Category: Research

Five University of Wisconsin-Madison faculty have been awarded fellowships from the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the largest scientific society in the world, founded in 1848, the year before classes began at the UW. (11/29/06 print edition of the Capital Times)

Scientists would help lead the nation’s research on deadly animal diseases at a high- security building near Stoughton if UW-Madison is picked as the site of a new federal lab.
But the proposal, at the university’s Kegonsa Research Campus in the town of Dunn, faces significant competition: 14 applicants are vying for the new National Bio and Agro- Defense Facility.

A Dane County circuit court judge ruled in favor of animal rights activists who wish to build a museum between two primate testing facilities on the UW-Madison campus.

Judge Sarah O�Brien ruled that Richard McLellan, who supports the Primate Freedom Project, had a legitimate commitment from landowner Roger Charly to sell some land in Madison for $675,000. The parcel in question is between the Harry F. Harlow Primate Psychology building and the Wisconsin National Primate Research Center. Organizers with the Primate Freedom Project want to use the land for a museum, which they say would expose the cruelty of primate research.

A panel of scientists Tuesday called for more scrutiny of ââ?¬Å?high-impactââ?¬Â studies published by science journals, a reaction to the bogus stem cell findings trumpeted last year in the journal Science.

Q: Paper or plastic: Which supermarket choice is better for the environment?

A: Tuncer Edil, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at UW-Madison, came back with a surprise answer: C, “Neither of the above.”

MADISON, Wis. — A Dane County judge ruled on Monday in favor of animal rights activists who want to build a museum protesting animal research between two primate labs.

Judge Sarah O’Brien ruled that a contract between the activists and a business owner for the purchase of property near the University of Wisconsin research labs is valid and enforceable. O’Brien ordered business owner Roger Charly to sell the land for $675,000 as specified in the contract.

Rick Bogle, the leader and founder of the Primate Freedom Project, which is the organization behind the proposed museum, started hugging his wife in court after the judge announced her

Animal rights activists for the Primate Research Group celebrated last year when they had an agreement with Madison business man Robert Charly to buy his building. The group planned on putting a museum in that building detailing what they call the horrors of primate research. That building was the perfect location for them…in-between the two labs where University of Wisconsin researchers conduct tests on primates.

From his office at the Wisconsin National Primate Research Center, Dr. Joseph Kemnitz has watched people dig through the center’s trash cans, apparently searching for documents they think could be incriminating.

When Franklin Roosevelt and the first New Deal Congress faced the question of how best to organize broadcasting on the public airwaves, they enacted the federal Communications Act of 1934. That law brought into the modern age the principle that had underpinned the “freedom of the press” protection in the first amendment to the Constitution: that a competitive and responsible media was essential to the healthy functioning of a democracy.

In my life so far, I’ve been what University of Wisconsin researcher Scott Baum might call a pretty lucky monkey. Baum works at the university’s National Primate Research Center, in Madison, on a project monitoring the effects of a full-nutrition, extremely low-calorie diet on rhesus macaques.

There’s one thing that Terry Devitt, a spokesperson for the UW-Madison, wants to emphasize: “We’re one of 14 places. It’s speculative.”

Let’s speculate.

Already, the UW’s Kegonsa Research Facility near Stoughton has made the cut from 29 sites initially proposed for a new high-security biodefense lab devoted to deadly animal pathogens.

The proposed National Bio- and Agro-Defense Facility would study deadly foreign animal diseases like hoof and mouth and swine fever. Devitt says these are diseases that farmers “fret about all the time” because “they would devastate the ag economy.”

In the final month of the fall election, Cleveland and Columbus television stations let paid political advertisements – not news stories – do their talking.

During a typical 30-minute evening news broadcast, Cleveland’s top four stations each aired more than five minutes of political ads, but devoted about 1 minute and 20 seconds to election news, a University of Wisconsin-Madison study of political coverage released Tuesday shows.

WASHINGTON – Television viewers in the Midwest got an eyeful of politics during local newscasts last month, but most of it was in the ads, not the news.

A study by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s NewsLab found that in the month before the Nov. 7 elections, television stations in seven Midwest markets aired an average of 4 minutes and 24 seconds of political ads and 1 minute and 43 seconds of election news during a typical 30-minute broadcast.

A University of Wisconsin study unveiled today finds TV viewers in the Midwest saw more campaign ads, than campaign coverage, on their local news.

Jessica Hodges, a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin, was another first-timer on the flight to Antartica headed by a team from McChord Air Force Base near Tacoma.

For three weeks, Hodges will work at the South Pole, testing sensors encased in large glass balls that will be buried in 9,000-foot holes drilled into the ice.A group of universities and the National Science Foundation are conducting the $272 million IceCube project to detect subatomic particles as they pass through the Earth from deep in space.

From a lonely and curious headstone for a dog named Grennie to strangely twisted catalpa trees standing in sentinel-like rows, the UW-Madison Lakeshore Nature Preserve offers tantalizing mysteries to anyone who ventures into its depths.

Josh Zalasky should be the kind of college applicant with little to worry about. The high school senior is taking three Advanced Placement courses. Outside the classroom, he is involved in mock trial and two Jewish youth groups and has a job with a restaurant chain. He is a National Merit semifinalist and scored in the top 3 percent of all students who take the ACT.

(Broadcasting & Cable) _ The University of Wisconsin’s News Lab is issuing another study of Midwest TV station newscasts, this one covering the 30 days before the election, that will likely show that ads for politicians got more airtime in those newscasts than coverage of the races.

