Category: Research

For senior artist Kandis Elliot, postermaking is one of the best tasks of the job. Her series of educational posters started 4 years ago, when greenhouse and garden director Mo Fayyaz of the University of Wisconsin (UW), Madison, asked for a fruit poster. Introduction to Fungi is just the latest?and one of the hardest, because the botany department lacks a mycologist. And Elliot didn?t want to settle for a simple mushroom poster. ?There?s a gazillion of those things,? Elliot says. ?We wanted something that shows fungi as mushrooms but something more than mushrooms. Your beer, your wine, and your bread. The stuff on the back of your fridge.?

Last year, the UW-Madison beat back a Dane County Board resolution calling for an advisory panel to explore the ethics of primate research, much to the disappointment of local monkey defenders (see Rick Marolt?s opinion column, 10/14/10). Instead, the university agreed to host a series of forums, which many predicted would be a bust.

A world-renowned University of Wisconsin research center may be forced to limit available services and make staff layoffs as a direct result of a tight national budget for research institutions.

In the American tropics, thick woody vines called lianas are outpacing trees. They?re sucking up soil, nutrients and water, leaving less resources for the trees around them. University of Wisconsin plant ecologist Stefan Schnitzer studies these aggressive, fast growing vines known as lianas.

Every morning, mothers all over America leave their kids at home with nannies and au pairs or drop them off at the houses of family or leave them at daycare. With so many options, millions of working women have made this kind of surrogate parentage part of their everyday ritual. But that hand-off that may seem so simple is fraught with a range of emotions and challenges. Cameron MacDonald is the author of Shadow Mothers: Nannies, Au Pairs and the Micropolitics of Mothering and Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Cameron joined us to talk about her research into the topic.

Tens of millions of years before humanity sowed its first crops, a somewhat humbler organism was starting up its own large-scale agricultural operations. Leaf-cutter ant species depend on actively managed fungus farming to feed their teaming colonies.

Two days ago, the acclaimed British science journalist and blogger, Ed Yong, published a post titled I think you have all you need for a blog. This detailed an e-mail exchange with a public information officer who?d been approached for, surprisingly enough, information for a story.

A 30-year University of Wisconsin-Madison light research project would be terminated under President Barack Obama?s 2012 budget blueprint.

UW-Madison announced it will host three forums on campus that examine the ethics of using animals in research. These programs were first proposed this past summer, when the Dane County Board considered forming a citizens advisory panel to look at whether experimenting on monkeys at UW-Madison is humane and ethical — a measure which ultimately failed.

A mechanical engineering senior has for the second year in a row claimed the top prize in the University of Wisconsin – Madison?s Schoofs Prize for Creativity, the school said Monday.

UW-Madison needs more space to house monkeys for its animal research enterprise, university officials told a UW System Board of Regents committee on Thursday. Jon Levine, director of the Wisconsin National Primate Research Center on campus, told the Capital Planning and Budget Committee that some studies are being put on hold because current quarantine and holding facilities can?t handle the number of non-human primates required by university researchers.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison is in the middle of three-day birthday party for famous naturalist Charles Darwin.

UW-Madison?s annual Wonders of Physics program — a fast-paced educational presentation designed to generate interest in physics among learners of all ages and backgrounds — returns to campus this weekend.

Geron Corp., the company conducting the first U.S.-authorized trial of human embryonic stem cells, said Chief Executive Officer Thomas B. Okarma has stepped aside as the company focuses on making deals with drugmakers.

Sometimes the next medical breakthrough is where you least expect it. Researchers at the UW made an astonishing discovery — the key to treating heart disease could come from the venom of a scorpion.

Three forums on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus will highlight the ethics of animal research.

Three forums on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus will highlight the ethics of animal research. Eric Sandgren, an associate professor of pathobiological sciences, announced the forums on Tuesday.

“We want these talks to be discussions with the community on the costs, benefits and ethics of animal research,” said Sandgren, who directs the Research Animal Resource Center. “More transparency, more communication and better information help everyone involved in this emotional debate.”

Wisconsin residents should expect warmer weather over the next 50 years in the state, and will need to adapt to the changing weather conditions, according to a new study on climate change by University of Wisconsin researchers.

Wisconsin?s temperatures are expected to increase by an annual average of 6 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit by midcentury – a warming trend that will be highly variable and affect everything from our farming practices to the way we fish. The study by University of Wisconsin-Madison scientists and others in state government shows that a rise in temperature produces a jumble of different outcomes.

The world?s newest astronomical observatory is defined by a field of 86 colored flags rippling across an ice-covered polar landscape. Each banner marks a line of glass-covered orbs that stretches down a mile and a half into the ice, like beads on a frozen string.

Like roller coaster rides? Strap yourself in ? stem cells may be your scientific ticket.

UW-Madison scientists have coaxed blood cells, including some from a patient with leukemia, into embryonic-like stem cells, which could improve the understanding and treatment of blood cancers such as leukemia. The discovery by researcher Igor Slukvin and his campus colleagues is the second disease model created at the university involving induced pluripotent stem cells, co-discovered in 2007 by university stem cell pioneer James Thomson. The development should allow scientists to see what goes awry in blood cells when leukemia and similar diseases form, enabling the researchers to better fight the conditions, Slukvin said.

There was no apocalyptic cause for the recent deaths of 200 cattle in Central Wisconsin. The steers succumbed in a Portage County feed lot earlier this month, and Doctor Peter Vanderloo at the Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Lab said tests have shown that it was moldy sweet potatoes used in the animals? feed that did them in. ?The mold product that grows on sweet potatoes was present in the sweet potatoes,? said Vanderloo. ?All the clinical science, the death loss, the changes in the steers, are all compatible with this mold.

The Waisman Center on the UW-Madison campus is hosting its seventh annual “Autism: A Day with the Experts” program on Saturday.Three UW-Madison scientists will speak about the latest advances in autism research. The event also features a resource fair.

While this map comes courtesy the other UW (Wisconsin),The fascinating map, courtesy of the University of Wisconsin is not your normal topography.  Rather, Daniel Huffman logged about 1.5 million Twitter posts, and checked them for swear words (you can check out his methodology ? that is, which swears he used ? on his blog). 

Preschoolers know they prefer foods with salt, sugar, and fat and they can show it, according to a new study from researchers at the University of Oregon and University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Lying on a soft white blanket while waiting to get prepped for his medical treatment, Clyde looked bummed as he softly moaned.

It wasn?t clear whether he knew what lay in store for him. Clyde is a basset hound. Like most members of his breed, he always has a “hangdog look.”

On this day, 10-year-old Clyde was undergoing one in a series of TomoTherapy treatments for the cancerous tumor in his nose. He is one of the first pets to be treated by the relatively new radiation therapy at the University of Wisconsin School of Veterinary Medicine, the first veterinary school in the nation to open a TomoTherapy clinic.

Last week, two stories came out on successive days. First, Todd Finkelmeyer of The Capital Times noted that UW-Madison spent more than $1 billion on annual research for the first time this past fall.

A biomass power project at the University of Wisconsin-Madison has been nixed by new Republican Gov. Scott Walker, on account of the project?s high cost.

For the past several years, scientists who see limitless medical benefits from stem-cell research have battled through hard limits to their ability to pursue their work.