Cellular Dynamics International is out with a new product: stem cell-derived neurons. The Madison company, founded by UW-Madison stem cell pioneer James Thomson, says it is the first commercial release of human brain cells, created through the company?s stem cell technology, in large enough quantity, quality and purity for use in life science research.
Back in 2005, then-Harvard president Lawrence Summers proclaimed that boys were simply better at math because, well, because they were boys. It was a statement once-removed from sending the little ladies back into the kitchen with aprons tied around their waists and frankly, the backlash that quickly followed and pulverized Summers was well-deserved.
Many believe that fossils represent organisms that died millions of years ago. Scientific literature, however, contains dozens of well-described original soft tissues in fossils. Since laboratory tests have shown that organic tissues decay in only thousands of years, these fossils have been at the center of much heated controversy.
Philip Ball writes in The Guardian about another new initiative from NSF to fund ?potentially transformative? research. He begins his essay with this…
Many explanations for the gender gap in math skills don?t hold up, suggests new research on math skills and gender in 86 countries.
Scientists have previously believed that the relatively low numbers of women in high-level mathematics could be due to biological differences between men and women. But a new, international study at the University of Wisconsin-Madison has cast doubt on the idea that the differences are biological at all.
A UW researcher was honored at the White House Friday for her work to provide more opportunities for women and underrepresented minorities in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
The University of Wisconsin?s IceCube Research Center will be hosting celebrations in honor of the 100th anniversary of the first-ever trek to the South Pole this upcoming Tuesday.
Discover’s Carl Zimmer on cutting-edge flu research and the way it’s portrayed by news media.
A: A total lunar eclipse could be seen in cloud-free regions across most of the United States and Canada on Saturday morning, Dec. 10. In a total lunar eclipse the sun, Earth and moon line up and the Earth casts its shadow on the moon. The moon is always a full moon and it never goes completely dark during a total lunar eclipse. It appears reddish for the same reason that sunsets and sunrises often have a red tint.
A: It?s not clear that they do, says Robert McGrath, coordinator of mind/body wellness services at University Health Services at UW-Madison. McGrath has seen a study that found that children laugh no more than adults, but added that kids do have some advantages in the laughter department.
Marshall Middle School is into its fifth year of an experiment in single-sex education, a practice under attack from some who say it doesn?t work and could harm students. Janet Hyde, an authority on the role of gender in education at UW-Madison calls single-sex education theory “pseudoscience.”
Antarctica may be the bottom of the world, but the coldest, driest, highest continent is the best place for looking up at the heavens from Earth.
It?s a rare kind of research that incites a frenzied panic before it?s even published. But it?s flu season, and influenza science has a way of causing a stir this time of year.
A UW Madison researcher will be honored at The White House on Friday.
Dr. Angela Byars-Winston will receive an award for her efforts to enhance job opportunities for young girls, women and minorities in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM).
With attention largely focused on the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery, people may not have noticed that UW-Madison was building another major science facility nearly right across the street.
In honor of the centennial of Roald Amundsen?s South Pole expedition, the IceCube Research Center on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus has scheduled a celebration next week.
A $112 million biochemistry complex on Henry Mall will be substantially completed this month and occupants are expected to move in over winter break. The complicated project involved gutting several historic buildings, the restoration of 1940s-era murals and a new, six-story research tower.
UW-Madison?s Bassam Z. Shakhashiri is canceling his long-standing and popular holiday chemistry show this year for the first time since 1994 due to a family medical issue. “It was a hard decision. We?re very sorry to do it,” said Cayce Osborne, outreach specialist for the Wisconsin Initiative for Science Literacy.
Many employers don?t think college graduates today have the necessary skills to fill job openings. According to a survey conducted by the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools, only 7 percent of hiring decision-makers believe the higher education system does an “excellent” job of preparing students for the workplace. Similarly, only 16 percent reported that applicants are “very prepared” with the knowledge and skills they would need for the job.
The annual “Once Upon a Christmas Cheery” science shows, which have been produced by UW-Madison chemistry professor Bassam Shakhashiri for more than four decades, will not take place this year. The university announced in an emailed news release Wednesday that the programs scheduled for Saturday and Sunday have been canceled “due to a family medical emergency.”
Overall, things are better for Dane County businesses this year, but company executives are not so optimistic about 2012. That?s the gist of the 2011 First Business Economic Survey of Dane County, being released Wednesday. Of 3,584 surveys sent, 337 were returned. The sample size has a margin of error of 5 percent….The survey was conducted by UW-Madison’s A.C. Nielsen Center for Marketing Research in September and October.
A UW-Madison office in Shanghai could be open as soon as June, according to officials who just returned from a trip to China to explore the possibility of the university?s first foreign outpost. Gilles Bousquet, dean of the division of international studies and vice provost for globalization, said that would be the “ideal” timeline but it hinges on continued support here and getting the necessary permits in China. He said UW-Madison is convening a planning team to determine next actions.