(MADISON) Wildfires account for a lot of property damage every year in the U.S., and forestry officials are constantly assessing how to predict when and where they will occur. A UW-Madison researcher says one largely overlooked predictor is the human factor.

Generally, vegetation and terrain are examined to figure out fire-prone areas. But Alexandra Syphard, a post-doctoral fellow for UW-Madison�s Department of Forest Ecology and Management, says most blazes happen along developments or roads, where forestland borders urban areas.

The H5N1 virus, better known as bird flu, may have a way of becoming more dangerous to people. Researchers have identified two mutations in a surface protein of the virus that enable it to bind more easily to human cells. Watching for these mutations in viruses isolated from people could provide early warning of the emergence of a virus with pandemic potential.

“Know thy enemy” ââ?¬â? many would consider that one of the most crucial rules of engagement in any war.

Now those waging war against the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus have come one step closer to knowing their enemy, or at least understanding how this crafty bug makes the leap from birds to humans.

In a letter published in the current issue of Nature, lead researcher Yoshihiro Kawaoka and his colleagues have identified two key changes that took place in some versions of the viral strain that allowed the virus to infect not only chickens and ducks but humans as well.

(MADISON) Anti-smoking forces are teaming up with the military to do battle against tobacco in Wisconsin. They want to reduce the number of soldiers who light up.

The rate of smoking among soldiers past and present is ten percent higher than the general population, and so anti-tobacco forces have decided it�s time to aggressively fight a product they consider an enemy of public health.

Dr. Michael Fiore kicked off the new anti-smoking effort. Its military-like moniker is ââ?¬Å?Operation Quit Tobaccoââ?¬Â and is run by the UW Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention. It will offer all military personnel –active and otherwise — counseling through the Wisconsin Tobacco Quite Line, along with free nicotine patches and/or gum as long as the supply lasts.

Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have identified two genetic mutations that appear to be involved in turning a deadly bird flu virus into a deadly human one.

ASHWAUBENON � After a decade as a nonsmoker, Gunnery Sgt. Andrew Wall cracked under the pressure of military service in Iraq.

The Marine, like many of his cohorts, started using tobacco � in his case, smoking � to alleviate the stress of war.

He eventually quit again and has been smoke-free for three years, Wall said Wednesday. It’s helped him become a healthier, better Marine.

Humans’ closest cousins, the Neanderthals, vanished 30,000 years ago after sharing turf with humans for millenniums. But why they disappeared remains a mystery.

Quoted: Sean Carroll, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

A new program aims to help veterans quit smoking. Veterans might find it easier to put down those smokes and chewing tobacco with the help of Operation Quit Tobacco. “A program designed to help Wisconsin military personnel who use tobacco and want to quit ââ?¬Â¦ to do that successfully,” says Dr. Michael Fiore. “Whether you’re active duty, reservists, National Guard, or a veteran, if you’re ready to quit we’re ready to help.”

Congress approved legislation this week aimed at stopping the harassment of researchers who use animals in experiments and the vandalism of their laboratories and equipment.

Animal-welfare groups and civil libertarians said the measure, the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act (S 3880), could chill legitimate expressions of free speech to oppose animal research, but lawmakers said they had reworded an earlier version of the legislation to protect that right. President Bush is expected to sign the measure.

“Today” show host Matt Lauer talks with Turkish psychologist Defne Aruoba and Sean Carroll, UW-Madison professor of genetics, about a family living in rural Turkey with five siblings who walk on their hands and feet. (Under “Monday’s Video.”)

In October, engineering professors and students held a two-hour nanotechnology program at UW-Madison with exhibits and demonstrations to help Lego League participants better understand the concept.

When Democrats take control of the House and Senate next year, they will reintroduce legislation to expand federal funding for embryonic stem- cell research, a move that could be a boost to UW-Madison scientists.
But they’ll have an uphill battle changing the mind of President Bush, who earlier this year vetoed bipartisan legislation that would have lifted restrictions on using federal money for such studies, or generating a veto-proof majority, observers and advocates said.

Included in the “Short Takes” section is this brief: Is there really such a thing as “backward evolution”? Could that explain the mystery of five adult siblings in modern Turkey who seem incapable of walking upright?

Respectful but revealing, the “Nova” hour “The Family That Walks on All Fours” (7 p.m. Tuesday, Milwaukee’s Channel 10 and other PBS stations) explores the scientific controversy over these five individuals, whose condition causes them no end of grief in their rural village. Among the experts who contribute pieces to the puzzle is Sean Carroll, a University of Wisconsin-Madison geneticist.

The Democrats’ election victory on Tuesday will increase the number of lawmakers who support relaxing President Bush’s restrictions on stem-cell research, but not by enough to overcome a presidential veto.

However, the political winds may be blowing toward a modification of federal and state policies on the controversial research, most of which is conducted at universities.

As a scientist who studies evolution, Sean Carroll has trouble understanding the mindset of those who reject evolution.

“Denial is an interesting psychological feature of humans,” said Carroll, a University of Wisconsin professor of molecular biology. “The United States paces the world in biomedicine, but we’re debating evolution 150 years after Darwin, on the mountain of DNA and other evidence? Are you kidding me?”

Charles Darwin would have been impressed with Sean Carroll’s findings.

Carroll, a professor of molecular biology at the University of Wisconsin, has helped push the boundaries of what is known about evolution, taking the “what” from Darwin’s groundbreaking research 150 years ago and finding the “how.”

It’s in the genes.