Jim Kossin, a researcher at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the University of Wisconsin, says the warm ocean waters and exchange of heat between the ocean and atmosphere, plus the lack of dry air or strong upper-level winds, created an ideal environment for Hurricane Laura to rapidly intensify all the way to the Louisiana coastline.
“It’s like a funhouse mirror,” said Cecelia Klingele, an associate professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School. “People look at the same facts and have wildly different reactions. It is troubling because when people are having such different reactions, I guess tragedies like this shouldn’t be a surprise. People are afraid of each other and that is a situation that creates danger for everyone.”
Young Mie Kim, a journalism professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who has studied misinformation networks on social media, said the accounts “look like coordinated behavior and share some similar traits with Russian tactics,” but she cautioned about making firm attributions.
Quoted: UW Political expert Mike Wagner helps highlight impactful moments from RNC.
Quoted: According to Dr. Christine Whelan, a clinical professor at UW-Madison’s School of Human Ecology, these pods are typically made of small groups of three or four students in a similar age or grade range in order to share resources.
Quoted: According to Dr. Dustin Deming, a cancer researcher at UW-Madison, patients getting diagnosed with colon cancer are typically in their late 60s and early 70s. But in the last 50 years, Deming explained that the number of colon cancer patients under age 50 has more than doubled.
Athletes today aren’t necessarily risking life and limb by staging protests — if anything, NFL players are sparing themselves some harm by canceling practices — but according to a professor of Law at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, their platforms give them “a unique role to play” in effecting change.
“Their protest reaches ordinary people in the United States and worldwide,” Linda Greene said via email Thursday. “Their protest also touches and concerns the multibillion dollar interests of coaches, franchises, and media and other corporations, including advertisers, who depend on their labor.”
Noted: Hart Posen interviewed in video beginning at 3:13 mark.
Quoted: The idea of using azithromycin for COVID-19 was based on preliminary French research suggesting a benefit that later was found to be flawed, said Ann Misch, an assistant professor of infectious disease at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health.
Separately, laboratory research showed hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin reduced viral replication of cells infected by the virus, though not azithromycin alone. But, she said, “there’s a huge chasm between an effect in cell culture and in humans.”
She said there is no evidence azithromycin is effective against COVID-19.
“If people are using azithromycin, I am sorry to hear that,” she said.
Quoted: “Many citizens and officers like body camera footage because it provides objective documentation about one portion of an interaction,” Cecelia Klingele, UW-Madison associate professor of law said.
The work also stands out because it documents such a widespread and lasting ecological shift, adds Steve Carpenter, a limnologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. More typically, researchers have observed such shifts in a single location, often a lake, showing how dominance swings back and forth between two species as temperature changes or fishing becomes more intense, he says. The new results “show that regime shifts can spread among connected habitats and transform an entire coastline rather rapidly.”
Patricia Devine, a psychologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who led the study, poses a situation in which a tall, young black man is walking on a college campus. “A student might assume he’s on the basketball team,” she says. In this situation Devine suggests if people check the assumption, they will likely realise there is no evidence other than the stereotype.
“Part of what’s going on this spring is continuity from six years ago,” said Pamela Oliver, a professor emeritus of sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “Groups had actually never stopped. All those street protests that were happening 2014 to 2016 died down after the fall election, but the issue didn’t die down.”
Athletes today aren’t necessarily risking life and limb by staging protests — if anything, NFL players are sparing themselves some harm by canceling practices — but according to a professor of Law at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, their platforms give them “a unique role to play” in effecting change.Mets GM apologizes for criticizing MLB commissioner as Mets, Marlins stage silent protest“Their protest reaches ordinary people in the United States and worldwide,” Linda Greene said via email Thursday. “Their protest also touches and concerns the multibillion dollar interests of coaches, franchises, and media and other corporations, including advertisers, who depend on their labor.”
“Rapid intensification events are more likely because of climate change,” Jim Kossin, a hurricane researcher at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the University of Wisconsin, told The Post.
The findings are exciting but “a stepping stone,” says Qiang Chang, professor of medical genetics and neurology at University of Wisconsin-Madison, who was not involved in the work.
But how was this critical food provisioning infrastructure established? Who are the workers that make it possible? And where should it go in order to advance a more just food system? These are the questions Dr. Jennifer Gaddis seeks to answer in her 2019 book The Labor of Lunch.
