Tag Research
Research finds soda tax does little to decrease obesity
Extra sales taxes on soda may not do anything to improve people's health, according to new research from health economist Jason Fletcher of the La Follette School of Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Read More
Researchers discover new way to make muscle cells from human stem cells
As stem cells continue their gradual transition from the lab to the clinic, a research group at the University of Wisconsin–Madison has discovered a new way to make large concentrations of skeletal muscle cells and muscle progenitors from human stem cells. Read More
New Milky Way portrait to be on Town Center media wall
The dramatic new infrared picture of the plane of our galaxy will be viewable for the next week on the large media wall in the Town Center of the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery on the UW–Madison campus. Read More
Dramatic new portrait helps define Milky Way’s shape, contents
Using more than 2 million images collected by NASA’s orbiting Spitzer Space Telescope, a team of Wisconsin scientists has stitched together a dramatic 360-degree portrait of the Milky Way, providing new details of our galaxy’s structure and contents. Read More
Startup focuses on reliable, efficient cooling for computer servers
In a dark, windy room on the top floor of Engineering Hall on the University of Wisconsin–Madison campus, racks of computers are processing information for a college that relies, like all technical fields, on massive computing power. The noise comes from multiple fans located inside each computer case and from the large air conditioner that drives currents through the room to remove waste heat from the processors. Read More
In the lab, scientists coax E. coli to resist radiation damage
Capitalizing on the ability of an organism to evolve in response to punishment from a hostile environment, scientists have coaxed the model bacterium Escherichia coli to dramatically resist ionizing radiation and, in the process, reveal the genetic mechanisms that make the feat possible. Read More
Halting immune response could save brain cells after stroke
A new study in animals shows that using a compound to block the body’s immune response greatly reduces disability after a stroke. Read More
Study suggests potential association between soy formula and seizures in children with autism
A University of Wisconsin–Madison researcher has detected a higher rate of seizures among children with autism who were fed infant formula containing soy protein rather than milk protein. Read More
Small scale, large potential: An expert weighs in on the future of microfluidics
More than a decade ago, David Beebe wrote that the field of microfluidics had the potential to significantly change modern biology. Now Beebe, an expert in the field, has written a high-level perspective on the state of microfluidics for the journal Nature. Read More
Baby sea turtles spend ‘lost years’ in warm blankets of seaweed
Nosing their way out of eggs buried in sandy beaches from Florida’s east coast north into the Carolinas, baby loggerhead sea turtles race to the water as fast as their flippers will carry them and begin a swim frenzy to clear the predator-rich shore. Read More
Military dads have to re-learn parenting after deployment
Fathers who returned after military service report having difficulty connecting with young children who sometimes don’t remember them, according to a study released this week. Read More
Sardis dig yields enigmatic trove: ritual egg in a pot
Sardis has given up another treasure in the form of two enigmatic ritual deposits, which are proving more difficult to fathom than the coins for which the city was famous. Read More
New report profiles UW–Madison organic agriculture research
University of Wisconsin–Madison scientists are engaged in a wide range of research related to organic agricultural production practices, according to a new report released on Feb. 28 at the MOSES Organic Farming Conference in La Crosse. Read More
UW-Madison a partner in national effort to retool U.S. manufacturing
Contributing expertise in such areas as advanced manufacturing, controls and high-performance computing, the University of Wisconsin–Madison will play a key role a $320 million initiative to create and apply cutting-edge technologies to advance U.S. global competitiveness in manufacturing. Read More
‘Greener’ aerogel technology holds potential for oil and chemical clean-up
Cleaning up oil spills and metal contaminates in a low-impact, sustainable and inexpensive manner remains a challenge for companies and governments globally. But a group of researchers at UW–Madison is examining alternative materials that can be modified to absorb oil and chemicals. Read More
Seed dispersal gets a test in carved-out ‘habitat corridors’
Field ecologists go to great lengths to get data: radio collars and automatic video cameras are only two of their creative techniques for documenting the natural world. So when a group of ecologists set out to see how wind moves seeds through isolated patches of habitat carved into a longleaf pine plantation in South Carolina, they twisted colored yarn to create mock seeds that would drift with the wind much like native seeds. Read More
Oldest bit of crust firms up idea of a cool early Earth
With the help of a tiny fragment of zircon extracted from a remote rock outcrop in Australia, the picture of how our planet became habitable to life about 4.4 billion years ago is coming into sharper focus. Read More
New, inexpensive production materials boost promise of hydrogen fuel
Generating electricity is not the only way to turn sunlight into energy we can use on demand. The sun can also drive reactions to create chemical fuels, such as hydrogen, that can in turn power cars, trucks and trains. Read More
Nathan Whitehorn a 2014 ‘Young Star’ in astrophysics
Nathan Whitehorn, a postdoctoral researcher on the IceCube project at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, has been named a “Young Star” by the Division of Astrophysics of the American Physical Society (APS). Read More