Category: Research

Mother-of-pearl, known for its beautiful shine, also has enormous strength, which UW-Madison scientists studied using polarized light.

The oil industry has committed more than $700 million to alternative energy research at three Northern California universities, prompting debate over how commercial interests might shape the direction and results of scientific advances.

Molly Jahn, dean of the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences at the University of Wisconsin, said the key factor in the push for alternative research sponsors has been the drop in state funding for the university over the last 20 years.

For Clark Johnson, the quest to see if life might exist elsewhere in the universe begins by looking at chemical isotopes – different forms of the same chemical element.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison geology professor hopes to find out if microscopic living organisms produce different ratios of these isotopes compared with isotopes produced in non-biological processes.

Fantasy baseball leagues could bring scientists a better understanding of how people learn.

Erica and Rich Halverson, assistant professors at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, are conducting a study of the organization and rules of play of three different fantasy baseball leagues, as well as participants’ strategies, degree of competitiveness, and what they get out of the game.

Good news! Dane County is out of the running for that new $400 million Homeland Security bio-hazard research center.

UW-Madison officials are shaking their heads in disappointment that its 200-acre site in the town of Dunn was not a finalist for the animal-disease research facility. They had visions of landing 300 to 400 jobs involving research into the deadliest and most contagious diseases.

U.S. federal officials yesterday announced a short list of five possible sites for a new high-security agricultural biodefense lab. One of them will be awarded the $450 million facility, slated to open in 2012, which will study deadly animal diseases such as hoof-and-mouth disease, Nipah virus, and African swine fever.

Four prominent stem cell scientists have filed “declarations” in support of a citizens’ group that is trying to break the University of Wisconsin’s hold on patents for human embryonic stem (ES) cells.

Joining the fray are Harvard researchers Chad Cowan and Douglas Melton, as well as Alan Trounson of Australia’s Monash University. A new statement was also submitted by Jeanne Loring of the Burnham Institute for Medical Research in San Diego, California, who has been advising the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, which filed the initial complaint last July.

If nanoscience is the field of stuff so tiny it can never be seen, does it matter if the scientist can see at all? At the University of Wisconsin’s nanoscience center, Andrew Greenberg is in charge of education and outreachâ??and it occurred to him that blindness, often thought of as a handicap in the sciences, becomes irrelevant when the subject matter is invisible anyway.

Anthrax, bird flu and other deadly biological threats are headed for another state.

That’s a bad thing, according to people involved in the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s failed bid to win a $450 million grant for a lab that will study deadly animal illnesses, such as bird flu, and other contagions such as anthrax and smallpox.

The Department of Homeland Security said Wednesday it has whittled down to five the list of 17 finalists for the 520,000-square-foot National Bio- and Agro-Defense Lab. The lab will replace an aging facility at Plum Island, N.Y., that was criticized for security lapses after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

WASHINGTON (AP) – The federal government has selected sites in five states as finalists for a $450 million national lab where killer germs like anthrax, avian flu and foot-and-mouth disease will be studied, members of Congress said Wednesday.

Sites in Texas, Georgia, Kansas, Mississippi and North Carolina were chosen as possible hosts for the 520,000-square-foot National Bio- and Agro-Defense Lab, said senators from Texas and Kansas and Texas House members.

Mentor Corp., a California medical products company, will expand its presence in Madison with the construction of a 37,000-square-foot plant at the University Research Park.

Construction of Mentor’s facility began this week and is expected to be completed during the summer of 2008, park officials announced Wednesday. Santa Barbara, Calif.-based Mentor will employ about 40 at the expanded site when it becomes fully operational.

MADISON, Wis. — University of Wisconsin-Madison did not make the list of finalists to be home to a federal lab that will study deadly animal diseases.

UW-Madison proposed putting the national bio- and agro-defense lab on land it owns southeast of Madison in the Town of Dunn.

A number of residents near the proposed site protested the idea, WISC-TV reported.

