UW-Madison stem-cell scientists have received a $7.2 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to study rats with Lou Gehrig’s disease.
About 30,000 Americans have the disease, also known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS. The progressive condition, usually fatal within a few years after diagnosis, weakens muscles and eventually makes people unable to breathe.
MADISON, Wis. (AP) – A Wisconsin scientist will set sail Friday to study earthquakes off Japan.
University of Wisconsin-Madison geologist Harold Tobin is part of a team that will investigate deep oceanic faults in the Nankai Trough. Such faults are responsible for creating tsunamis.
Tobin and the team will launch their research vessel from Shingu Port in Japan.
The expedition calls for deep-sea drilling.
It’s expected to last eight weeks.
The University of Wisconsin allowed a star researcher to study material that could be used to produce the Ebola virus in a lab less secure than whatâ??s required under federal guidelines.
The UW-Madison conducted research on the deadly Ebola virus in 2005 and 2006 in a lower-level security facility than is recommended until the National Institutes of Health told the university to stop.
John Hammond, director of the Sunshine Project, a watchdog group for biological research, said Wednesday that researchers at the University of Wisconsin made and manipulated copies of the entire Ebola virus genome without proper safety precautions.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison allowed a star researcher to study genetic material that could produce the Ebola virus in a lab less secure than required under federal guidelines, officials said Wednesday. The study stopped last fall after a federal health official told the university the material must be contained in the most secure type of lab, a Biosafety Level 4.
A researcher at the University of Wisconsin at Madison performed work on the Ebola virus genome from late 2005 to 2006 in a less-secure environment than is required by federal regulations, according to documents released on Wednesday by an advocacy group, but Wisconsin officials said the research did not put public safety at risk.
UW-Madison allowed a star researcher to study material that could be used to produce the Ebola virus in a lab less secure than what’s required under federal guidelines.
The study was stopped last fall after a National Institutes of Health official told the university the material must be contained at labs with the highest level of security, or Biosafety Level 4.
The National Institutes of Health annoaunced Tuesday it has awarded UW-Madisonâ??s School of Medicine and Public Health a $41 million grant, one of the largest grants in the schoolâ??s history.
The grant will funnel into the universityâ??s new Institute for Clinical and Translational Research. â??This is a highly visible, highly covetous award given to only the most elite institutions in the country,â? said Robert Golden, dean of the UW School of Medicine and Public Health.
A $41 million research grant was awarded to the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health Tuesday.
Many patients don ‘t do what science says they should, from people at risk for heart disease taking aspirin to prevent heart attacks to men taking drugs to stave off osteoporosis, a bone disease.
A $41 million federal grant awarded to UW-Madison aims to bridge such gaps by improving the way campus discoveries are spread to the public.
The National Institutes of Health has awarded the UW-Madison Medical School a $41 million grant to help get medical research findings to patients more quickly.
The goal of the effort, known as translational research, is to move biomedical and health sciences discoveries into practical use in doctors’ offices, clinics and hospitals, where the knowledge can be used more rapidly and effectively to improve people’s health, officials said.
The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s proposal for a new engineering school and research park would require buying some 83 acres of Milwaukee County Grounds property near Highway 45 and Swan Blvd., UWM Chancellor Carlos Santiago said Monday.
Milwaukee, Wis. – The private sector’s interest level in the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center is extremely high and includes a diversity of interests that are engaged in the project, according to the University of Wisconsin-Madison dean who helped write a successful grant proposal to fund the center.
Molly Jahn, dean of UW-Madison’s College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, said the recent five-year, $125 million Department of Energy grant award that established the research center will produce economic and environmental benefits for Wisconsin and the Midwest – something the private sector is keenly aware of.
MILWAUKEE — When he gives lectures on how alcohol harms Wisconsin communities, Dr. Paul Moberg starts by showing an editorial cartoon he calls “sobering.”
The 1994 cartoon by Green Bay Press-Gazette cartoonist Joe Heller shows University of Wisconsin-Madison mascot Bucky Badger in front of a blackboard bearing a series of ignominious state rankings: Wisconsin leads the nation in binge drinking and in percentage of adult drinkers.
“Hello,” the caption says, “My name is Bucky and I have a drinking problem.”
Humans might not be the only species to go â??ga gaâ? over their infants. A recent study published by University of Chicago researchers suggests female rhesus monkeys may also engage in a form of â??motherese,â? a form of baby talk in which parents make high-pitched cooing noises for their infants.
Why do 10 million Americans carry the genetic mutation that causes cystic fibrosis, even though they don’t have the frequently fatal lung disease?
The answer could lie in 2,500-year-old bones from Europe being tested at the State Laboratory of Hygiene.
