Category: Research

While Wisconsin�s position in stem-cell research is strong, there are pitfalls and competitors to reckon with if the state wishes to hold its leading position, according to UW-Madison stem cell researcher Prof. Gabriela Cezar.

Cezar, who recently joined UW to assist with its stem-cell work, spoke this week at a luncheon sponsored by the Wisconsin Innovation Network, a division of the Wisconsin Technology Council, about the current state of stem-cell technology and where the field can go in Wisconsin and worldwide.

(MADISON) Kidney disease is sharply increasing in Wisconsin. One reason may be the increasing lifespan of residents. It was the focus of a study done by the Population Health Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

A top UW-Madison researcher who has worked for the Pfizer drug company said Tuesday that firms using stem cells to test and create new drugs could generate more than $3.6 billion in revenues by 2020.

And Wisconsin could be home to new companies doing doing that work, thanks to a wealth of scientific experts here, said Dr. Gabriela Cezar, who spoke at a Wisconsin Innovation Network luncheon.

University of Wisconsin Chancellor John Wiley spent most of November in South Africa helping launch one of the world�s biggest telescopes into operation.

In a move that could light up the future of agriculture, UW-Madison scientists have mapped the three-dimensional structure of a protein in plants that detects light.

Now that the structure of the protein, called phytochrome, has been detailed, researchers might be able to manipulate it to make crops more or less sensitive to light or make plants flower at different times of the year.

Embryonic stem cell researchers are worried about the future of international cooperation in their field after a prominent scientist’s surprise resignation from a fledgling stem-cell-sharing effort.

(MONTREAL, QUEBEC) A major international meeting on climate change begins today in Montreal. A Wisconsin professor will be there, highlighting a recent report on the damage global warming may cause. (6th item.)

Children adopted from abroad often have difficulties adjusting to their new families and to life in this country, exhibiting poor social skills, problems bonding with new family members and reticence in dealing with strangers.

Those difficulties are generally traced back to emotional deprivation in large orphanages, where infants often outnumber staff by 40 to 1, and caregivers do little more than feed and change the infants.

One of the world’s most prominent stem-cell scientists resigned last week from his position as director of a major new international research consortium, acknowledging that his laboratory had used ethically questionable means of acquiring human egg cells.

A University of Wisconsin-Madison scientist has figured out what appears to be an economical way to solve the scarcity of milk in developing tropical countries. But it is more complicated than shipping a truckload of dairy cows south.

The lack of emotional care given to infants in some Romanian and Russian orphanages has provided researchers an opportunity to study the hormonal basis of the mother-child bond.

Researchers led by Seth D. Pollak of the University of Wisconsin have found that these children, even three and a half years after adoption into Wisconsin families, produce two critical hormones in a different pattern from children with traditional upbringings.

Two UW-Madison computer science professors, Paul Barford and Lawrence Landweber, have been named to the National LambdaRail�s Networking Researching Council (NNRC), which will make key policy decisions regarding the high-speed fiber optic network�s research goals.

Scientists have found startling differences in a hormone linked to social bonding in children who spent their first years in foreign orphanages. These changes remain two years after they have gone from an environment of neglect to one of love and attention.

Children who were seriously neglected in infancy can carry a physiological burden for years, even after moving to a loving environment. A study of their hormonal responses shows that their brains are less equipped to trust and form social bonds than other children.

“We don’t want to reach the conclusion that this difference is permanent,” says Seth Pollak, a developmental psychopathologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who led the study. But he adds that the take-home message is that “children really need to be in families”.

STANFORD, California (AP) — Two government biologists heavily recruited by Stanford University have decided to work in Singapore instead, saying they will face fewer restrictions on stem cell research overseas.

Demonstrators discovered this week that targeting researchers at their homes has potential pitfalls.
A group protested for 45 minutes Tuesday night outside what they thought was the home of UW Medical School assistant professor Michele Basso.

Add one more item to the list of things that can be affected by climate change and global warming: human health.

Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the World Health Organization have compiled a series of studies showing that people have been adversely affected by regional and global climate change. The WHO suspects 150,000 people per year, for the past 30 years, have died as a result of a gradually warming planet. The WHO says that annually, 5 million cases of illness can be attributed to it, too.

Health and climate scientists at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, who conducted one of the most comprehensive efforts yet to measure the impact of global warming on health, said the WHO data also show that rising temperatures disproportionately affect poor countries that have done little to create the problem. They reached their conclusions after entering data on climate-sensitive diseases into mapping software.

LONDON (Reuters) – Global warming poses an enormous ethical challenge because countries that produce the least amount of greenhouse gases will suffer the most from climate change, scientists said on Wednesday.

Whether it is an increase in poor health from diseases such as malaria or shrinking water supplies, nations in sub-Saharan Africa, Asia and South America are vulnerable to the consequences of changes in global temperatures.

Rep. Tammy Baldwin, a Democrat from Madison, said the plan was “necessary if the United States is to maintain a leadership role in technology and grow our economy in the 21st century.”

Baldwin said that “if the Congress adopts this agenda, both the UW-Madison and area businesses will surely benefit from increased federal support for research and development in alternative energy sources, high speed communications and biotechnology.” The University of Wisconsin-Madison was the fourth-biggest research institution in the country in fiscal 2003, according to National Science Foundation figures.

A University of Wisconsin-Madison professor has won the National Medal of Science, the nation’s highest honor for science and technology.

Edwin Lightfoot, emeritus professor of chemical and biological engineering, is one of eight recipients of the award, which will be presented by President Bush in a White House ceremony. The date has not yet been set.

Lightfoot joined the faculty at UW-Madison in 1953. His textbook, “Transport Phenomena,” published in 1960, is considered a landmark in chemical and biological engineering.

The beautiful lakes surrounding Madison have become a recent concern for the city�s future.

A University of Wisconsin-Madison professor was named a recipient of the 2004 National Medal of Science, the nation�s highest honor for science and technology, by President George W. Bush Tuesday.

The Wisconsin State Journal’s Nov. 4 editorial “Extreme tactics miss the mark” is what misses the mark. The extreme tactics are not being perpetrated by animal rights activists; the extreme tactics are being perpetrated by the rest of us.

Animal rights activists have done little to evaluate the merit of research being done at our university, indicated by distortions in public statements. People who use animals for biological research are harassed, regardless of whether they have done anything reprehensible.

I participated in the recent demonstrations against the primate experiments at the UW. I was approached by many neighbors and passers-by who shared their experiences with me, involving the animal experimentation industry.

Thanks to the Wisconsin State Journal for their balanced coverage of the recent protests. Too often the tactics of these groups, which include harassment, threats and property destruction, are underreported. The best way to expose the extremism of these groups is to fairly and openly document their methods.

Activist Rick Bogle, in his Monday guest column, claims the UW stifles debate about animal research. His contention is easy to refute. As the chairman of the All Campus Animal Care and Use Committee, the oversight body for animal use at UW-Madison, I have been working to establish contact with animal activists to find common ground, improve research animal welfare and enhance public understanding.

A generation ago, childhood cancer was considered a death sentence. Now, through research, approximately 75 percent of children with cancer in the U.S. are being cured. Still, we need to provide more effective and less toxic treatments.
This means testing. Some research can be done by computer modeling and in test tubes. However, any experimental treatment being considered for clinical testing must first demonstrate conclusive anticancer effects without causing “side effects” that outweigh the anti-tumor benefits, which still can only be done by involving laboratory animals that have cancer, most often mice.

SCIENCE has always fascinated me. As a child in Tibet, I was keenly curious about how things worked. When I got a toy I would play with it a bit, then take it apart to see how it was put together. As I became older, I applied the same scrutiny to a movie projector and an antique automobile.

Across the United States, radioactive uranium rods wait in storage containers at nuclear power plants, mounting into a large waste issue for the national government and utility companies. As waste builds, many Midwestern universities, including UW-Madison, are looking to improve nuclear fuel reprocessing techniques and streamline the nuclear fuel cycle, which would reduce the overall volume of toxic waste.