Milwaukee, Wis. – Will members of the so-called Xbox generation ever be as interested in helping companies create information technology as they are in consuming it?

Judging by the growing number of technology activities in Wisconsin’s K-12 public schools and institutions of higher learning, there may be more hope than many IT labor-starved employers think.

Wisconsin won’t be getting a new federal facility for the research of animal diseases. A site in the Dane County Town of Duun was one of seventeen in the running for the Department of Homeland Security’s new National Bio and Agro Defense Facility.

UW-Madison was not selected as a finalist for a national disease research facility, officials are expected to announce later today.
The Department of Homeland Security selected five finalists in Texas, Georgia, Kansas, Mississippi and North Carolina, according to wire reports quoting Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas.

Prions and dirt can make a sickening combination.

Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that when prions, the abnormal proteins believed to cause chronic wasting disease in deer, are bound to common soil minerals, they become nearly 700 times more infectious than prions alone.

A federal agency has ordered Texas A&M University at College Station to halt all research on biological-warfare microbes, after the institution failed to report two cases of accidental exposure of laboratory workers.

Scientists have known for decades that black holes produce powerful jets of plasma, releasing energy into the universe at nearly the speed of light and fueling the formation of interstellar objects.

Now, a new observation suggests that neutron stars, a smaller cousin of black holes, can produce relatively strong jets that rival black holes in power and efficiency.

“This is the first time it has been shown how powerful these outflows from neutron stars can be,” said Sebastian Heinz, assistant professor of astronomy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison

If there is one area in the state’s economy that has consistently fallen short of its potential it’s our share of federal dollars.

It’s been going on forever and some would argue it’s not all bad. But there’s nothing wrong with getting the occasional windfall from the feds especially when it’s for something as substantial and promising for the long term as a center for bioenergy research.

Madison: A new study by UW researchers has shed some light on how the soil itself could help transmit CWD from deer to deer.

It’s kind of difficult to fight the spread of a disease when you don’t really know how the disease is spread. This study provides some much needed answers, but asks a whole lot more questions.

Researchers at UW Madison have made a new finding about the disease that threatens Wisconsin’s deer herd. Researchers have known that the rogue proteins, or prions, that cause chronic wasting disease can remain in the soil for a long time.

UW-Madison scientists are at the cutting edge of nanotechnology research.

Many of the science fiction novels Glenn Seaman read as a boy were set in high-tech worlds he never thought could exist. But over the years, Seamen, now in his 50s, has watched technology bring humankind closer to realizing once-fantastical ideas, like supercomputers, artificial intelligence and deep space travel. Because of this, he sees no reason why today’s science fiction can’t be tomorrow’s reality.

“The laws of nature constantly seem to be changing,” he says. “Any time there is an absolute, it seems we at some point transcend it.”

Dear Editor: In reading the recent article about retired Professor Reid Bryson, I couldn’t help but feel that Bryson is a rebel without a cause. Current science shows a consistent connection between atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and the amount of carbon dioxide that humans are putting into the atmosphere. The large majority of the scientific community is in agreement about the reality of global warming and the need for a concerted response.

What is most troubling about Professor Bryson’s position is that it encourages inaction.

By binding to a common soil mineral, the misshapen proteins that cause chronic wasting disease in deer can be as much as 700 times more infectious than exposure to the proteins alone, according to researchers at UW-Madison.

U.S. scientists are studying the remarkable shiny material known as mother-of-pearl in an effort to harness its simplicity and superb strength.

University of Wisconsin-Madison physicists said while the shiny material of pearls and abalone shells has long been prized in jewelry, mother-of-pearl — also called nacre — is 3,000 times more fracture-resistant than the mineral it is made of, aragonite.

Inspired by the love she has for her ill dog, a stay-at-home mother from rural Maine has raised enough funds to bankroll a major scientific study on how long rabies vaccines remain effective.

“These will be the first long-term challenge studies on the canine rabies vaccine to be published in the United States,” Kris Christine said this week. The research will be conducted at the School of Veterinary Medicine at University of Wisconsin-Madison.