An international effort, led by Dr. Phil Farrell, a pediatric pulmonologist from UW-Madison, is analyzing bones from ancient Celtic people.
A decade or so ago, the University of Wisconsin put its stamp on a sports drink that was meant to become synonymous with its athletic department, and become marketable to a large-scale audience.
But Badger Max not only failed to unseat its close cousin Gatorade, which was developed at the University of Florida in the mid-1960s thanks to the curiosity of an assistant football coach, it was far from a hit at home.
Q. How does gravity work?
A. Gravity is an attractive force between any two objects, whether they ‘re as small as subatomic particles or as large as galaxies, explained UW-Madison physics professor Akikazu Hashimoto.
University of Wisconsin biotechnology will soon have the capability to accomplish unprecedented feats, thanks to $23.6 million in recent investments in a Madison company.
Why should Wisconsin invest millions of dollars to build and operate a UW school of public health in Milwaukee, when a school of public health already exists at UW-Madison?
That question should prompt lawmakers to delete from the state budget a proposal to spend $500,000 on planning for a UW-Milwaukee school of public health and to deny the university ‘s request to start hiring faculty and staff.
Student athletes have coaches for advice, fans for support, Bucky Badger for laughs and a custom-made protein drink at the University of Wisconsin.
Lewis Thomas, the noted physician and essayist, mused openly on the allergic tendency of our species. He found the condition without teleological merit, and declared it a “mistake.” Now two booksâ??Mark Jackson’s Allergy: The History if a Modern Malady and Gregg Mitman’s Breathing Space, How Allergies Shape Our Lives and Landscapesâ??are available for those who wish to delve further into this “mistake” that affects 50 million Americans.
The old slogan â??Guinness is Good For Youâ? may actually be true, according to new medical research that suggests the stout may help prevent heart attacks.
University researchers in the US claim that drinking a pint of the black stuff each day may be as effective in preventing heart attacks as an aspirin because it can reduce heart clots.
Trials at the University of Wisconsin used dogs with narrowed arteries similar to those in people with heart disease to compare effects of drinking stout with those of drinking lager.
A California company has agreed to deposit its federally approved stem cell lines in the national stem cell bank in Madison, the bank said Friday.
Novocell, a leading stem cell engineering company in San Diego, deposited the lines this month, according to the WiCell Research Institute, which runs the bank.
Madison, Wis. – Eric Singsaas is the kind of professor you might not expect to find at a University of Wisconsin System campus outside Madison or Milwaukee. He’s a Ph.D botanist and biochemist at UW-Stevens Point with expertise in the biological production of hydrocarbons ordinarily made by plants. That puts him on the cusp of the emerging biofuels industry, a potential source of economic growth for Wisconsin.
Q. Why is the ocean salty?
A. The saltiness of the sea comes from dissolved minerals, especially sodium, chlorine, sulfur, calcium, magnesium, and potassium, said Galen McKinley, a UW-Madison professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences.
Cheeseheads have short memories, so Phil Pellitteri expected the calls.
Just as media types jump at the first trace of snow to remind people where their brake pedal is, we tend to act stunned when mosquitoes follow hard rains. A big part of Pellitteriâ??s week has been to smack us upside our forgetful heads.
â??I would give you the same interview 15 years ago,â? said Pellitteri, an entomologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Researchers at Pennsylvania State University, Columbia and other institutions have found a virus that they say contributes to the mysterious collapse of honeybee colonies around the United States.
Quoted: UW-Madison entomologist Phil Pellitteri
The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation has been a strong voice in the patent reform debate. As the first research institution to isolate and proliferate human embryonic stem cells, the University of Wisconsin-Madison clearly has a strong interest in protecting and holding patents that will lead to further development of scientific breakthroughs and discoveries.
What’s the buzz?
If you haven’t stepped out of your house the past week or two, that hum you hear outside is from millions of floodwater mosquitoes that have exploded on the scene, following the record rainfalls in August.
Quoted: UW-Madison entomologist Phil Pellitteri
Wisconsin workers filled more jobs in 2006 but earned less than in 2005 and, for the first time since 1983, experienced more unemployment than the nation as a whole, according to a Labor Day statistical update released today.
The Center on Wisconsin Strategy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison compiles data from various government agencies to offer “The State of Working Wisconsin” in even-numbered years and a less comprehensive update in odd-numbered years.
CONOVER, Wis. — Four years after they invaded the Gile Flowage, spiny water fleas have shown up in Vilas County’s Stormy Lake.
The exotic invaders hadn’t been found in any other Wisconsin inland lake until their discovery last week.
Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Trout Lake station found the water fleas while monitoring the Vilas County lake for other types of zooplankton. The tiny animals are important because they form the basis of food chains in lakes.
Madison – When University of Wisconsin-Madison scientist James Thomson staked his claim in 1998 as the first researcher to isolate and grow human embryonic stem cells, he set on fire an emerging area of science that many believe has potential to cure some of the world’s most difficult diseases.
Backed by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, Thompson also set in motion a patent skirmish that heated up last year when two groups asked the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to examine the validity of WARF’s three key embryonic stem cell patents.
After years of concern about Wisconsin’s brain drain, now there’s evidence of a “boomerang” effect.
Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have found that although Wisconsin suffers a slight loss overall of college-educated residents, the drain is mostly among graduates in their 20s. In fact, the state has net gains among college grads in their 30s and 40s.
“That’s a heartening development,” said John Karl Scholz, an economist and co-author of a working paper on the research. “If it continues, that’s clearly a source of strength for the state, because clearly college-educated people in their thirties and forties are likely to be putting deeper roots in the community, and that’s a good thing. The trend is good.”
Colin Scanes, the new vice chancellor for research and economic development and dean of the graduate school at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, was recruited from a similar post at Mississippi State University to reinforce UWM’s commitment to research and high-tech job creation.
The recent State Journal story on ethanol should have read, “Are we too energy dependent?” The answer is yes. Wisconsin consumers paid $19 billion for energy in 2005 with at least $12 billion leaving the state, costing us 300,000 jobs.
Q. Is it true that cell phone chargers continue to draw power when they ‘re not charging a battery, simply because they ‘re plugged into an outlet? And if this is true, how can it be?
A. Although he hasn ‘t measured it, UW-Madison emeritus electrical engineering professor Don Novotny guesses that a plugged-in charger still draws about one-third of the power it does while operating.
Imagine your child is entering kindergarten. You take her to get her shots: Polio, flu . . . and obesity?
According to new research published in the International Journal of Obesity (yes, they have a whole academic journal focusing just on issues of fat people), a virus could potentially be one reason some people are extremely fat.
Researchers at the University of Wisconsin in Madison found that mice and chickens started packing on the pounds when they were infected with a human virus with the sexy name of adenovirus-36.
Three studies published by a University of Wisconsin (UW) geneticist who resigned last year amid accusations of fraud have been replicated, according to her former collaborators.
The researcher, Elizabeth Goodwin, was investigated by the university last year after her students accused her of misusing data on a grant application. The investigation also raised questions about data in three of Goodwin’s papers, which the investigators could not verify. Since then, however, the papers’ other authors and the editors of the journals in which they were published have confirmed that the results are scientifically valid. The investigation was turned over to the Office of Research Integrity at the NIH, but the ORI has not issued a final ruling.
New research shows that erectile dysfunction drugs such as Viagra, Levitra, and Cialis may increase production of oxytocin, a reproductive hormone released during orgasm.
That news comes from scientists at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. They tested sildenafil (Viagra’s active ingredient), vardenafil (Levitra’s active ingredient), and a related chemical called T-1032 in lab tests on rats.
Anti-impotence drugs can turn men into more loving partners, new research suggests.
As well as its original aim of improving sexual performance, Viagra boosts levels of a “cuddle chemical” in the brain that increases a man’s love for his partner.
Q. What are teeth made of?
A. Built for crunching and chewing, teeth mostly consist of hard, inorganic minerals such as calcium. But they also contain nerves, blood vessels and specialized cells that manufacture the different parts of the tooth, said Bill Gengler, a veterinary dentist and oral surgeon with the UW-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine.
No American diplomat’s career has been more thoroughly documented and debated — or celebrated and reviled — than Henry Kissinger’s. There are shelves of biographies by distinguished authors, and Kissinger himself has produced a massive three-volume memoir followed by a steady flow of books, essays, and commentaries. These two books do not provide startling new historical accounts of Kissinger, but they do offer some fresh glimpses of his motives and personality on display in high office.
WASHINGTON — Impotence drugs such as Viagra may do more than help men physically have sex — they may also boost levels of a hormone linked with feelings of love, U.S. researchers reported on Thursday.
Viagra, known generically as sildenafil, raised levels of the hormone oxytocin in rats, a team at the University of Wisconsin-Madison said in a report published in the Journal of Physiology.
A University of Wisconsin-Madison training program in a hot area that combines biology and computer science has been awarded another $5.2 million, five-year federal grant.
The Computation and Informatics in Biology and Medicine training program received the grant from the National Library of Science, said George Phillips, a UW-Madison biochemistry professor with an affiliate appointment in computer science who directs the program.
Malicious, self-propagating worms and other lethal attacks are the stuff of Paul Barford’s daily existence.
