Like some humans, giant pandas struggle with digestion due to changes in diet – an affliction that could be interrupting their reproduction, according to a new study.
Painful pooping may stop panda sex
Cosmos
Category: Research
UW researches why obesity is breast cancer risk factor
WISC-TV 3
Studies show that being overweight or obese is associated with a higher risk of cancer. One woman at the University of Wisconsin-Madison is trying to figure out why that is, specifically in cases of breast cancer.
Thousands more trail cameras coming to Wisconsin
AP
MADISON — Wisconsin scientists have launched an ambitious new plan to catalog wild animals using thousands of trail cameras, a project that could help answer just how many deer and other creatures roam the state.
Wisconsin trail cam project goes live
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Quoted: “Something like this has never been done before, not for such a large area,” said UW–Madison Professor of Forest and Wildlife Ecology Phil Townsend, a leader on the project, in a statement released Tuesday by the university. “The number of trail cams and the spatial scale we’re working on will make this project unique.”
Panda feces study provides insights into microbiome, reproductive troubles
ScienceDaily
A stomachache can put a real damper on your love life — especially if you’re a giant panda. One minute it’s breeding season and you’re happily dining on fresh bamboo leaves, the next you’re left clutching your stomach while your gastrointestinal lining passes through your system. This is exactly what seems to happen to captive giant pandas, and the researchers behind a new study are beginning to suspect it may play a role in their struggles to reproduce.
Health officials work with UW to track Zika-prone mosquitoes
WISN-TV, Milwaukee
Health officials are collaborating with the a state university after learning that a Wisconsin woman contracted the Zika virus.
The Opening Bell 05-18-16: GMO + TSA = BAD!
WGN Radio, Chicago
On the May 18, 2016 episode of The Opening Bell, Steve Grzanich talked with the University of Wisconsin-Madison Life Science Communication department chair, Dominique Brossard. The two discussed the recent details of a genetically engineered crop study and how it effects the market. Rick Seaney, airline industry expert, stopped by as well to share some more perspective on the TSA line madness.
Taking a ‘snapshot’ of Wisconsin wildlife
Wisconsin Radio Network
Wisconsin is home to numerous species of wild animals, although getting a handle on just how many can often prove quite difficult. A joint effort between University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers and the state Department of Natural Resources could take some of the guesswork out of that process, with members of the public also lending a hand.
Increased number of ticks becomes bigger problem in Madison area
Channel3000.com
Noted: Researchers at UW-Madison have seen a spike in the ticks in the UW arboretum, increasing from around 40 in 2014 to 600 found last year.
“It’s a new risk for people to worry about for both themselves and for their families and for their animals,” said Susan Paskewitz, a UW-Madison entomologist.
Paskewitz is leading a group of students to find ways to reduce the risk of Lyme disease from ticks.
DNR, UW-Madison researchers launch crowdsourced wildlife tracking project
Wisconsin State Journal
Anyone with computer access can now take part in conducting wildlife research in Wisconsin.Snapshot Wisconsin, a collaboration between UW-Madison and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, is recruiting the public to help track the state’s wildlife population.
Regeneration pioneer to join UW faculty, Morgridge Institute
Wisconsin State Journal
A scientist who is a pioneer in studying how the body regenerates damaged tissue will be joining the UW-Madison faculty this fall.
There’s a Hotline for People With Knotty Wood Questions
Atlas Obscura
Who would you call if you had a wood-related question? The Forest Products Laboratory, of course. But, did you even know of its existence?
NASA Satellite Data Helps Document Wisconsin Wildlife
NASA
A collaboration of NASA, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR), and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Snapshot Wisconsin aims to provide one of the richest and most comprehensive caches of wildlife data for any spot on our planet.
Madison company invents compound to make lithium ion batteries safer
Channel3000.com
Noted: Silatronix was founded by two UW-Madison chemistry professors, Robert Hamers and Robert West, after a hallway conversation in which the “two Bobs” sought to literally change the world.
“The safety issues are very real,” Hamers said recently in an interview in the company’s laboratory on the city’s east side, near the Madison College campus. “Our goal is to make lithium ion batteries perform better and be safer, and the way we did that is by inventing a new liquid called an electrolyte. It’s one of the three major components of the lithium ion battery.”