Dr. Gaddis is an assistant professor of Civil Society and Community Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In this conversation, we discuss the politics of participatory research, the centrality of racial justice organizing to the success of the food movement, and the stunning connections between school food and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and uprisings against white supremacy in the United States.
Quoted: Richard Monette, director of the Great Lakes Indigenous Law Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, largely agreed that the messaging would not have much influence on Native people.
He doubled down on Greendeer’s statement that U.S.-tribal relations are not as bad as some make it seem, but he added the presence of these tensions opens Native groups up to these types of social media attacks.
“America has got this history of trying to separate the Native American from her land and from her wealth. That’s true, and that gets exploited by people throughout the world,” Monette said. “If we don’t want them to use this against us, then we should stop doing that.”
UW-Madison journalism professor Mike Wagner said Democrats appear to be trying to win back some of those who voted for Barack Obama in 2012 but shifted to Trump in 2016. Trump’s narrow Wisconsin victory four years ago was aided by the fact that Clinton received nearly a quarter-million fewer votes than Obama did four years earlier.
Thongchai Winichakul, professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said the 2014 coup “brought back strong waves of ultra-royalism” to Thai society, boosting the king’s standing. At the same time, “it is no secret that the coup regime remains in power due to the support of the palace,” he said.
Interviewed: As the country struggles to rid itself of the pandemic, many people are left wondering why are stocks doing so well? Moses Altsech from the UW-Madison Business School discusses the economy on Live at Four.
If Tropical Storm Laura does undergo rapid intensification, says Jim Kossin, a researcher at NOAA and the University of Wisconsin, “It’s very likely that climate change is playing some role in that.”
The findings match what has been observed on a smaller scale in other studies, said Dave O’Connor, a virologist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Superspreading events, which provide the virus with huge numbers of hosts in a small amount of time, are driving the global outbreak. Delays in returning test results make it much more difficult to mitigate their effects; by the time those infected in such events know they’re sick, they have probably infected many more people
“We’re terrified of the possibility of a ‘twindemic,’” said Dr. James Conway, medical director of UW Health’s immunization program. “If we did get a particularly bad flu season and COVID-19 continues to have these surges, both the health systems and the communities would really be in great stress.”
Gay Seidman, a professor of sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who was the first person who ran by petition to win a Harvard Board of Overseers election, and who campaigned on an anti-apartheid divestment platform in 1986, said she had not expected to win; instead, she said, she saw the candidacy as “a way to start conversations about what’s an acceptable business practice.”
She said she would warn the members of the new slate that “change happens really slowly in institutions that are as complicated as universities,” but that “if you think of the goal as to start conversations, then they have already won.”
Akin to archaeological digs for the digital age, participants’ experiences also suggest strategies for maximizing code reusability in the future. One common thread is that reproducibility-minded scientists need to up their documentation game. “In 2002, I felt like I would just remember everything forever,” says Karl Broman, a biostatistician at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. “It was only later that it became clear that you start to forget things within a month.”
Quoted: “Face to face campaigning is a known positive … the positive on the Republican side is they know this can work. One of the negatives is that we don’t know that it works in a pandemic,” said Michael Wagner, a journalism professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison who specializes in political communication and behavior.
Other factors linked to low IQ could also contribute to the disparity, including lead poisoning and quality of nursery schools, says Maureen Durkin, professor of public health at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, who was not involved in the research. Some families have reported difficulty getting therapists to visit their homes if they live in a neighborhood perceived as “dangerous,” she says.
Health care workers, older adults, people with serious medical conditions and minorities are among groups that might get COVID-19 vaccines first if supply is limited, as federal and state committees rush to set priorities before vaccines become available.
The team’s new analysis shows Earth’s climate “can change a lot faster than we’ve previously thought,” says Shaun Marcott, a paleoclimatologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who wasn’t involved in the new study. The resulting shifts in ecosystems, although short-lived, could have been profound.
Menzi Chinn, a professor of public affairs and economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said the data from BLS shows a slowdown in Wisconsin’s recovery. He pointed to the 30,500 jobs the state added in July, numbers that are much smaller than the 104,600 jobs added in June.
