UW In The News

For our future, someone has to think about dirt

Noted: An even bigger fix is in order, according to Bill Tracy, an agronomist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “This is where the Secretary of the Future would come in,” he said.Tracy said we need to think critically about having corn and soybeans as the nation’s biggest crops. There’s not only the problem of nitrate pollution from fertilizing corn to worry about, but there’s also soil erosion.

Eden Prairie father releases book on how to fight distracted driving epidemic

EDEN PRAIRIE, Minn. – As National Distracted Driving Awareness Month begins in April, a Twin Cities father released a book detailing his research on how to fix the epidemic.

Spiny Waterflea Invades State’s Inland Lakes And Comes With A High Cost

A recent study conducted by researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that the economic and ecological impact of invasive species in the state’s inland lakes has been greatly underestimated.

Slew of anti-abortion laws may thwart Zika research

The furor from the Planned Parenthood sting videos is driving a tide of bills, which range from outright bans on research using aborted tissue to prohibitions on donating the tissue. Story quotes UW-Madison’s Alta Charo and Robert Golden.

Our cave man DNA and early human inbreeding

Noted: The current study and previous research suggest that we can no longer think of our ancestors as interbreeding with other hominins only once, said John Hawks, professor of anthropology at University of Wisconsin-Madison. “It is happening repeatedly, wherever modern humans are coming into contact with these archaic people,” said Hawks, who was not involved in the current study.

Kathy Cramer: The road-tripping scholar

Kathy Cramer didn’t set out to be the bard of bifurcation in Wisconsin. She just wanted to listen to people talk. “I always wanted to study Wisconsin,” says Cramer, 45, a Grafton native and director of the Morgridge Center for Public Service at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

James Baughman remembered as popular journalism professor

Facing a room full of students the day after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, professor James Baughman distilled decades of studying the history of mass communications into one assignment: Write about it, he told the class. Like Ernie Pyle writing about the Allied invasion of Normandy during World War II. Or CBS News radio correspondent Edward Murrow reporting from London as the Nazis’ bombs fell. Baughman “just came in and scrapped everything and said this is what you’re doing,” recalled Jason Stein, a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter who took one of Baughman’s classes as a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

UW cancer doctors targeting cancer at the molecular level

In a conference room overlooking Lake Mendota, pictures of tumors and lists of gene names flash on a screen. Doctors discuss treatments, not based on where in the body a patient’s cancer started but on genetic mutations in their tumors. The doctors are working as a “molecular tumor board,” a new service by UW Carbone Cancer Center in Madison to help doctors and patients at UW Health and around Wisconsin benefit from a hot topic in cancer: precision medicine.

Clinton, Sanders Shift Focus to ‘Pivotal’ Wisconsin

Both candidates have “a real shot” at winning Wisconsin, Barry Burden, a University of Wisconsin-Madison political science professor, told Newsweek. Clinton and Sanders have been effectively tied in polling since the beginning of the year, and there’s not much indication that voters are indecisive about their candidate. Midwestern states have proven to be the battleground between the two candidates—they effectively tied in Iowa, she won by a hair in Illinois, he won Michigan and she took Ohio. “Wisconsin is at the intersection of all these states,” Burden says. “That sets up a real showdown.”

How to be happy: 10 science-backed ways to become a happier person

Noted: “There are now a plethora of data showing that when individuals engage in generous and altruistic behavior, they actually activate circuits in the brain that are key to fostering well-being,” Richard Davidson, founder of the Center for Healthy Minds at the University of Wisconsin and author of The Emotional Life of Your Brain, has explained.

Here’s Why Ted Cruz’s Muslim Patrolling Plan Would Never, Ever Work

Noted: Mark Sidel, professor of law and public affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and author of More Secure, Less Free? Antiterrorism Policy and Civil Liberties after September 11, doesn’t think much of Cruz’s suggestion, either.

Yi Fuxian, Critic of China’s Birth Policy, Returns as an Invited Guest

BEIJING — Eight thousand miles is a long way to fly someone so he can tell you you’re wrong. That’s what awaits Chinese officials on Friday when Yi Fuxian, a scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, speaks at a panel on China’s population policies at the Boao Forum, an annual gathering of hundreds of politicians, businesspeople, opinion leaders and journalists.

On Campus: UW students’ HIV treatment test advances in Clinton Global Initiative competition

Two UW-Madison students’ idea for a low-cost test to help people with HIV manage their treatment has advanced to the second round of a Clinton Global Initiative competition of ideas from colleges across the country.

Study details high cost of invasive species in lakes

A new study says invasive species in lakes cause significant economic damage. The study examined the spiny water flea invasion of a single Wisconsin lake and calculated the damage to the lake’s water quality at $140 million. While the study focused on one lake, it points to the need for more data about the economic impact of invasive species, said study author Jake Walsh, a Ph.D. student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

UW-Madison’s Keisha Lindsay works to help students see how identity plays in politics

“Intersectionality” may sound like an arcane academic theory, but Keisha Lindsay says the term might be closer to home than many believe. It refers to the way people’s identities — gender, race, class — intersect to shape their experiences, particularly the experience of oppression … Lindsay, an assistant professor in political science and gender and women’s studies at UW-Madison, says her students sometimes are surprised to realize the ways in which it applies to them.