A: The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration?s Climate Prediction Center issues seasonal climate outlook maps for the nation. The organization?s forecast for Wisconsin?s 2011-12 meteorological winter (which started Thursday and runs through Feb. 29) is for below-normal temperatures and above-normal precipitation.
A. “The size and shape of bubbles and balloons are determined by a competition between their surface tension, which makes them contract, and their internal pressure, which makes them expand,” said UW-Madison physics professor Clint Sprott, who is founder of “The Wonders of Physics” campus and traveling show.
Science reporters and bloggers are lighting up the Internet with posts noting the creation of a genetically modified version of the deadly H5N1 bird flu which can be easily transmitted among ferrets, which closely mimic the human response to flu. Although many of these reports focus on the work coming out of this Dutch medical center, most also note University of Wisconsin-Madison researcher Yoshihiro Kawaoka conducted similar work. Sources within the university confirm that’s true.
Much to the delight of birders, snowy owls, rarely seen in these parts, are making their way by the hundreds into Wisconsin and other upper Midwestern states as they do every few years, journeying south in search of food from their normal wintering grounds on the Arctic tundra….This year, the birds are appearing not only in Wisconsin but in Minnesota, Michigan and North and South Dakota, according to maps kept by Jesse Ellis, a UW-Madison zoology student.
The Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery has received the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Gold certification in time for its one-year anniversary Friday.
In celebration of the building?s first anniversary, multiple celebrations, including a variety of tours, are slated to take place from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the Discovery Building.
AquaMost, a Madison company developing a new type of water purification technology, has received another $4 million in investment funds and grant money. AquaMost?s technology, called photoelectrocatalytic oxidation, was invented at UW-Madison.
Several state agencies have unveiled guidelines created in congruence with University of Wisconsin researchers to promote the continued use of biomass energy in Wisconsin, despite the state?s current categorization as a leader in the field of biomass crop planting.
Even after the old-fashioned method of checking out books, journals and resources with cards catalogs ended at UW-Madison?s Memorial Library in 1986, the library continued to house millions of cards on the second floor. The collection will soon be removed to create space for new library services that will facilitate innovative research methods, the university announced Tuesday.
Differences seen in the structure and function of psychopaths? brains could help explain their often callous and impulsive anti-social behavior, U.S. researchers report.
Inside a Dutch medical facility is a potentially devastating weapon that could kill millions: A genetically modified version of the H5N1 bird flu, engineered to be easily transmitted among ferrets. And the researchers who figured out how to do it would like to share their work with the world.
At some point, engineering professor Brianno Coller realized he didn?t like slogging through dry math problems as an instructor any more than he had as a student. So he thought about what could liven things up ? animation! interactivity! ? and it hit him: video games.
Psychopaths are usually diagnosed by their behavioral patterns: an eccentric personality, including lack of empathy and remorse, deceptiveness, and abusive actions. Now, researchers have shown that psychopaths also have differences in particular brain regions, with fewer connections between the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), a brain region involved in feelings of empathy and guilt, and the amygdala, which mediates fear and anxiety, according to a study published in the November 30 issue of Journal of Neuroscience.
Story cites figures from the University of Wisconsin?s Institute for Research on Poverty that show the poverty rate would be about double what it is now without government programs such as Social Security, SSI, food stamps, the Earned Income Tax Credit and other programs. The UW figures show a 23.8% Wisconsin poverty rate in 2009 if you don?t count those programs, 11.5% if you do. (These figures are the UW group?s version of the poverty rate – a measure that is undergoing revisions nationally.)
Wayne Feltz is a self-described weather geek. Last week, he stood one afternoon on the wind-whipped roof of UW-Madison?s Space Science and Engineering Center, where he works as a researcher, and stared up through the canopy of dish antennas that top the building like some crazy, bristly hairdo.
“We?re running out of room!” Feltz shouted. There was a hint of geeky pride in the pronouncement. And why not? Thanks to what researchers such as Feltz are accomplishing in this building, you will be accurately forewarned this winter of the snowstorms that will turn your driveway into a ski hill. Hunched over their computers, scientists here have advanced meteorology to where we can now literally peer into the future and predict everything from the landfall of hurricanes to the formation of tornados.
If your neighbors say it is raining more in Milwaukee now than in their youth, they are correct.
Milwaukee?s climate has been getting wetter over the last 60 years. Future generations here might be telling each other that the city is getting even more rain than today, with more intense storms, said Steve Vavrus, a senior scientist with the Nelson Institute Center for Climatic Research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have discovered a molecular mechanism that could open the door to new approaches to fighting cancer. The research, which was published this week in the journal Nature, focuses on the body?s penchant for producing its own hydrogen peroxide at the site of wounds.
