U.S. Space Pioneer, UI Professor James A. Van Allen Dies

The world's science community suffered a great loss this month with the death Aug. 9 of U.S. space pioneer James A. Van Allen, the Regent Distinguished Professor of Physics in the University of Iowa College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Van Allen, who is perhaps best known as discoverer and namesake of the Van Allen Radiation Belts surrounding Earth, died of heart failure at University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics. He was 91. Plans for a memorial service are still pending. More >>

Tributes, news, photos, and video chronicling Van Allen’s tremendous contributions to the exploration of space, and to Iowa, may be found at http://www.uiowa.edu/~ournews/van-allen

Memorial contributions to the UI Foundation’s James Van Allen Scholarship Fund may be made at http://www.givetoiowa.org/vanallen

College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Department of Physics and Astronomy: http://www.physics.uiowa.edu

UI External Support Is A Record $366.4 Million For 2005-2006

University of Iowa faculty, together with staff and students, generated an all-time record $366.4 million in grants and contracts for UI research, education, and service during fiscal 2006, a 1.7 percent increase from 2005. More >>

Illinois Fund-Raising VP Chosen To Head University Of Iowa Foundation

Lynette L. Marshall, vice president of the University of Illinois Foundation at Urbana-Champaign, has been named president of the University of Iowa Foundation. The announcement was made today by Charles M. Kierscht, interim president, chair of the UI Foundation board of directors and chair of the presidential search committee. More >>

UI Foundation: http://www.uifoundation.org

Armstrong, Kerry, Weiner Testify At UI Field Hearing On Cancer

About 600 people attended a Field Hearing on Cancer held July 28 on the University of Iowa campus by the U.S. Senate Appropriations Subcommittee On Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies. The hearing included testimony from U.S. Sen. John Kerry (D.-Mass); George Weiner, director of the Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center at the UI and chair of the Iowa Consortium for Comprehensive Cancer Control; and cycling champion and cancer survivor Lance Armstrong, among others. Hundreds more individuals watched the live UITV broadcast of the hearing on various cable stations. Later in the day, Armstrong, Weiner, and UI football coach Kirk Ferentz spoke to RAGBRAI bike riders in Coralville about cancer issues. More >>

Photos, audio, and video of the field hearing, as well as print versions of some of the testimony, are available at http://www.uiowa.edu/~ournews/cancerhearing/

Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center : http://www.uihealthcare.com/depts/cancercenter/

Register Now For Homecoming Reunion Weekend 2006

The University of Iowa will again celebrate Homecoming this year with a week of events leading up to the Saturday, Oct. 7 football game against the Purdue Boilermakers, including the traditional Homecoming parade, pep rally and concert on Friday, Oct. 6 – all under the theme of “Home Is Where the Hawk Is.” Special activities are in store for all alumni from the classes of 1981, 1986, and 1996, in addition to activities planned for alumni of individual colleges. For more information and to register by the Sept. 29 deadline, visit the UI Alumni Association’s Homecoming website. More >>

Find a UI Alumnus: https://www.iowalum.com/find

Can’t wait for homecoming or football season to begin? Meet local Hawkeye fans, as well as Iowa’s new athletic director Gary Barta, at an I-Club event in your area: http://www.uifoundation.org/athletics/events/area.shtml

UI Physicians Listed Among ‘Best Doctors In America’

One hundred eighty-eight University of Iowa physicians have been selected for inclusion in the 2006 "Best Doctors in America" database. More >>

UI Hospitals & Clinics: http://www.uihealthcare.com/

Children's Hospital Of Iowa Leader Announced

Officials at University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics recently announced the selection of John A. Brandecker for the position of associate hospital director and Children's Hospital of Iowa administrator. More >>

Children’s Hospital of Iowa: http://www.uihealthcare.com/depts/childrenshospitalofiowa/index.html

$14.6 Million NIH Grant To UI Will Build On Macular Degeneration Findings

A five-year, $14.6 million grant from the National Eye Institute of the National Institutes of Health will fund an international, multidisciplinary effort led by the University of Iowa to leverage two recent genetic discoveries into possible treatments for age-related macular degeneration. More >>

