For years, scientists have believed that apes do not have the capacity for speech – but one gorilla might be changing that. Koko – known for her abilities in sign language – has learnt simple sounds, as well as signs, from imitating humans.
There’s been a lot of talk recently about declining bee populations. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, beekeepers are seeing average yearly declines of about 33 percent. One UW-Madison student (Jeremy Hemberger) is taking a unique approach to stopping the trend, by using some tiny technology.
A key Senate Republican told 27 News Wednesday that she cannot support the current version of an Assembly bill designed to ban the sale and use of aborted fetal tissue, because it would stop major medical research being conducted at UW-Madison.
Sen. Alberta Darling (R-RIver Hills) made those comments just one day after the Assembly Committee on Criminal Justice and Public Safety held a public hearing on the bill.
Gov. Scott Walker isn’t saying whether he supports the current version of a bill in the Legislature that would ban research involving aborted fetal body parts. Walker was asked Wednesday about the measure, which drew opposition from University of Wisconsin and private researchers at a public hearing Tuesday.
UW-Madison, which says it gets fetal tissue for research from four licensed tissue banks, is reviewing whether the banks meet federal regulations and university requirements.
A bill to ban some research on aborted fetal tissues at Wisconsin universities could face challenges in federal courts, which have struck down similar laws around the nation for failing to spell out what’s a crime and whats not.
Governor Scott Walker is not offering much support for a bill that would restrict research in the state that uses tissue from aborted fetuses.
This week, beekeepers, farmers, pesticide operators and state agriculture officials met at the Agricultural Research Station in Arlington. It’s the first of several meetings to come up with a plan protecting bees and other pollinators.
Interviewed: Richard Davidson, one of the world’s leading neuroscientists for a look at how the practice of mindfulness affects the brain.
MADISON — Republican lawmakers sponsoring a bill to ban research on aborted fetal tissue in Wisconsin — a proposal medical groups oppose — said Tuesday they were working on changes to protect work at the University of Wisconsin that uses existing cell lines.
A new UW Health study shows older women do not need to take high levels of vitamin D to increase their bone density. Lead Study Investigator Dr. Karen Hansen, associate professor of medicine, says up until now guidelines for Vitamin D usage were all over the map.
As the Wisconsin Legislature debates a Republican bill that would ban the use of aborted fetal tissue in research, University of Wisconsin law professor and bioethicist Alta Charo writes in the Washington Post about the GOP’s long history of support for such research.
Federal law already bans the sale of aborted fetal tissue.
Planned Parenthood and other groups could not profit from selling the tissue of aborted fetuses under a bill banning its sale and use, proponents of the measure told a state Assembly panel Tuesday.
Research in Wisconsin could still be conducted on tissue derived from fetuses aborted more than five years ago while the state would ban some current research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison that uses more recently aborted tissue, under a proposal that came before lawmakers Tuesday.
Nothing will quite make crunching into a deep-fried, spiral-cut potato-on-a-stick anything but a decadent treat enjoyed at the State Fair.
Scientists use DNA to figure out a lot of useful stuff: whether a drug will work to fight a certain form of cancer, who committed a crime, the ancient history of a fragment of fossilized bone. Now a team led by biologists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are putting genetic analysis to work to get to the bottom of a different sort of compelling question: the evolution of lager beer.
Republicans in the state legislature want to ban research in Wisconsin, using tissue from aborted fetuses, legislation which opponents fear could damage the biomedical industry in the state.
Abortion opponents and medical researchers packed a public hearing Tuesday to testify on a bill banning the sale and use of aborted fetal tissue.
A new UW Health study suggests a possible link between high blood sugar and Alzheimer’s. The study published late last month in the Journal of the American Medical Association Neurology, is giving scientists a better understanding of how insulin resistance or per-diabetes changes the way the brain uses sugar.
“People who have more insulin resistance, the brain does not use as much sugar,” Lead Investigator, Dr. Barbara Bendlin, associate professor of medicine, said of the study’s findings.
Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison said a bill banning the use of fetal tissue would bring a halt to medical research on campus. The dean of the UW School of Medicine and Public Health, the Wisconsin Medical Society, the Medical College of Wisconsin and a trade association representing biotech companies are all lobbying against the measure.
A research team led by a UW-Madison professor has received $2.6 million from the U.S. Department of Energy to improve solar power technology and make the alternative energy source more competitive with fossil fuels. Also: UW Police, Athletics join Snapchat.
All transfers of fetal tissue in Wisconsin could be banned, under a bill coming before lawmakers Tuesday that could affect medical research in the state.
A bill to ban the sale and use of aborted fetal tissue in Wisconsin could halt important medical research, UW-Madison and biotech leaders say, but sponsors of the bill say such research could continue with other tissue.
Noted: In good times, farmers spend a lot of money on their businesses. Each dollar of net farm income results in an additional 60 cents of economic activity as it flows through the economy, according to UW-Madison research.
In the late 1990s, Gail Robertson, a researcher studying irregular heartbeats at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, discovered the reason for unexplained cardiac deaths occurring in some patients who had used approved drugs.
Noted: The University of Wisconsin-Madisons Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies, or CIMSS, is partnering with the citizen science website Zooniverse and NOAA to categorize nearly 300,000 images collected over 32 years.
Noted: Authored by John R. Raymond, Sr., M.D., president and chief executive officer and professor of medicine at the Medical College of Wisconsin. Robert N. Golden, M.D., dean of the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health, the Robert Turell Professor in Medical Leadership and vice chancellor for medical affairs.