Since the Web site-defacing Code Red worm in 2001 terrorized computers around the world, the University of Wisconsin-Madison assistant computer science professor has focused on finding ways to defeat such nemeses.
Why should we care? That was a rhetorical question asked by Scott Craven, professor of wildlife ecology at UW-Madison, in leading off the second CWD Stakeholder Advisory Committee meetings in Madison last Saturday.
The meeting, held at Lowell Inn and Conference Center on the UW-Madison campus, drew a surprisingly small public attendance, less than 10 people. However, the reason for the meeting was for the 16-member committee to hear from experts about what is known about chronic wasting disease.
….”I obviously care for both personal and professional reasons, but this issue is just not on people’s radar screen like it was three years ago,” he (Craven) said. “One of the most important challenges that you face, as liaisons to groups of citizens and hunters, is to bring that back.”
(Also mentioned are Chad Johnson, an assistant scientist in the School of Veterinary Medicine, and Joel Pedersen, associate professor of Soil Science.)
If you’ve tried loading up on fruits, vegetables and whole grains and still can’t get relief from constipation, maybe you need more than a boost of fiber.
“The idea that many patients have, and unfortunately their physicians, if we just keep pushing fiber until the grass grows out of their behind they’ll have been treated successfully, that’s not really true,” said Dr. Arnold Wald, a professor of medicine in gastroenterology/hepatology at the University of Wisconsin.
The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) will today (Aug. 21) issue new rules intended to streamline the patenting process. But the change will also make it more costly and time consuming for universities and biotech companies to secure rights to their life sciences discoveries, patent experts say.
Carl E. Gulbrandsen, managing director of the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, the tech transfer office of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison has for the second year been named on the Hartwell Foundation’s list of top 10 biomedical research centers.
The ambitious plans of University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Chancellor Carlos Santiago are clear – build a new research park and engineering campus on the Milwaukee County Grounds in Wauwatosa.
Santiago and others see the campus as a key part of a plan to help transform the region economically and think it would lead to new opportunities for engineering graduates and help attract talent to the area.
How such a campus – 12 miles away from the main university – would affect the daily lives of UWM students and their education experience remains hazy. What a satellite campus would include is on the minds of engineering students, faculty and administrators and local officials.
CHICAGO — A cold-like virus may cause obesity, new experiments suggest.
Researchers at the University of Wisconsin in Madison have found that mice and chickens infected with a common human virus put on much more fat than uninfected animals. They have also discovered that the same virus is more prevalent among overweight people, a strong indication that it may also cause obesity in humans.
In four experiments, the Wisconsin researchers inoculated chickens and mice with adenovirus-36, a member of a viral family that includes about 50 strains. Most adenoviruses cause colds, diarrhea or pinkeye.
Madison, Wis. – At last, we’re getting to the bottom of what makes John Simpson and the California-based Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights tick – or, more accurately, ticked off.
Not only does Simpson think the historic Bayh-Dole Act has been a colossal waste of time and money, even though many experts believe it unchained the innovative potential of the nation’s research universities, but he doesn’t understand the basics about â??technology transferâ? on those same campuses.
Whether climate change has caused the extreme weather we’ve experienced in recent weeks — near-drought followed by heavy rain — is a subject of debate among scientists.
A study by the Union of Concerned Scientists and the Ecological Society of America in 2005 said Wisconsin’s climate was warming, that extreme heat would occur more often and long periods of flooding rains may increase. John Magnuson, UW-Madison professor emeritus, helped write that study and definitely believes that global warming is causing more extreme weather.
Quoted: Jonathan Martin, chair of the UW-Madison Department of Atmospheric Sciences
The blood thinner warfarin, which this week became the first widely used drug to carry a label encouraging doctors to perform a genetic test on patients before prescribing it, was discovered at UW-Madison.
The more that depressed people try to decrease their emotional response to negative situations, the greater their emotional response becomes, says a new study by UW-Madison researchers.
The finding suggests that in some people with depression, traditional psychotherapy may do more harm than good, the researchers say.
A team of University of Wisconsin-Madison engineers wants to fuse the technology of modern computers and the mechanical calculators of the past to produce a machine that could survive in the harsh environments such as outer space, car engines, battlefields, and children’s toys.
Fish farmers, aquaculture officials and state fisheries experts convened recently at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The UW Madison is studying road building with recyclables. Thanks to a federal grant and a partnership with the University of New Hampshire, the Recycled Materials Resource Center will look at using foundry byproducts in road construction.
Q. Can lightning strike in the exact same spot twice?
A. The short answer, according to UW-Madison atmospheric scientist Steve Ackerman, is yes.