What it means to be mindful and how it can help your kids
Channel3000.com
Noted: According to Lisa Thomas Prince, there’s even research going on in Madison on the topic of mindfulness and children. She said prior research proves kids who can tap into their thoughts and feelings and “check in” can better focus their attention, lower their anxiety and maintain good physical health. In addition, adolescents who have participated in the Center for Healthy Minds courses have had an easier time sleeping and navigating social situations.
Research tackles communication disorders in kids
Wisconsin State Journal
In a special column for the paper, Katie Hustad, Waisman Center professor of communication sciences and disorders, writes about her work studying how communication develops in children with cerebral palsy.
Wisconsin knows how its gardens grow
BTN LiveBIG
Every parent wonders at some point: How do you get kids to eat their vegetables? The answer: You make them grow the vegetables too!
Scientists to check for Zika-carrying mosquitos in Rock, Walworth counties
Janesville Gazette
MADISON—Nothing to worry about—really. But just to be sure, scientists will be collecting mosquito eggs in Rock, Walworth and other state-line counties this summer to make sure the Zika virus can’t creep north. They’ll set traps in June, said Susan M. Paskewitz, a professor of entomology at UW-Madison.
‘Blood Does Not Buy Goodwill’: Hunting Study Calls Into Question US Approach to Wildlife Management
VICE News
Wildlife authorities around the world have long turned to culls — a polite word for hunting — to reduce the populations of wild animals living too close to people or livestock.
Ticks that can carry Lyme disease becoming abundant in Madison
Wisconsin State Journal
When Susan Paskewitz,a UW-Madison professor of entomology, searched the UW Arboretum two years ago for immature deer ticks, the kind most likely to infect people with Lyme disease, she found 32. Last year, during the same amount of sampling at the same 17 sites in the Arboretum, she found 592.
UW professor picked to lead world’s largest biomedical library
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Patricia Flatley Brennan, a professor of nursing and industrial engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is the new director of the National Library of Medicine, the world’s largest biomedical library.
Watch kids’ toys explain why killing wolves might be a bad idea
The Washington Post
Hunters in Finland took to the forests this year to kill nearly 20 percent of that country’s 250 or so wolves. They did so as part of a controversial, government-approved “cull” that officials said was intended to prevent illegal poaching of the wolves.
Government culling of Minnesota’s wolves could increase poaching
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Governments often take on the job of killing problem wolves that attack livestock in order to increase public tolerance for the predators and, in theory, to reduce poaching by frustrated citizens.
Could legal hunts be encouragiong the poaching they’re meant to preempt?
Christian Science Monitor
A new study challenges the notion of government hunts as a conservation tactic to limit poaching of large carnivores such as wolves, big cats, and bears.
Why wolf hunting is bad, as explained by Playmobil figurines
The Verge
Listen: the US has had bad policies when it comes to wolves, and a very earnest French man would like to explain why, using what appear to be Playmobil figurines.
Why are carrots orange?
Christian Science Monitor
What’s two plus five? Three times nine? The square route of 16? Now name a vegetable. Chances are, you picked a carrot. Why? Because when we do math, we tend to think of the color orange. And which vegetable is indelibly linked to orange? The humble but ubiquitous carrot.
Dane County Sweet Potato Project Enlists Growers To Fight Food Insecurity
Wisconsin Public Radio
Dane County has rich farmland, dedicated farmers and gardeners, and some of the best homegrown food in the country. But not everybody is able to enjoy the region’s bounty.
Is hunting really a conservation tool?
Isthmus
The findings of a new study co-authored by a UW-Madison researcher challenge the conventional wisdom that hunting is an effective tool for the conservation of predators. It could have implications for Wisconsin’s wolf hunt as well as wildlife management efforts around the world. The authors anticipate a backlash.
Study Casts Doubt on Theory That Legal Hunting Reduces Poaching
New York Times
Government wildlife authorities and some conservation groups have for years argued that allowing some legal hunting can help reduce the illegal killing of threatened carnivores like wolves and grizzly bears.
Ever wondered the reason carrots are orange, here’s why
AFP
Scientists unveiled the gene in carrots that gives rise to carotenoids, a critical source of Vitamin A and the pigment that turns some fruits and vegetables bright orange or red.