Rejected mail-in ballots are unlikely to be the deciding factor in the 2020 election — but they could factor in to the result, according to Mike Wagner, a journalism professor who works with the Elections Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.”This is one of those elections where there are probably 19 things that could move a small number of votes in one way or another,” Wagner said.
Quoted: Kassem Fawaz, UW-Madison Electric and Computer Engineering Assistant Professor, said by default the feature is turned off, and it only works if state public health officials create an app to partner with the feature.
Peter Goff, an assistant professor in educational leadership and policy analysis at UW-Madison, said with the introduction of the equal interval grading scale, the district should clearly define to students and parents what it means to earn each letter grade.
UW-Madison political science professor David Canon said vice presidential picks usually have fairly minimal impacts within their home state. “Are there any voters who will not vote for Joe Biden because Harris is the VP instead of Baldwin? Yeah, maybe there are a few, but I can’t imagine that will be enough to change the result in Wisconsin,” Canon said.
Eleanor Powell, a University of Wisconsin-Madison politics professor, said there were reasons to think that they would. She said Mr Biden had better relations with the community, had chosen Kamala Harris, a black woman, as his running mate, and would receive help from Barack and Michelle Obama.
John Eason, a University of Wisconsin-Madison sociologist who studies the effect of prisons on rural communities, argued that “it doesn’t matter who it is” that’s getting worse-hit by Covid-19 behind bars, given how many Black individuals are incarcerated. “If we don’t find a way to decarcerate, Black people are going to lose.”
But such tests face regulatory hurdles before they can be produced widely. Other rapid tests that are available now may need to be refined further before they can be “operationalized,” or used effectively in an actual setting, like a school, according to Dave O’Connor. He and colleagues in the AIDS Vaccine Reseach Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, have been piloting what is called a loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) test, which can be done on saliva, as part of the N.I.H. Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics initiative. They’re running their project out of a minivan. “The first day we tested five or six people,” he told me. “Today we ran 80.”
Some of the discrepancies might have arisen at least partly because the brainstem is difficult to capture in brain images, says Brittany Travers, assistant professor of kinesiology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. It is surrounded by major blood vessels and cerebrospinal fluid, which are in constant motion due to breathing and circulation and create ‘noise’ in images.
“After spending a billion dollars on his own candidacy in the primary, many in the party thought that would imply spending at least as much on the general election, if not more,” said Eleanor Neff Powell, an associate professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a focus on money in politics. “A billion dollars may be an unreasonable expectation, but he set — and in some ways expanded — those expectations during the primary, even if he didn’t outright say how much he planned to spend in the general.”
Quoted: “I think outbreaks like we saw at UNC are completely possible, really, at any campus,” Jeff Pothoff, UW Health’s chief quality officer, said. As reopen plans inch towards reality, he said students are the “wild cards.”
The issues are typical of the snags new reactor designs run into on the road to approval, says Michael Corradini, a nuclear engineer at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. “I don’t think these things are show-stoppers.”
Written by Robert N. Golden, MD, is dean of the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. Joseph E. Kerschner, MD is dean of the Medical College of Wisconsin School of Medicine.
Quoted: But, Trump is still tailing Biden among Wisconsin’s voters. According to surveys from both the Marquette Law School and the UW-Madison Elections Research Center, Biden is holding a steady, five to six percent lead over Trump in the state.
“In 2016, Trump was the outsider and he was trying to take down Washington,” Burden said. “He was running against an establishment figure in Hilary Clinton and he pledged to go to Washington and ‘drain the swamp.’ Now, he’s governing and is serving as president in the swamp and has to still convince voters that he’s shaking things up, but still governing effectively.”
“If a storm is moving northwards at 10 miles per hour, and the wind’s rotational speed is 90 miles per hour, then to the east, the wind speed will be 100 miles per hour, and to the west, it will be 80 miles per hour,” said Steve Ackerman, director of the Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.
The estimates, to be published in the National Tax Journal by Mr. Chernick, David Copeland at Georgia State University and Andrew Reschovsky at the University of Wisconsin, are based on the mix of local revenue sources, the importance of state aid and the composition of jobs and wages in each city. The researchers predict average revenue shortfalls in the 2021 fiscal year of about 5.5 percent in a less severe scenario, or 9 percent in a more severe one.