Noted: “It was made by a neutrino that came through the Earth somewhere below our detector,” said IceCube’s principal investigator Francis Halzen, of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Noted: IceCube is now getting so much data that the team has given up naming individual detections, says detector lead Francis Halzen of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Noted: In her conference keynote address, Marsha Mailick, director of the Waisman Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, shared data gleaned from 10 years of following the lives of more than 400 people with autism, starting in 1998. This study was prescient; adults are vastly underrepresented in autism research, and longitudinal studies into old age are badly needed.
Noted: The Clean Lakes Alliance, City of Madison, Dane County, Mio Soft, UW-Madison Center for Limnology, and the Space Science and Engineering Center teamed up to put this together.
Noted: Dave Gagnon is the program director for Field Day, which is housed within the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He’s in charge of about a dozen software engineers who help produce physical and nonphysical experiences aimed at helping students learn new topics.
A UW-Madison biochemist has been selected by Pres. Barack Obama to chair the committee honoring those making major contributions to the sciences.
GRAND CHUTE – Five local high schools worked with University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers recently to study the impact of advanced courses on graduates’ success after high school.
The Confederate flag. The Supreme Court ruling on gay marriage. Policing minority communities. Nuclear weapons and Iran. Summer often brings a lull in the news, but not this year. And, come September, many students are going to want to talk about many of these headlines.
UW-Madison scientists are trying to find new uses for acid whey — the liquid byproduct in cream and cottage cheeses and Greek yogurt.It’s nothing like sweet whey, the cheese making leftover that’s often converted into protein powder.Dean Sommer of the UW Center for Dairy Research says today’s acid whey is hard to convert to a useful powder.
University of Wisconsin-Madison biochemistry Prof. Judith Kimble has been tapped by President Barack Obama to chair the President’s Committee on the National Medal of Science.
The latest research on preventing the spread of White Nose Syndrome among Wisconsin’s bat populations will be presented this weekend. You can also find out how you can help preserve the populations.
Dean Sommer wants to turn 8 billion pounds of whey from a liability into an asset.
A new faculty member at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Marianne Fairbanks, is bringing decades of experience with dyes, fibres and design to the development of a solar textile technology.
Two University of Wisconsin-Madison faculty members — one a textile artist and the other a chemist — have teamed to create fabric solar panels.
A round-up of July media clips featuring UW-Madison’s Alta Charo, from the UW-Madison Law School, on fetal tissue used in research. Quotes appear on NPR, Fox News, in Politico and more.
In the 58 years since they first responded to the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study, thousands of men and women have provided descriptions of their families, incomes, education, aspirations, social lives and health (both physical and mental). Many of the 10,317 who took the first survey have stuck with it, answering five follow-ups over the last half century.
Jeremy Hemberger drives two hours to the cranberry marshes of central Wisconsin to glue radio chips to bumblebees. On a good day.
Lakeforecast.org is the creation of a collaboration of the Clean Lakes Alliance, software company MIOsoft, city and county officials and UW-Madison’s Center for Limnology and the Space Science and Engineering Center.
Noted: The bill would go further than existing law and ban donations of such tissues or research on long-standing tissue lines — an alarming development for some medical researchers … University of Wisconsin-Madison officials have raised similar concerns. In some cases, it might no longer be possible to determine the origins of certain long-standing tissue lines, according to Tim Kamp, a medical doctor and co-director of the UW-Madison’s Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine Center.
University of Wisconsin-Madison scientists are researching which habitats encourage native bumblebees to forage in fields and thrive, and honeybee population declines have driven up the costs of renting nonnative bees for pollination. Quoted: Jeremy Hemberger, graduate student in entomology.
But now, the National Weather Service, University of Wisconsin-Madison and the National Sea Grant Program are working together like never before to improve prediction methods and better determine the strength of rip currents.
About 10,000 years ago, the teosinte plant underwent a mutation that would change the world. The tough greenish husks surrounding its golden grains disappeared, and the plant began its long evolution into what we now call corn.
A familiar face to viewers of Wisconsin Public Television has penned a book telling stories of Wisconsin Native Americans who helped sustain the land.
(Video) Facebook posts from couples proclaiming their love may be annoying to some, but there’s new research that shows those proclamations are good for their relationships. Catalina Toma, an assistant professor of Communication Arts at UW, talks about the new research.
Sickening couples’ Facebook posts are a sign of true relationship commitment, according to a study published this week.
Technology originally designed to study homes and heath with UW-Madison’s School of Nursing is now being used at crime scenes. Researchers at the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery are hoping 3D scanning will make some of the most complicated crime investigations more efficient.
Jeanne Bristol and Kay Cronin remember their dad as a proud man who worked hard to get ahead. “He put himself through college in his 50s,” Kay says. “It was important to him.”
When it comes to dementia research, UW-Madison is the new kid on the block. “But it is quickly reaching national status,” says Dr. Sanjay Asthana, who heads the UW’s Alzheimer’s research program. “Our young scientists are already leaders, and they are the future of the field.”
Quoted: Tim Kamp, a medical doctor and researcher and co-director of the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine Center, said the proposal could affect research on the campus and in private biotechnology companies.
Wisconsin’s “cheeseheads” might someday have a wealth of local options to pair with the state’s most popular food. And they may have Nick Smith to thank for it.
It’s well-known that children from lower socioeconomic backgrounds tend to lag behind their better-off peers in academic readiness and school performance.
Anxiety disorders are among the most common type of mental disorder in the United States, affecting about 29 percent of adults at some point, according to National Institute of Mental Health statistics. These disorders often appear early on, and among children can cause trouble sleeping, difficulty concentrating, or avoidance of social events.