Gene editing transforms biology, raises ethical questions
Wisconsin State Journal
UW-Madison researchers are joining scientists around the world in using a powerful gene editing tool that is transforming biology and could improve human health as much as anything since the first successful isolation of human embryonic stem cells, at UW-Madison, in 1998.
Scientists peel back the carrot’s genetic secrets
Reuters Africa
Scientists have gotten to the root of the carrot, genetically speaking. Researchers, including lead scientist, University of Wisconsin horticulture professor and geneticist Phil Simon, said on Monday they have sequenced the genome of the carrot, an increasingly important root crop worldwide, identifying genes responsible for traits including the vegetable’s abundance of vitamin A, an important nutrient for vision.
UW and Medical College win $5.5 million grant to study Alzheimer’s
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
The Medical College of Wisconsin and University of Wisconsin-Madison have joined forces to win a $5.5 million federal grant to study Alzheimer’s disease.
UW researchers discover new technique to track brain development
A team of researchers at University of Wisconsin has developed a noninvasive method to track brain development in children using two different brain imaging techniques.
UW Doctor Among Those Focusing On Physician Training To Combat Opioid Epidemic
Wisconsin Public Radio
A Dane County doctor is using a federal grant to educate colleagues about the appropriate use of strong painkillers in an attempt to help combat a national epidemic of death and addiction related to opioids. But an increasing push to focus on — and potentially change — how physicians practice has some pushing back.
New WARF leader to make first public appearance
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Erik Iverson, who takes the helm July 1 at the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, will make his first public appearance in the state at the Wisconsin Entrepreneurs’ Conference in June.
UW scientist receives national award for brain repair work
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Marina E. Emborg, an associate professor of medical physics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, has won the 2016 Bernard Sanberg Memorial Award for Brain Repair.
China must scrap remaining birth control policies to avert demographic crisis, says medical researcher
South China Morning Post
Yi Fuxian, one of the most vocal opponents of China’s birth control policies, says the government should scrap the remaining measures to address a looming demographic crisis that is pushing the nation into Japan’s path of economic stagnation.
Meditation can help with aging, pain, depression, experts say
NBC's Today.com
Everyone seems to meditate: Coworkers plan to vacation at a meditation retreat, friends chat about favorite meditation apps and countless articles praise the practice. Does meditation live up to the hype?” The science is very much in an embryonic state,” says Richard Davidson, founder of the Center for Healthy Minds, at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, but adding “meditation plays an important part of the maintenance of well-being.”
ER wait time depends on type of patient problem, UW study says
Wisconsin State Journal
Emergency room doctors are inclined to see you quickly if you have a simple problem such as an ankle injury or allergic reaction, but they may take longer if you have a complex complaint like numbness or vaginal bleeding, a study at UW Hospital’s ER found.
Mindfulness therapy works for recurrent depression
Reuters
Noted: “When mindfulness is combined with cognitive therapy, one of the things we see is people being trained to regard their thoughts as just thoughts and not to get ensnared by them,” said Richard Davidson, who wrote an editorial accompanying the study.
UW-Madison researchers develop explosive detecting technology
NBC15
A group of researchers and students at UW-Madison have developed a technology that attaches to drones to detect explosive devices.
Dr. Gerald Kulcinski, Director of the Fusion Technology Institute at UW-Madison, along with his team of researchers, have found a way to take existing fusion technology and turn it in to a device that can detect materials from the air.
Zika: Another warning flag of health threats due to climate change?
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Noted: Author Jonathan Patz, M.D., M.P.H., is director of the Global Health Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The Wake-Up Call That Transformed Neuroscientist Richard Davidson’s Life
Huffington Post
Richard Davidson had been studying the brain for more than a decade when he was asked a question that quite literally changed his life.
The Best Radio Antenna Is One That’s a Tank
Popular Mechanics
But what if you could effectively enlarge antenna size by using the vehicle itself as an antenna? That’s what University of Wisconsin–Madison engineers are seeking to do as part of a project supported by the Office of Naval Research (ONR).
