The latest news from the UW

On behalf of state employee Jeff Ott, we, his family and friends, would like to take this opportunity to thank all of you at the UW for your generous donations of sick leave through participation in Washington State’s shared leave program.

JAMMERS JAM: Allow us to be boastful for a moment and note that University Week’s parent department, News & Information, is home to the current champs of the Walk-in Challenge.

The UW Bothell and the UW Tacoma have announced the recipients of the President’s Medalist Award at their institutions.

Attention new employees and those who help them get started at the University: Signing up for direct deposit just got a whole lot easier.

John Wott, professor of forest resources and director of the Washington Park Arboretum for more than 10 years, has been named acting director of the UW’s Center for Urban Horticulture in addition to his duties as arboretum director.

Adults often struggle trying to learn a second language, but the process may not be as tedious and slow as commonly believed.

Innovative programs ranging from English language classes for UW employees to an interdisciplinary degree program in humanitarian relief received support from the Fund for Innovation and Redesign.

John Wott, professor of forest resources and director of the Washington Park Arboretum for more than 10 years, has been named acting director of the UW’s Center for Urban Horticulture in addition to his duties as arboretum director.

The major trends in the American diet can be described as more calories, more refined grains, more added sugars, and more added fats. The reasons behind these trends are largely economic, says Dr. Adam Drewnowski, director of the Nutritional Sciences Program in the UW School of Public Health and Community Medicine

When a magnitude 6.8 earthquake struck western Washington in 2001, hundreds of brick chimneys in two neighborhoods were seriously damaged or toppled. New research suggests the shaking in these areas might have been intensified by the Seattle fault, even though it was not the source of the earthquake.

Virtual reality appears to dramatically change how the brain physically registers pain, not just how people subjected to pain perceive the incoming signals, according to a new study by a group of University of Washington researchers.

Scientists expected the Stardust spacecraft to send back pictures of comet Wild 2 showing a chunk of rock and ice coated with dust, obscuring any interesting features. Instead, they got images filled with sharply defined mesas, craters, pinnacles and canyons.

Banks located in the Pacific Northwest and Hawaii did a better job of managing operating costs in 2003 than the national average, yielding investors a healthy 12 percent return on equity.

Although pedestrian injuries have decreased in recent years, they still remain a significant health problem, accounting for 13 percent of traffic fatalities in the U.S. The growing popularity of light trucks, a category that includes sport utility vehicles (SUVs), has presented a new challenge for pedestrians and raises an important question: Do light trucks increase the risk of severe injury and death for pedestrians?

New findings indicate that the endangered callimicos are not a missing link between small and large New World monkeys.

Adults often struggle trying to learn a second language, but the process may not be as tedious and slow as commonly believed.

Ovarian cancer has often been called the silent killer because it’s so hard to detect. New UW research indicates that ovarian cancer may not be silent, and both women and their health-care providers should be alert for symptoms.

Bonnie Dunbar, one of the world’s most experienced women astronauts and a 1970s-era engineering graduate, will be honored this week as the UW’s Alumna Summa Laude Dignata winner for 2004.

Thirty new UW professors and librarians will venture on a five-day tour of Washington in order to discover the culture, geography and economics of the state as part of the seventh annual Faculty Field Tour.

Dr.

Dr.

Tina Mankowski is the new director of Health Sciences/UW Medicine News and Community Relations.

Where are we? The photo above was taken somewhere on campus.

It’s every child’s fantasy to play only the games he wants to play with the friends that he likes best.

More than 25 years of zoning policies intended to preserve the nature of Eastern King County’s wild and rural lands may be encouraging the very sprawl land-use planners want to avoid.

What do you get when you cross a computer and a seeing-eye dog?

That’s easy, according to a group of student researchers at the University of Washington’s Human Interface Technology Laboratory: a first-of-its-kind Wearable Low Vision Aid.

If you were to do something special on Sept.

Editor’s note: This year University Week decided to follow the development of one UW graduate student as he learned — through being a teaching assistant — how to be an effective teacher.