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Russian Lawmaker Wants a ‘Ministry of Happiness’ as Citizens Sour on War

Newsweek

Mikhail Troitskiy, professor of practice at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told Newsweek that while Matviyenko is likely not among the most corrupt politicians in Russia, her comments should be viewed in the context of the country’s current political situation. Russia is known for public figures who may struggle to properly express their sentiments, or those of the citizenry, because they avoid taboo subject matter.

Science of fainting: New research showing link between brain and heart offers clues

NBC News

“Oftentimes we’re just scratching our heads as to what to do about it,” said Dr. Zachary Goldberger, a cardiologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health who wasn’t part of the new research.“Now that these scientists have helped us to understand that there’s a possible mechanism for it, you could potentially imagine that there’ll be therapies on the horizon,” he said.

How and Why Do Violent Tornadoes Form?

Smithsonian Magazine

Atmospheric scientist Leigh Orf of the University of Wisconsin-Madison has taken advantage of advances in supercomputing to build ten-meter-resolution models that can directly simulate tornadoes. At this scale, turbulence comes alive, Orf says. His models reveal how small areas of rotation could combine to kick off a tornado. “It fully resolves non-tornadic vortices that merge together in ways that are very compelling and I’ve never seen before,” he says.

Burying power lines for wildfire prevention is effective but expensive

CNBC

“So one option is to essentially just shut down the power line, because if there is no voltage and no current on the line, there is no chance of this release of energy happening and then there is no chance of an ignition,” explains Line Roald, an associate professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison whose work includes modeling the risk of wildfire ignition and power outages in the electric grid.

Before Trump, before Agnew, Hate Mail Reveals Long-Simmering Hostility to Journalists

Scientific American

Looking beyond published records to private discourses provides a fuller portrait of the U.S. at midcentury and the resentments that linger. Handwringing about the low trust in journalism that social media and online comments make visible today is justified as long as we acknowledge it has deep roots, ones that will not disappear when Trump rallies stop.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR(S)Kathryn J. McGarr is an associate professor at the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication. She earned her Ph.D. in history from Princeton University and is the author of City of Newsmen: Public Lies and Professional Secrets in Cold War Washington (University of Chicago Press, 2022).

The Republican Party loves Israel. That support wasn’t always a key GOP priority

NPR

“Graham first visited Israel in 1960. And it’s a really big deal,” said Daniel Hummel, a research fellow at the University of Wisconsin Madison. Not only did Graham preach in Israel, but he met with then-Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion: “He really makes a point to articulate a Christian Zionist view that the nation of Israel is a fulfillment of God’s plans for the Jewish people and that it has a great future ahead of it,” explained Hummel.

Should You Delete Your Kid’s TikTok This Week?

The Atlantic

Families with a direct connection to the region may have a tougher time navigating the next few days than those without one. And age matters a lot, the experts said. Younger kids, particularly those in second grade or below, should be protected from watching upsetting videos as much as possible, says Heather Kirkorian, the director of the Cognitive Development and Media Lab at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. They’re too young to understand what’s happening. “They don’t have the cognitive and emotional skills to understand and process,” she told me.

What Colors Do Dogs See?

Scientific American

But unlike humans, who see very poorly in low light, canines have evolved to see well in both daytime and nighttime conditions, explains Paul Miller, a veterinary ophthalmologist at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

What the United States Can Learn From Brazil About Asylum

Mother Jones

But not all asylum seekers in Brazil are treated equally. In a new book published this month titled The Color of Asylum: The Racial Politics of Safe Haven in Brazil, Katherine Jensen, an assistant professor of sociology and international studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, offers a more complicated look at how different groups of asylum seekers, namely Congolese and Syrians, navigate the asylum process in South America’s largest nation.

College personal essays: How schools could end this nightmare.

Slate

olleges might think that essays help open up opportunities for students, but the opposite could be true. A new study by Taylor K. Odle, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Preston Magouirk, a data scientist at the District of Columbia College Access Program, looked at the nearly 300,000 students who started but never submitted an application through the Common App.

The New Face of Nuclear Energy Is Miss America

WSJ

“Why isn’t this being shouted from the rooftops?” asked Stanke, a 21-year-old nuclear engineering student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is too Wisconsin-nice to shout, but in more than 20 states so far she has touted clean energy and nuclear medicine at schools, nursing homes, a state legislature and once on a water-skiing podcast.

AOC? Romney? If voters don’t want Biden or Trump, who’s their pick?

USA Today

For Biden, one of voters’ biggest concerns appears to center around age. Barry Burden, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, previously argued that, even if Biden’s age has not affected his ability to do the job, “some members of the public may nonetheless believe he is not mentally sharp enough or that he lacks the necessary physical stamina.”

