Category: UW Experts in the News

Quoted: Falling temperatures typically bring a procession of tiny victims to hospital emergency rooms. ?I usually admit 10 to 12 injuries per year because of this,? said Dr. Lee Faucher, a surgeon at the University of Wisconsin Burn Center.

Quoted: Michael Rothschild, emeritus professor at the school of business at the University of Wisconsin, calculated that if terrorists destroyed completely one of America?s 40,000 shopping malls per week, your odds of being there would be one in a million.

Quoted: ?It?s asking a lot for a piece of paper to change actual consumer behavior,? John Kozup, an assistant professor of consumer science at the University of Wisconsin, said in an interview. ?It could be a decision aid but that is it.?

Noted: Another expert on the weak force, University of Wisconsin professor Michael Ramsey-Musolf, considers the muon experiment to be a tour-de-force piece of work. The important thing for him is that the uncertainty of the muon lifetime has now dropped by a factor of ten. But he also said that a more precise lifetime and a more precise knowledge of the strength of the weak nuclear force tells us just a bit more about nature.

Quoted: “20 years from now, we?ll probably see maybe half the farms that are there now, because that?s been the trend and I see no reason why that trend won?t continue,” said Phil Harris, an agriculture professor at UW-Madison.

Quoted: UW-Madison communications professor Barry Orton.

Quoted: ?The law is a language-based system,? said the University of Wisconsin?s Michele LaVigne, to the Inquirer. ?Drop someone in who can?t access that immediately, and we still don?t know what to do with them.?

Quoted: UW Madison political scientist Charles Franklin says quick action is planned on the Governor?s campaign promise to create 250,000 new jobs.

Quoted: The challenge is getting more people to use this plentiful supply in a year that so far hasn?t made much news about illness that can drive vaccination, says Dr. Jonathan Temte of the University of Wisconsin and the American Academy of Family Physicians. He pushes his own patients to be vaccinated, and this year had so many shot-haters flock to the nasal-spray FluMist version that he had to order a second batch.

About 94 percent of respondents rated the quality of life as good or better, up a pinch from 2009, the third annual resident satisfaction survey by the city and University of Wisconsin Survey Center says.

Quoted: And while most courts say they do their best, a good effort is not good enough, said Michele LaVigne, a lawyer and scholar at the University of Wisconsin Law School.

Quoted: Extreme weather events such as heavy flooding and drought – thought to be linked to the warming of the oceans and to changes in the precipitation cycle – create conditions for waterborne illnesses that may be becoming more common in the United States, said Jonathan Patz, a professor of environmental public health at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. A cryptosporidiosis outbreak that killed 50 people in Milwaukee in 1993, preceded by the heaviest rainfall month in 50 years, could be a sign of things to come, he said, given that record rainfalls have become more common in recent years.

Quoted: Dave Wilcox, a PhD student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Journalism & Mass Communication, writes that the coverage on social media points to the need for everyone to be better news consumers as well as producers. He followed events on Twitter and gives the service an ?A? for engagement, and a ?C-? for accuracy:

Neil Whitehead, an expert on domestic terrorism at the University of Wisconsin, gives his perspective on the deadly shooting rampage in Tucson, Arizona.

Quoted: UW-Madison Law School Professor Walter Dickey.

Quoted: Michele Hilmes, professor of media and cultural studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Vang Pao, a revered former general in the Royal Army of Laos who led thousands of Hmong guerrillas in a CIA-backed secret army during the Vietnam War, died Thursday. He was 81. In 2002, Madison dropped a plan to name a park in his honor after a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor cited published sources alleging that Vang Pao had ordered executions of his own followers, of enemy prisoners of war and of his political enemies.

Quoted: ?It?s a tough job. It?s a physically demanding job,? reminded Doug Reinemann, an agricultural engineer from UW-Madison Milking Research and Instruction Lab.

Quoted: According to Ken Mayer, a UW-Madison political science professor, a Voting Rights challenge is the most likely way for Democrats to have the GOP?s map disqualified.

Quoted: “In the old days, they said, ?Sit down, shut up and vote.? But those days in the Senate are long gone,” said Charles Franklin, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Former Madison Ald. Noel Radomski,a UW-Madison administrator who served one term on the City Council from 2005-07, has dropped out of the race for mayor.

Noted: A preliminary report from the University of Wisconsin-Madison veterinary lab says the death of a horse in Deerfield last month probably was not caused by an animal attack.

Quoted: “Research shows that when couples are having fun together, it helps them feel positive about each other and improves their relationship satisfaction,” said Linda Roberts, a program specialist with the University of Wisconsin-Extension and professor of Human Development and Family Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Noted: Walker is a Republican. Both the state Senate and Assembly flipped to the GOP in November. That change will make it easier for Walker to manage Wisconsin?s budget, compared to Democrat Doyle, according to John Witte. He?s part of UW-Madison?s La Follette School of Public Affairs.

Noted: David Williamson Shaffer, professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the departments of Educational Psychology and Curriculum and Instruction, makes video games that help people learn while they play, called epistemic games.

Quoted: “When you look at the all-time box-office leaders and see how many of them are sequels, theres no sign being sent to Hollywood that audiences have had too much, or at least not in a language that Hollywood cares to understand,” said Dr Jonathan Gray, a professor of cultural studies at the University of Wisconsin.

Quoted: Richard J. Davidson, director, UW-Madison Center for Investigating Healthy Minds, “practice acts of kindness.”

Quoted: Tim Gattenby, coordinator of adapted fitness and personal training in the UW-Madison kinesiology department.

Quoted: Steven A. Ackerman and Jonathan Martin, professors in the UW-Madison department of atmospheric and oceanic sciences.

Quoted: Charles Franklin, a pollster and professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said he thinks voters understand that Walker can have only a marginal effect on the economy. But if Walker racks up big successes in areas under his control, such as the budget, then voters will understand if the jobs goal isn?t met.

Quoted: “In scientific controversies, fights that challenge existing knowledge take several years to settle, at least,” says scientific communication expert Dominique Brossard of the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Planck?s distance from today?s world, filled with battling blogs, turbulent tweets and pugnacious press conferences, doesn?t make his message matter any less, Brossard suggests, as we ponder the latest high-profile hullabaloo in science ?NASA?s arsenic microbe kerfuffle.

Quoted: Robert Lemanske, a professor at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, says patients at his pediatric asthma clinic are checked regularly for side effects such as slowed rates of growth. He quizzes parents and young patients on details like where they keep their inhalers to make sure they?re taking their prescribed medicine.

Quoted: PAM HERD, associate professor of public affairs, University of Wisconsin: Scott Walker has made it pretty clear that he wants a very, very limited regulation of plans that participate in the exchange. And the state, it doesn?t look like, at least, will get really involved in terms of negotiating on behalf of citizens for things — for — for benefits and the cost of the plans.

Quoted: “Studies have shown that you are less likely to spend when you pay cash,” says Michael Collins, faculty director at the Center for Financial Security at the University of Wisconsin.

Quoted: ?You don?t get caught up in cheerleading and you don?t get caught up in muting your criticism,? admonished University of Wisconsin-Madison?s Stephen Ward. The media had become the nationalist mouthpiece, he said; it was unbecoming if not worrisome.

Noted: She was reporting on comments made by Dr John Hawks, an anthropologist from the University of Wisconsin, who argues that the fact the size of the human brain is decreasing doesn?t necessarily mean our intelligence is in decline as well.

Quoted: “Any government or any governor has limited impact on employment growth, but that doesn?t mean zero,” said Andrew Reschovsky, a professor of applied economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.