The Department of Energy announced three recipients of the most-coveted biofuel grants in the nation last week. The University of Minnesota applied for the funding but did not receive it.

Some University officials involved in the application process criticized the selections because of the DOE’s ties to research teams receiving funds. Story also quotes UW-Madison professor Timothy Donohue.

He spent his summers playing ball, 12 hours a day he and the other guys on Berwick Avenue pursued the sport with tireless passion.

They played until the streetlights came on. They played until someone’s mom called from an open screen door, and then they kept playing as the door slapped behind her. They played until she called a couple of more times. They played until they could not play any more.

Still, University of Wisconsin-Madison professor Sean Carroll didn’t end up playing baseball for a living. One of his buddies, John Locasio, was drafted by the Reds. Mr. Carroll hadn’t gotten a bat on one of John Locasio’s pitches since 7th grade.

But he didn’t do too bad for himself anyway.

“Of all the scientists in the world today,” wrote philosopher of science Michael Ruse, “there is no one with whom Charles Darwin would rather spend an evening than Sean Carroll.”

Since it was reported this month by The Capital Times, Professor Emeritus Reid Bryson’s anti-establishment position against man-made global warming has provoked floods of interest, great indignation and — particularly among his fellow University of Wisconsin scientists — no shortage of exasperation.

Forget the proverbial seven-year itch.

Not to disillusion the half million or so June brides and bridegrooms who were just married, but new research suggests that the spark may fizzle within only three years.

Researchers — including UW-Madison professor Larry Bumpass — analyzed responses from two sets of married or cohabitating couples: one group was together for one to three years, the other for four to six years.

Dear Editor: Professor Reid Bryson, featured in a front page article in his role as a global warming skeptic, comes across as very engaging personally and highly engaged in public discourse, so I suspect he does not want to be patted condescendingly on the head and told to enjoy his retirement with gardening or other puttering.

Very well, professor, put up or shut up…

In an accompanying article on early agriculture, Eve Emshwiller, an ethnobotanist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, was quoted as saying the reports of early dates for plant domestication in the New World were remarkable because the activity appeared to have occurred not long after humans first colonized the Americas, which is now thought to be at least 13,000 years ago.

An animal rights group has filed a complaint with federal regulators alleging that the University of Wisconsin-Madison violated the Animal Welfare Act in its treatment of primates used for research.

…. Eric Sandgren, chairman of a UW-Madison committee that oversees animal research projects, told The Capital Times that university researchers welcome USDA inspectors and that their visits often lead to improvement in the research program.

Scientists say they’ve created embryonic stem cells by stimulating unfertilized eggs, a significant step toward producing transplant tissue that’s genetically matched to women.
The advance suggests that someday, a woman who wants a transplant to treat a condition like diabetes or a spinal cord injury could provide eggs to a lab, which in turn could create tissue that her body wouldn’t reject.
Ethicists disagreed on whether the strategy would avoid the long-standing ethical objections to creating embryonic stem cells by other means.

MADISON, Wis. â?? Federal regulators are reviewing a complaint by a watchdog group accusing University of Wisconsin-Madison scientists of mistreating primates who died after experimentation.

Necropsy reports obtained by Stop Animal Exploitation Now show a 4-year-old macaque monkey that died in 2005 had an unspecified foreign object lodged in its intestinal tract.

A 14-year-old female rhesus monkey also died that year after a tube inserted for a surgery severely injured the monkeyâ??s throat, reports show. Another female rhesus died of a bacterial infection after giving birth.

Take the sweet sugar in your kitchen, and imagine turning this into something that could fuel your car. A team of chemical engineers at UW think they finally found a way to do just that.

“It has the same energy density as gasoline, so 40-percent more than ethanol,” said grad student and team member Yuriy Roman Leshkov.

“So we’re making a fuel that’s superior to ethanol and biodiesel,” said fellow researcher Chris Barrett. The two worked under the leadership of professor James Dumesic, who’s findings were reported earlier this month in the journal ‘Nature.’