A. “Carbonated” beverages get their name from dissolved carbon dioxide. The bottling process increases the pressure and amount of carbon dioxide in the liquid and air inside the can to levels much higher than in the air outside.
A. The most common way to define the start of winter is to appeal to the solstice, the day on which the noontime sun is positioned at its farthest southern point of the year. This is the astronomical start of winter ? Dec. 22 this year. On that day, the noontime sun will be directly overhead at 23.5 S latitude.
A US biosecurity committee is deciding whether crucial research on H5N1 bird flu is too dangerous to publish. The work shows a few mutations that might allow H5N1 bird flu to cause a lethal human pandemic.
A group of scientists is pushing to publish research about how they created a man-made flu virus that could potentially wipe out civilisation.
Hunched over their computers, scientists at the Space Science and Engineering Center have advanced meteorology to where we can now literally peer into the future and predict everything from the landfall of hurricanes to the formation of tornados.
Mentions that this year, about $1 million was programmed for genetic improvement research, conducted at University of Wisconsin-Madison and other institutions. Another approximately $300,000 is pegged for conservation programs.
At first glance, a program launched last week that will provide college scholarships for up to 2,600 current ninth-graders attending public schools in Milwaukee looks similar to a growing number of initiatives across the country designed to give students the boost they need to pursue a college degree. But The Degree Project is different in one significant way: It was built from the ground up as a research project to collect data and to examine whether these so-called promise programs are a wise use of funds in an era of limited resources.
“What we want to look at is if there is clear evidence that these programs work,” says Douglas Harris, a UW-Madison associate professor of educational policy studies who helped design the project and is its evaluator.
Psychopaths such as Hannibal Lecter – Anthony Hopkins? character in the film The Silence of the Lambs – are callous, anti-social and sometimes violent. They are incapable of feeling empathy or guilt.
Brains of Wisconsin prisoners diagnosed as psychopaths are different in structure and function from the brains of prisoners who committed similar crimes but were not diagnosed with the mental disorder, a new study led by University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers indicates.
Differences in psychopaths? brains may help explain their anti-social behavior, according to new research.
The longer a child lives in an impoverished neighborhood, the greater the risk that they won?t graduate from high school, according to a recent study by the University of Michigan and the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have grown human embryonic stem cells into neurons that appear capable of adapting themselves to the brain?s machinery by sending and receiving messages from other cells, raising hopes that medicine may one day use this tool to treat patients with such disorders as Parkinson?s and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, commonly known as Lou Gehrig?s disease.
A UW-Eau Claire study has found that a popular website used to rate college professors is “providing useful feedback about instructor quality.” RateMyProfessors.com allows students to voluntarily rank their professors, but there is conflicting research on the validity of the website. Skeptics say students who use the site are not representative, tend to have extreme views, and give high ratings to easy instructors.
Researchers working on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus have shown that neurons derived from human embryonic stem cells and implanted into the brains of mice can connect with the brain?s circuitry to both transmit and receive signals. The findings, which were reported Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by a team of scientists who work at the university?s Waisman Center, could help lead to new therapies for treating everything from strokes and traumatic brain injuries to Parkinson?s and Huntington?s disease.
A. There are a series of questions you can ask yourself to aid in predicting the formation of frost for your own backyard:
Rich Low of Madison served as an infantry officer in the Army in Iraq in 2005 and 2006, leading some 280 combat missions. When he came back from the service, he didn?t think his experience affected him in any major way. He had nightmares, and he startled easily, but he chalked that up to just something veterans live with. Then he enrolled in a study he initially wrote off as “just some hippie thing,” where he learned about yoga breathing and meditation. A year later, Low, 30, sums up his experience with two words: “It works.”
That?s the idea behind the study coming from The Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at the Waisman Center on the UW-Madison campus. Researchers there, including associate scientist Emma Seppala, believe something as simple as breathing can change the lives of veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, even those who don’t think they have post-traumatic stress disorder.
Integrating a complex, single-crystal material with “giant” piezoelectric properties onto silicon, University of Wisconsin-Madison engineers and physicists can fabricate low-voltage, near-nanoscale electromechanical devices that could lead to improvements in high-resolution 3D imaging, signal processing, communications, energy harvesting, sensing, and actuators for nanopositioning devices, among others.
A. “Dark muscles, because they?re locomotive, are a different fiber type than light muscles, and the fibers contain different amounts of oxygen-carrying proteins,” said poultry expert Mark Richards, a professor of animal sciences at UW?Madison.
Mentions a 2011 study by the University of Wisconsin-Madison?s Applied Population Laboratory of declining participation among male deer hunters
Religion is said to be the driving influence behind Americans? low moral opinion of nanotechnology, according to a researcher who surveyed public opinion on science and technology. Dietram Scheufele, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor of life sciences, and a colleague found in their study that only 29.5 percent of respondents from a sample of 1,015 adult Americans agreed that nanotechnology was morally acceptable.