Wausau’s Will Hsu wins UW under-40 award

WAUSAU – Madison. Minneapolis. Boston. Phoenix. Will Hsu has lived, worked, and studied in many cities across the country. But for Hsu, there’s no place like home: Wausau.

Bronson Koenig’s buzzer-beater shoots Badgers into Sweet 16

Wisconsin’s remarkable run under Greg Gard continued Sunday night in the second round of the NCAA East Regional, thanks to one of the more remarkable comebacks in recent memory.

Tom Still: Why basic research matters at state’s colleges and universities

MADISON — There are 115 universities in the United States that can lay claim to an “R1” rating from the national organization that ranks research institutions, and Wisconsin is now home to two of them — the UW-Madison and the UW-Milwaukee, which joined the elite Research Level 1 list in February.

Stinkbug egg portrait among 2016 Cool Science image contest winners

An image of human tissue and blood cells that looks like an Impressionist painting, a blood-red moon, and a batch of stinkbug eggs are among the 10 images that won the 2016 Cool Science Image contest.

Wisconsin leads the way in the art of glass

It’s hotter than molten lava, constantly moving and requires artisans to work in a careful precision with their tools, their space and each other. It’s glass, and no other university has shaped its future as an artistic medium longer than the University of Wisconsin.

Taking the online medicine

“Never tried sharing data like this before,” said the tweet. “Feels like walking into a country for the first time. Exciting, but don’t know what to expect.”David O’Connor of the University of Wisconsin-Madison was announcing his decision on February 14th to post online data from his laboratory’s latest experiment.

University of Wisconsin activists shake up student government

A group of 17 minority student activists running for the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s student government secured a majority of the available positions on the Associated Students of Madison (ASM) Student Council.

Is, gulp, Wisconsin the best athletic program in the country?

March has become a month when Wisconsin celebrates the muscle of its athletic department. The last 14 years the Badgers have played in a college football bowl game and then qualified for the NCAA men’s basketball tournament. It is the longest streak in NCAA history.

Student brewers at UW-Madison selected for another round of commercial production

A trio of student brewers from a food and beverage fermentation class were named winners Wednesday of the second-annual Campus Craft Brewery contest. The winning beer, an American wheat ale with white and red wheat, will now be commercially brewed and distributed throughout the state by Wisconsin Brewing Co. in Verona, sponsor of the contest, which is designed to prepare students for work in the food and beverage industry.

Madison’s Atlantis: The Lost City

The peaceful atmosphere of the UW–Madison Arboretum seems an unlikely site for a city rocked by scandal, war and nature’s cruel grip. Yet tucked within the Arboretum is Madison’s own Atlantis, its lost city.

More visibility with #TheRealUW may be mixed blessing

With many students using #TheRealUW to voice their experiences with racial prejudice on campus, a discrimination expert said there are caveats that come with greater media attention.

University of Wisconsin psychology professor Markus Brauer, an expert on discrimination, said greater visibility means students’ perceptions of racial prejudice on campus will have a concrete impact on the racial climate.

Can your address predict a premature death?

Rural counties have higher rates of smoking, obesity, child poverty and teen births, as well as higher numbers of uninsured adults than their urban counterparts, according to the report, a collaboration between the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute. Large urban counties have lower smoking and obesity rates, fewer injury deaths and more residents who attended some college.

“What we think is going on here is that … in rural areas, there is a smaller population, fewer businesses, fewer taxes — and they’re struggling to offer as many opportunities as urban,” said lead researcher Bridget Catlin [senior scientist and director of MATCH]. “All of this has a significant impact on health.”

Global investors remain committed to real estate

Quoted: Erwan Quintin, associate professor at Wisconsin School of Business, said liquidity was a concern, as were a shortage of opportunities. Nevertheless, conviction plays a role, he said: “People are investing in those sectors because they feel that the sector has a future that justifies investing in it.”

Is Agent Orange Still Causing Birth Defects?

Quoted: Vietnam claims its data are sound, but the disagreement has sustained tension for years, particularly about effects that might be passed down to subsequent generations. Although U.S. laboratory tests in animals show that genetic damage caused by dioxin can be passed on to offspring, susceptibility varies widely by species, and no studies have been done in humans. Whether animal findings reflect the human experience “would be notoriously difficult to prove,” cautions Robert Moore, a toxicology researcher at the University of Wisconsin– Madison.

Financial Literacy Poses Lifelong Challenges

Noted: Knowing what one should do is different from actually doing it, though. That difference is why financial security scholar J. Michael Collins, a University of Wisconsin-Extension family and consumer economics specialist, prefers the concept of “capability” over “literacy.”