UW In The News

Sleep Deprivation Shuts Down Production of Essential Brain Proteins

The researchers made their measurements every four hours, an advance on earlier studies that usually looked at a single time point during a 24-hour period, says Chiara Cirelli, a neuroscientist at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, who co-wrote a commentary accompanying the two papers. “It’s a very comprehensive analysis across the entire light-dark cycle,” she says.

Wisconsin country doctor treats Amish, studies genetic diseases

Quoted: “These changes come out of huge health care systems like Kaiser Permanente,” says Byron Crouse, who retired last September from his job as associate dean for rural and community health at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “How do you scale that down to a small, rural practice?”

New marching director leading UW Band into next era

The UW-Madison community is celebrating Homecoming this week. It’s the first for the new Badger Band director.UW Band Director Dr. Corey PompeyDr. Corey Pompey took over this season, when long-time UW Band director Mike Leckrone retired after leading the band for 50 years.

Has corporate feminism come to solve Pakistan’s social problems? Not quite

Quoted: In her book The Gender Effect: Capitalism, Feminism, and the Corporate Politics of Development, University of Wisconsin-Madison professor Kathryn Moeller examines why transnational US corporations such as Nike are increasingly investing in philanthropic efforts to promote the prosperity of girls and women in the Global South and finds that these corporate-led campaigns end up benefiting corporations at the expense of women in the Global South.

Why Amazon Fires Keep Raging 10 Years After a Deal to End Them

Quoted: “The agreement has so many holes, the deforestation is still just going on,” said Holly Gibbs, a University of Wisconsin geographer who has studied the agreement.

These State Birds May Be Forced Out of Their States as the World Warms

Quoted: “There’s a lot we don’t know about how certain species might adapt to novel climate conditions,” said Benjamin Zuckerberg, an associate professor in the Department of Forest and Wildlife Ecology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “We might see bird species shifting their nesting times or changing their diet.”

With Harvest Underway, Wisconsin Farmers Continue To Face Uncertain Corn, Soybean Markets | Wisconsin Public Radio

Paul Mitchell, director of the Renk Agribusiness Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said Wisconsin had fewer cases of late planting than South Dakota and Minnesota. He said the state’s dairy industry provides some security for farmers growing corn

Adjustable Desks: Health Benefit Or Hype?

Quoted: University of Wisconsin-Madison engineering professor Robert Radwin studies workplace ergonomics. He was not involved in the University of Pittsburg study but he instructs students on the qualities of sit-stand desks which he feels have gotten a lot of hype. He does not have one.

Every Single Living Thing Is Part of an Ecosystem. Here’s How They Work

Quoted: “The ecosystem concept ecologists now use has been refined since it was first introduced by Tansley almost a century ago,” says Stephen Carpenter, a scientist in the Center for Limnology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “Ecosystem science studies the interactions of all the living and non-living entities in a specified place. This definition is consistent with modern concepts of energy, nutrient flow and biogeochemistry, which barely existed during Tansley’s career.”

Is a vaping-linked lung illness a public health crisis? That depends on who you ask

Quoted: Communication scholar Dietram Scheufele at the University of Wisconsin-Madison said that at any point in time, roughly five issues tend to dominate a person’s memory. A constantly shuffling set of concerns struggle endlessly for one’s attention.

A Note to the Nobel Prize Selection Committee

A professor here at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, Howard Temin represented what society expects from us and had the characteristics that make society willing to fund our work. People want scientists who get up every morning committed to finding the truth.

UW sports analytics, bracketology and solving the opioid crisis

Noted: According to the UW-Madison College of Engineering website, Albert researches “modeling and solving real-world discrete optimization problems with application to homeland security, disasters, emergency response, public services, and healthcare.”

The research on emergency response, for example, focuses on how to match the right resources with the right needs at the right time. In one aspect of this research, Albert looks at how to get the right mix of vehicles to an emergency.

National Academy of Sciences pulls video on possibility of designer babies

Quoted: “I am disappointed by this,” said Alta Charo, a University of Wisconsin, Madison ethicist involved in past academy panels on gene editing. She said the tweet and video could further misunderstanding about editing’s most important uses or wrongly suggest that it’s possible now to bestow traits like intelligence.

Wisconsin manufacturing hub asks, ‘what factory recession?’

Quoted: “We have pretty much tapped out the labor market,” says Steve Deller, an economist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “We have companies that are saying that that’s causing part of the slowdown. It’s a bottleneck.”