UW-Madison scientist’s study uses ice records to link Industrial Revolution, climate change
Capital Times
In Madison, there are more than 160 years of records on the freezing and thawing dates of lakes Monona and Mendota. But it was centuries of data on a lake in Japan and a river in Finland that helped a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor emeritus and a team of researchers show climate change trends since the Industrial Revolution.John J. Magnuson, the former director of the UW’s Center for Limnology, co-led the study into how records of freezing and thawing dates have changed. The results, published Tuesday in the journal Scientific Reports, showed that “global processes including climate change and variability are driving the long-term changes in ice seasonality.”
UW-Madison scientist’s study uses ice records to link Industrial Revolution, climate change
The Capital Times
In Madison, there are more than 160 years of records on the freezing and thawing dates of lakes Monona and Mendota.But it was centuries of data on a lake in Japan and a river in Finland that helped a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor emeritus and a team of researchers show climate change trends since the Industrial Revolution.
What Japanese monks and Finnish merchants are teaching us about climate change
NPR News
You wouldn’t think that a Japanese monk and a merchant from Finland would have much in common, but it turns out they do: Climate change.
Inherited learning disability could one day be treated with a pill, study suggests
The Independent
An inherited learning disability similar to autism – called Fragile X – could one day be treated with a pill, a new study suggests.
Researchers find tsunamis on the Great Lakes
MLive.com
New research has found the Great Lakes may have a type of tsunami after all. They are not tsunamis caused by earthquakes. These tsunamis are caused by organized areas of thunderstorms.
Japanese Priests Collected Almost Seven Centuries of Climate Data
Smithsonian
Almost every winter, after Lake Suwa in the Japanese Alps freezes, the male Shinto god Takeminakata crosses the ice to visit the female god Yasakatome at her shrine, causing a ridge known as the omiwatari to form. At least, that’s what the priests living on the shores of the lake believed. When the water froze, they would conduct a purification ritual and celebration in honor of the ridge, using its direction and starting location to forecast the harvest and rainfall for the coming year.
The Best Radio Antenna Is One That’s a Tank
Popular Mechanics
?University of Wisconsin engineers have done it, devising a new and better way for military vehicles to communicate.?
UW Researchers See Promise In Cancer Drug To Help Fragile X Syndrome
Wisconsin Public Radio
University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers say a study performed on mice with fragile X syndrome shows a possible path to improving memory and learning for people with the condition. Fragile X is the most common cause of inherited intellectual disability.
Wisconsin researchers land NIH dementia grant
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Researchers at the Medical College of Wisconsin and the University of Wisconsin- Madison have received a four-year, $5.5 million grant to better understand how communication between parts of the brain changes as the result of normal aging or of dementia.
UW Researchers Are Exploring The Link Between Climate Change And Zika Virus
Wisconsin Public Radio
University of Wisconsin-Madison scientists are looking into whether climate change may lead to the faster spread of diseases like the mosquito-transmitted Zika virus.
UW-Madison Researchers Are Making Progress In The Hunt For New Antibiotics
Wisconsin Public Radio
As more infections become resistant to antibiotics, a University of Wisconsin research team’s search for new ways to knock down bad bacteria and fungi has become increasingly urgent.
Wollersheim Winery, UW students collaborate to release new Red Fusion wine
WISC-TV 3
Wollersheim Winery will be releasing a new wine Wednesday in collaboration with the University of Wisconsin-Madison fermentation sciences program, according to a release.
Researchers discover ‘tsunamis’ on Great Lakes
Duluth News Tribune
They may not wipe out entire cities or occur after earthquakes, but two University of Wisconsin researchers say the Great Lakes have tsunamis that can wreak havoc of their own.
Drones May Soon Be Able to Detect Improvised Explosive Devices
Government Technology
Drones may soon have the capability to save thousands of lives each year by detecting terrorists’ improvised explosive devices and active land mines from long-ago wars thanks to innovative technology developed at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Hyperloop and UW-Madison’s BadgerLoop Team
WORT 89.9 FM
Hyperloop is the name of a potential transport system, with the idea of shooting people in pods through a tube at speeds of over 700 mph. Does this sound like a pipe dream straight out of science fiction? Not for Elon Musk. You know him – he’s the owner and innovator of Tesla Motors and SpaceX. But for Hyperloop, he invited over 100 teams from around the world to a competition to present their ideas on how to make Hyperloop work. Well, a team from UW-Madison made the cut.