Nov. 18, 2009

by Jill Sakai

As a young microbiology graduate student, Kevin Eliceiri met a professor just recruited to UW–Madison, a highly regarded geneticist and imaging expert named John White, now professor emeritus of anatomy and molecular biology. “Though John was well-known for being a biologist, he was equally well-known for being a microscopist and imaging innovator. He’s a researcher who can speak with depth and breadth to computer scientists, physicists and biologists alike,” Eliceiri says. Inspired, he joined White’s lab the next day.  Read the full news article here: http://www.news.wisc.edu/17378

Nov. 9, 2009

by Dian Land

Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health have eliminated cervical cancer in mice with two FDA-approved drugs currently used to treat breast cancer and osteoporosis.

Nov. 9, 2009

by Dave Tenenbaum

Becoming "hard of hearing" is a standard but unfortunate part of aging: A syndrome called age-related hearing loss affects about 40 percent of people over 65 in the United States, and will afflict an estimated 28 million Americans by 2030.

Oct. 21, 2009

If 2008’s inaugural MathBio Symposium was a big-picture look at collaboration, the focus of this year’s symposium is on the best picture.

MathBio 2: Image, hosted by the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery and the Graduate School on Nov. 19 and 20 at the Fluno Center, will highlight the need for interdisciplinary collaborative efforts to better understand, analyze, visualize and disseminate biological imaging data.

The 20 Finalists for the 2009 National Book awards were announced Wednesday, October 14th. Among the 5 nominees for Non-fiction was our own, Dr. Sean Carroll and his book, Remarkable Creatures. The winner in each category - Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, and Young People's Literature - will be announced Wednesday, November 18th at the Annual National Book Award Benefit Dinner and Ceremony. 

Congratulations to Dr. Carroll!

The National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) of the National Institutes of Health today (Sept. 28) announced an $8 million, three-year grant to establish a Wisconsin Center of Excellence in Genomics Science.

The new center is a collaborative effort among the University of Wisconsin-Madison, the Medical College of Wisconsin and Marquette University, and will be coordinated by the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW). It will be co-directed by Michael Olivier, professor of physiology at the MCW Biotechnology and Bioengineering Center (BBC) and the Human and Molecular Genetics Center (HMGC); and Lloyd M. Smith, W.L. Hubbell professor of chemistry and director of the Genome Center of Wisconsin (GCW) at UW-Madison.

CMB trainer, Dr. Sean Carroll has begun writing a weekly column in the science section of the New York Times. His column will run every Tuesday. To check out his first article about the evolution of sharks, follow the link.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/15/science/15creature.html 

Ron Raines, a professor with joint appointments in the biochemistry and chemistry departments, has won the 2010 Repligen Award from the American Chemical Society. The Repligen Award is a lifetime achievement award for outstanding contributions to our understanding of the chemistry of biological processes. Ron is the 25th winner of the award, and the youngest to date. He will be honored at the 240th ACS national meeting in Boston.

Aug. 24, 2009

by Susan Lampert Smith

A team of scientists from the School of Medicine and Public Health has successfully grown multiple types of retina cells from two types of stem cells — suggesting a future in which damaged retinas could be repaired by cells grown from the patient's own skin.

Aug. 20, 2009

by Dian Land

Success in soccer sometimes comes with "bending it like Beckham." Success in cellular fusion — as occurs at the moment of conception and when nerve cells exchange neurotransmitters — requires that a membrane be bent before the merging process can begin, University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers have shown.