials Monday remained upbeat about the prospect of a large development at Judge Doyle Square, despite the decision of Madison-based Exact Sciences to opt against moving its headquarters downtown as part of a proposed redevelopment there.
Exact Sciences announced Monday it will instead seek to expand at the UW Research Park on the West Side.
In a major turnabout, Exact Sciences Corp. is withdrawing from the massive Judge Doyle Square project south of Capitol Square and now intends to expand at the University Research Park on the West Side, company officials announced Monday.
UW-Madison professors took a formal stand Monday against Republican-backed state legislation that would allow concealed carry permit holders to bring guns into university buildings and ban research on aborted fetal tissue.
Exact Sciences Corp. is stepping away from plans to build a new headquarters in downtown Madison and is in discussions with the University of Wisconsin-Madison to develop a biotech campus in University Research Park on the city’s west side instead.
A new study shows that among families with healthy children, the chances of divorce tend to increase with each successive child. However, among families with at least one disabled child, there is no increase in the rate of divorce as the family grows bigger.
What is the environmental cost of a meal eaten at a student union? Thomas W. Bryan, a graduate student in environment and resources at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, sought to answer that question by tracing food-supply chains to determine the carbon footprint of each menu item.
But now, engineers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have come up with technology that enables energy to be harvested from moving tires.
Since the late 1960s, psilocybin mushrooms have been illegal in the United States due to their hallucinogenic effects on the human mind.
What began as an uproar over undercover videos of Planned Parenthood officials callously discussing how to collect fetal tissue is now threatening research vital to finding treatments for devastating conditions from Alzheimer’s to blindness.
The UW2020 Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation Discovery Initiative has received an overwhelming number of responses to their new grant research program.
The UW2020 program, which began in 2014, has received an array of responses from faculty and academic staff. All staff with permanent principle investigator status are eligible to apply, and some 150 applications have already been received.
Noted: About 30 years ago, Jones was involved in a study at the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a device that processed images and used vibrating pins on a fingertip to translate that image to a person who can’t see. The machine wasn’t mobile, but it was the start of what would become the BrainPort v100.
The identification of zebra mussels in Lake Mendota in Madison was the result of a class project from UW-Madison.
The number of concussions is cut in half. A UW study shows they’re down significantly because of new high school football practice rules. [Article discusses rules’ impact on Sun Prairie High School football.]
Quoted: “This study confirms what athletic trainers in high-school football have long believed about the association of full-contact drills or practices and the likelihood of concussion,” said Tim McGuine, senior scientist in the department of orthopedics and rehabilitation at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. “This is probably also true for other football injuries such as sprains, fractures and dislocations.”
A University of Wisconsin-Madison surgeon is on a mission to change testing standards for board-certified providers that would include testing touch techniques.
After more than 500 experienced physicians completed Dr. Carla Pugh’s breast exam simulation, her research published earlier this year in the New England Journal of Medicine showed 10 to 15 percent of them were not using enough force during the exam.
Researchers at UW-Madison created a new social network aimed at keeping elderly Wisconsinites in their homes longer. The researchers explain how this site was developed and how they’re studying the site’s effects.
Noted: Findings show that the rate of sports-related concussions sustained during high school football practice was more than twice as high in the two seasons prior to the rule change as compared to the 2014 season, said University of Wisconsin–Madison senior scientist Timothy A. McGuine, PhD, ATC.
“This study confirms what athletic trainers who work with high school football programs have long believed regarding the association of full contact drills or practices and the likelihood a player will sustain a concussion,” Dr. McGuine said. “This is probably also true for other football injuries such as sprains, fractures and dislocations.”
It’s used to find potential treatments for a wide range of common diseases and afflictions, including cancer, diabetes, birth defects, HIV, multiple sclerosis, ALS, and Alzheimer’s. Unlike adult tissue cells, fetal tissue cells can be manipulated into almost any kind of tissue, are less likely to be rejected by a host, and have the capacity to replicate rapidly — making them perfect for analysis into how diseases work. They are also being tried as actual treatments for Parkinson’s disease, spinal cord injuries, and diabetes, with researchers injecting fetal cells directly into organs in hopes of regenerating them. Fetal tissue was also a vital component in the development of vaccines for polio, chicken pox, rubella, and shingles. The polio vaccine alone saves 550,000 lives a year. Alta Charo, a bioethicist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, says fetal tissue research has benefited “virtually every person in this country.”
Experts say extra vigilance will be needed to prevent Lake Mendota zebra mussels from invading other lakes.
Eight-year-old Dario Alvarado-Steele huddled with his mother, Alisha, looking at a laptop screen.
The city’s longstanding ties with historical scientific achievements have a new home in the Madison Science Museum, which opened Thursday.The process of putting together the museum, the brainchild of Dave Nelson, emeritus professor of biochemistry at UW-Madison, began long before its recent grand opening.
Since July, an anti-abortion group’s deceptively edited videos targeting Planned Parenthood for allegedly profiting off sales of fetal tissue appear to have prompted at least four arson attacks on Planned Parenthood clinics. And even though the allegations were bogus, the vilification of the women’s health organization has done additional damage: Violent threats and a political chill in the wake of the videos have begun to undermine potentially life-saving research on diseases including diabetes, Parkinson’s, and Alzheimer’s. Fetal-tissue donation programs essential to such research have been shut down, supplies of the tissue to labs have dwindled, and legislation is brewing in multiple states that could hinder cutting-edge scientific studies.
As scientific fields rapidly evolve, putting more emphasis on effective communication skills and accessibility, the newest president of the Ecological Society of America said she will use decades of experience as an ecologist to navigate the organization through changing times.
Noted: Steve Ackerman and Jonathan Martin, professors in the UW-Madison department of atmospheric and oceanic sciences, are guests on WHA radio (970 AM) at 11:45 a.m. the last Monday of each month.
Is the University of Wisconsin-Madison a patent troll?
For decades, the massive mastodon skeleton that sits in the UW-Madison Geology Museum has been known as the Boaz mastodon, named for the Richland County village in which its bones were found in the late 1890s.