Barry Burden, director of the Elections Research Center at University of Wisconsin-Madison, said the mostly virtual convention could still succeed in energizing Democratic voters — a major goal of the quadrennial event.
“The production quality will actually be better than it would be with a live event,” Burden said. “There are going to be some really slick videos put together from around the country and assembled together to maximize, I think, the enjoyability of viewing.”
“If a requested ballot doesn’t arrive in the voter’s mailbox, or the voter ‘spoils’ the ballot by making a mistake, then voting in person on Election Day is a fail-safe,” said Barry C. Burden, director of the Elections Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Many of those opposed to the state’s actions point to recent research suggesting non-lethal methods, such as guardian dog teams and protected livestock enclosures, which tend to be more successful at preventing future attacks than simply killing predators, says University of Wisconsin-Madison biologist, Adrian Treves. Such killings can actually lead to more livestock losses because it disrupts the pack’s social networks, leading surviving wolves to turn easier prey such as domestic animals, says Treves, who founded Carnivore Coexistence Lab, which conducts research worldwide on conflict between predators and livestock.
Quoted: But raw numbers don’t always tell the whole story, said Ajay Sethi, an epidemiologist with the University of Wisconsin-Madison. For example, a rise in cases can also be due to a rise in testing.
“If you think about something too simplistically, you can fall into the trap of believing something that is partially or maybe not even true at all,” Sethi said.
In a shaded parking lot on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus, so-called spit concierges guide volunteers though giving a saliva sample. On the other side of the parking lot is a pared-down biology lab where scientists test the spit-filled plastic vials for the virus that causes COVID-19.
They’ll have the results within one or two hours.
Dr. Nasia Safdar, medical director for infection control at UW Health, echoed the WHO guidance, saying dental care “is considered high risk” and “routine dental care should still be approached cautiously given that rates of COVID transmission remain high.”
Quoted: “Coughing, sneezing, laughing, eating, and drinking — there are ways that those droplets spread so keeping that physical distancing is really important and if people aren’t able to physical distance, (they should) still wear a face covering,” said Dr. Matt Anderson with UW Health.
Quoted: “There’s a lot of reasons why in person is probably better than virtual. But this year, we have to balance that with the health and safety risks of trying to do in person school during a pandemic,” said Dr. Jeff Pothof, chief quality officer at UW Health.
Quoted: Kenneth Mayer, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told PolitiFact Wisconsin voting policies in Wisconsin over the past decade — when Republicans have generally controlled state government — have had “a disproportionate impact on communities of color, as well as other vulnerable voting groups.”
But Mayer added he does “not see evidence that the (election officials) had the goal of disenfranchising Black voters” when reducing the number of Milwaukee polling places from 180 to five.
Quoted: “Experiencing symptoms of hypervigilance, stress or distress are signals to discontinue your journaling exercise,” University of Wisconsin psychologist Shilagh A. Mirgain told UW Health.
Quoted: “The genie is out of the bottle,” says Professor Thongchai Winichakul, a historian at the University of Wisconsin and another survivor of the 1976 massacre.
“Society won’t stop, change won’t stop. The only thing we can do is to take care that the change takes place with as little bloodshed as possible. Thais have been gossiping about the monarchy in private for years, then teaching their children to praise it lavishly in public, to be hypocrites. All these young protesters have done is bring that gossip out into the open.”
Quoted: “If a storm is moving northwards at 10 miles per hour, and the wind’s rotational speed is 90 miles per hour, then to the east, the wind speed will be 100 miles per hour, and to the west, it will be 80 miles per hour,” said Steve Ackerman, director of the Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.
Colleges and universities across Wisconsin have developed a patchwork of plans to prepare for what at its core is an unknown: How to reopen campuses safely during a pandemic.
Quoted: Testing students every week or two will provide a gauge of whether the virus is taking hold on campuses. Many physicians stress this so-called surveillance testing is the only way to identify students and staff who are infected but don’t have symptoms.
“I don’t see how one can not do it,” said Nasia Safdar, an infectious disease physician at UW Health.
Quoted: Parents are making choices within an unequal system, says Erica Turner, who studies race and inequity at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Department of Education Studies.
“You can’t undo that individually,” she said. “But that doesn’t mean that you can’t do anything.”