What electronic games can teach us

Quoted: Green, now a cognitive psychologist at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, admits that the benefits of playing hours upon hours of Call of Duty may be limited in real life.

UW Study: Electric Pulses Hidden By Hats Could Help Reverse Balding

Now, a team at the University of Wisconsin-Madison think they have a promising — and discreet — solution. A device, hidden by a hat, that sends low-energy electric pulses to stimulate hair growth.

As the economy teeters, Trump’s ‘eighth wonder of the world’ wobbles with it

Quoted: “Every couple of months there’s been a different plan,” said Steven Deller, an economist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. “First it was 13,000 jobs. Now it might be 1,000 jobs. They’ve really scaled back on what they plan to do.”

New Study Finds Connected Habitats See Increases In Biodiversity

Researchers measured 239 plant species over 18 years as part of a habitat experiment at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, said the study’s lead author Ellen Damschen, an integrative biology professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

If We Connect Fragmented Habitat, New Species Will Come, Study Shows

“Like compound interest in a bank, the number of species increases at a constant rate each year, resulting in a much larger bottom line over time in habitats that are connected by a corridor than those that are not,” lead author Ellen Damschen of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, says in the press release.

Connecting fractured habitats has long-lasting ecological benefits, study in Science finds

Few plants grow beneath the timber trees’ dense canopy. Spongy mats of pine needles, up to a foot thick, cover the forest floor. “I might see zero species in the understory,” said study author Ellen Damschen, an ecosystem ecologist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. “Maybe one or two.

Flash drought declared in Washington due to abnormally hot and dry weather

Quoted: Jason Otkin, a meteorologist at the University of Wisconsin who published a study on the characteristics of flash droughts, wrote in an email that the D.C. area “is on the northern edge of large region centered on the southern Appalachians” that has seen sudden drought onset due “to a prolonged period of much drier and warmer than normal conditions.”

Rudy Giuliani’s role in Ukraine’s investigation of Joe Biden

Quoted: Soliciting help or anything of value from foreign officials in an election is unusual and could be illegal, said Yoshiko Herrera, professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. It’s also uncommon for a president’s personal attorney to communicate with foreign officials on matters that could influence White House policy, she said.

At Yale’s Singapore college, a canceled course on dissent triggers censorship claims

Quoted: Most U.S. universities that pursue such growth “recognize that their assumptions about academic freedom will need to be adjusted,” said Kris Olds, an expert on the globalization of public education, at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. “How far will they bend, though?”

Rates of Autism and ADHD Are Increasing Significantly for U.S. Kids

Quoted: It isn’t clear whether the greater prevalence of reported ADHD and ASD cases is necessarily a bad thing. According to Maureen Durkin, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health, in an editorial appearing accompanying the study in Pediatrics, greater awareness of the disorders and better diagnosis might be largely responsible for the higher numbers.

Harry Potter’s Broadway Box Office Tactic Cloaks Drop in Demand

Quoted: “When supply is fixed (as in this case), a decrease in demand requires a decrease in price to clear the market,” stated University of Wisconsin-Madison professor Alan Sorensen.

Climate change: Landmark UN report warns sea levels will rise faster than projected by 2100

Quoted: “It drives home the message that policies that curb greenhouse gas emissions can have a strong effect on future sea level rise,” said Andrea Dutton, an associate professor in the Department of Geoscience at the University of Wisconsin Madison. “What we do today can decide which of those pathways we’re on.”

Apparent new rise in autism may not reflect true prevalence

Diagnoses of those two conditions increase with maternal education, points out Maureen Durkin, professor of population health sciences and pediatrics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Durkin was not involved in the study but wrote an editorial accompanying the work3.

Can you teach kids kindness? New curriculum hopes to reverse trend of bullying in schools

Now, a team of psychologists at the University of Wisconsin think they have a way to help reverse the trend.

Madison cartoonist Lynda Barry wins MacArthur Foundation ‘genius’ award

Graphic novelist, cartoonist and creativity educator Lynda Barry of Madison is one of this year’s winners of the prestigious MacArthur Foundation fellowship, commonly known as a “genius” grant.

Why Vaping Became A Public Health Priority In Wisconsin, The US

“In Wisconsin today, 19 individuals will die of a disease directly caused by smoking cigarettes,” said Dr. Michael Fiore, who directs the University of Wisconsin Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention, in a Sept. 17, 2019 interview on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Central Time.