Healthcare workers worried about potential masking changes in hospitals

Popular Science

“It’s shocking to suggest that we need more studies to know whether N95 respirators are effective against an airborne pathogen,” said Kaitlin Sundling, a physician and pathologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, in a comment following the June meeting. “The science of N95 respirators is well established and based on physical properties, engineered filtered materials, and our scientific understanding of how airborne transmission works.”

How are Gen Zers buying homes already?

Marketplace

Members of Gen Z still face difficulties in home buying born out of the housing crisis, but they also benefited from entering the workforce at a time of record-low interest rates, said Max Besbris, an associate sociology professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

DHS warns about 2024’s cyberthreats

The Washington Post

The uncertainty of not having a nonpartisan elections leader in a paramount state is worrying, experts said. “The elections commission is training clerks around the state and issuing guidance, so to have uncertainty about who the top administrator is going into this crucial election season, I think is a real problem,” said Barry Burden, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison and director of its Elections Research Center.

Wisconsin Weighs Ousting Elections Official as Control of Voting Gets Partisan

WSJ

“It’s a serious problem to not have seasoned trusted leadership in place well before the election gets under way,” said Barry Burden, a political-science professor at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, who added that the nation will be watching the state in the 2024 presidential contest. “It’s a battleground state. It’s maybe the battleground state.”

Opinion | America Already Knows How to Make Childbirth Safer

The New York Times

Dr. Tiffany Green, a professor at the school of medicine and public health at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, said she believes the effort to reduce maternal mortality should focus not only on care received in hospitals, but on the social and economic conditions faced in general by Black women. The United States should consider using federal civil rights law in cases where racial bias severely hurt the care a patient received. “If you think bias is a fundamental driver of these iniquities then you have to hold providers accountable,” Dr. Green said.

School mask mandates are back. So are the political divisions they deepened.

The Washington Post

“Some school districts are rightfully going to want to protect vulnerable students,” said Tiffany Green, an associate professor in the department of population health sciences at the University of Wisconsin at Madison School of Medicine and Public Health. “Why would we not want to be proactive in protecting students, protecting teachers, protecting staff?”

A few schools mandated masks. Conservatives hit back hard.

Washington Post

“Some school districts are rightfully going to want to protect vulnerable students,” said Tiffany Green, an associate professor in the department of population health sciences at the University of Wisconsin at Madison School of Medicine and Public Health. “Why would we not want to be proactive in protecting students, protecting teachers, protecting staff?”

How hospitals can help patients prep for appointments

STAT

Working on question lists does not require a trained coach, however. A family member or friend can be a helpful guide to preparing for a visit, as the process of making a question list can decrease worry and increase a patient’s sense of control. In fact, there are various methods to brainstorm, clarify, and organize a question list, and anyone can find frameworks to navigate their medical decisions, including the Ottawa decision guides, the University of Wisconsin Surgery’s Best Case/Worst Case framework, or our own pre-appointment question list.

Is Raw Milk Safe? The Risks of Unpasteurized Dairy, Explained

SELF

In 1987, the FDA mandated that milk sold in the US must get heat treated, John Lucey, PhD, the director of the Center for Dairy Research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, tells SELF. That means that the products you see on grocery store shelves have been pasteurized, so they’re less likely to get you sick, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Tennis champion Althea Gibson’s greatness captured in two new bios

The Washington Post

In “Serving Herself: The Life and Times of Althea Gibson,” Ashley Brown, an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, describes the scene on the grounds, which should be among the most well-known trailblazing moments in American sports: “One of the world’s leading symbols of white supremacy and White womanhood had presented a sterling silver salver to a Black woman, a descendant of slaves, while a stadium filled with colonizers cheered. These were role reversals for the ages.”

Biden administration targets 10 drugs for Medicare cost negotiations

Washington Post

Americans on private insurance as well. But the greatest beneficiaries may be the poorest seniors: Studying Medicare claims data, researchers at the University of Wisconsin’s School of Medicine and Public Health and the University of Southern California’s Schaeffer Center for Health Policy & Economics projected that patients had filled 50,000 more insulin prescriptions for $35 each month between January and April — and about 20,000 of them might never have been filled without the law. Rebecca Myerson, a professor who helped write the study, said the data suggest the IRA is providing some financial relief to patients who would have “otherwise gone without” insulin.

Uncured bacon isn’t any healthier. Here’s why.

Consumer Reports

Without these compounds, meat would spoil. “Nitrite is especially important because it has inhibitory action against microorganisms and specifically against spores of Clostridium botulinum [which cause botulism], should they be present,” says Jeff J. Sindelar, a meat science professor and extension meat specialist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

The Clean Energy Future Is Arriving Faster Than You Think

The New York Times

“The world has produced nearly three billion solar panels at this point, and every one of those has been an opportunity for people to try to improve the process,” said Gregory Nemet, a solar power expert at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “And all of those incremental improvements add up to something very dramatic.”

Maui fires: Impact of climate change, drought, hurricane winds

CBS News

Maui experienced a two-category increase in drought severity in just three weeks from May to June, with that rapid intensification fitting the definition of a flash drought, said Jason Otkin, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.Otkin co-authored an April study that shows that flash droughts are becoming more common as Earth warms by human-caused climate change. A 2016 flash drought was connected to unusual wildfires in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, he said.

Kimchi and the wonder of fermented foods

NPR

HUANG: So here’s what’s happening. The salt draws water out of the cabbage leaves, breaking down cell walls, and that releases sugars that feed the kimchi-making microbes. I called up fermentation professor Victor Ujor at the University of Wisconsin. He loves fermentation, and he loves talking about microbes.

VICTOR UJOR: So I think they are such beautiful things.

What Kai Cenat’s chaotic giveaway in Union Park reveals about influencer culture

NPR

NPR spoke with Megan Moreno, an adolescent medicine physician and researcher at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, about the unique impact that content creators can have on young people, and how it can lead to events like Cenat’s meetup. Here’s what she told us: On the unique nature of internet celebrity with fans:For some followers, the connection to that content creator can feel so strong and so personal that they’ll start to develop what is sometimes called a parasocial relationship.

Joking around with kids isn’t just fun, it’s vital

The Washington Post

So calibrate your comedy accordingly. You’ll know if your approach is on the right track because laughs never lie. “Interactions with your child that are filled with mirth should be unscripted and spontaneous,” says Dipesh Navsaria, associate professor of pediatrics and human development and family studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a spokesperson for the American Academy of Pediatrics. “They should involve a back-and-forth where parent and child are ‘riffing off’ each other.”

The new liberal majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court is off to a tense start

NBC News

“The court has been a contentious place, by some measures, for a decade,” said Michael Wagner, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “But I do think it’s in the court’s interest to demonstrate how the decisions they make are rooted in the law and not rooted in politics. “It’s a difficult thing to do,” he added.

The NIH halts a research project. Is it self-censorship?

CBS News

Even though the NIH has had to navigate political rapids for decades, including enduring controversy over stem cell research and surveys on the sexual behavior of teens, this is a particularly fraught moment. “It is caught up in a larger debate about who gets to decide what is truthful information these days,” said Alta Charo, a professor emerita of law and bioethics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who has advised the NIH in the past.

July Was Likely Earth’s Hottest Month on Record

Smithsonian Magazine

“The reason that setting new temperature records is a big deal is that we are now being challenged to find ways to survive through temperatures hotter than any of us have ever experienced before,” University of Wisconsin–Madison climate scientist Andrea Dutton tells Seth Borenstein of the Associated Press. “Soaring temperatures place ever-increasing strains not just on power grids and infrastructure, but on human bodies that are not equipped to survive some of the extreme heat we are already experiencing.”

Journalism Is a Public Good and Should Be Publicly Funded

Scientific American

Other journalism models—including nonprofits such as MinnPost, collaborative efforts such Broke in Philly and citizen journalism—have had some success in fulfilling what Lewis Friedland of the University of Wisconsin–Madison called “critical community information needs” in a chapter of the 2016 book The Communication Crisis in America, and How to Fix It. Friedland classified those needs as falling in eight areas: emergencies and risks, health and welfare, education, transportation, economic opportunities, the environment, civic information and political information.

Bots Are Grabbing Students’ Personal Data When They Complete Assignments

Chronicle of Higher Ed

“We behave differently if we know we’re being watched. We get timid, we get shy, we spend a lot of our cognition on what people are going to think. … That’s not what we want” in higher ed, said Dorothea Salo, a teaching faculty member at University of Wisconsin at Madison’s Information School. This is especially the case in today’s political climate, where exploring topics like gender identity and abortion can put people in danger.

Environmental markets should guide federal land use

The Hill

Allowing markets to operate on federal land would put different American values on more equal footing, thereby reducing conflict. This might harm some political and special interests in the short run, but the change will be a win-win for free markets and for the environment.

-Dominic P. Parker is an economist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, a senior fellow at the Property and Environment Research Center, and the Ilene and Morton Harris visiting fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institutio