Department of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences: http://webeye.ophth.uiowa.edu/

Researchers Collaborate To Improve American Indian Children's Oral Health

Researchers from the University of Iowa Colleges of Public Health and Dentistry are collaborating with the Aberdeen Area Tribal Chairman's Health Board on a three-year, $1.2 million grant to improve the oral health of Northern Plains Indian children. More >>

College of Public Health : http://www.public-health.uiowa.edu/

College of Dentistry : http://www.dentistry.uiowa.edu/

UI School Of Art And Art History Will Dedicate New Building Sept. 8

Art Building West, the new building of the University of Iowa School of Art and Art History that was designed by internationally renowned architect Steven Holl, will be dedicated Friday, Sept. 8. The dedication of the new building coincides with "100 Years of Art at Iowa," a celebration of a century of instruction in the visual arts at the UI. As part of the celebration, there will be an "Online Auction Benefit Exhibition" of art by faculty of the School of Art and Art History. Artworks can be viewed and bids placed through the school's Web page, http://www.art.uiowa.edu from 3:30 p.m. Friday, Aug. 25, through 9 p.m. Monday, Sept. 25. More >>

Photo gallery: http://www.uiowa.edu/~fyi/issues/issues2006_v43/06052006/photo-feature.html

UI International Writing Program Assembles 2006 Global Literary Community

The "United Nation of Writing" will soon be in session. Prominent writers from around the world are converging on the American heartland, where the University of Iowa International Writing Program is headquartered. This one-of-a-kind residency program will welcome 30 writers -- representing 23 countries -- who will become part of the UI's rich literary culture for three months, late August through late November. More >>

International Writing Program: http://www.uiowa.edu/~iwp/

Gill: Test Shows Bird-to-Human Flu Transmission
(National Geographic, July 31)

A duck hunter and two wildlife workers in Iowa have tested positive for a nonlethal form of avian flu, according to a team of U.S scientists. Their study is the first to suggest that bird flu can be transmitted to humans from wild birds. "We did not detect H5N1, the virus that has caused such a high death rate in the humans it has infected," said the study's lead author, JAMES GILL, who is a disease specialist at the University of Iowa Hygienic Laboratory in Iowa City. More >>

The Center for Emerging Infectious Deseases: http://www.public-health.uiowa.edu/CEID/Projects.htm

Peters Discusses ‘Fightin' Words’
(Chicago Tribune, July 24)

A story about “fightin' words” asks whether every person has a trigger that will set him or her off. JOHN DURHAM PETERS, communication studies professor at the University of Iowa, says, "Every human being has a button." Peters' latest book, "Courting the Abyss: Free Speech and the Liberal Tradition" (University of Chicago Press, 2005), deals with the tricky balance between allowing free speech while maintaining a civil society. "It's good that we're sensitive enough to want to teach people not to be jerks," Peters says, "but it's bad that we're not tough enough to let public life get a little spicy and racy." More >>

College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Department of Communication Studies: http://www.uiowa.edu/~commstud/index.html

Squire: Iowa Race Could Signal Trend
(Fox News, July 23)

The number of political luminaries already flying into Iowa these days not only signifies an early start in the White House 2008 campaign, but also offers a clue into the sizzling race in Iowa's 1st Congressional District. In the last month, following the contentious Iowa Democratic and Republican primaries, big shots like Vice President Dick Cheney, White House political adviser Karl Rove and prospective 2008 Democratic presidential contenders John Edwards and Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana have come in to stump for the candidates in a northeastern Iowa district. According to analysts, the flow may not let up until November as this appears to be one of the most competitive races in the country, with no clear frontrunner in sight for the seat left vacant by Republican Rep. Jim Nussle, who is running for governor. "I think it's going to be tight right up to November," said PEVERILL SQUIRE, political science professor at the University of Iowa. More >>

College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Political Science at Iowa: http://www.polisci.uiowa.edu/

Westefeld: 1 In 5 Suffers From ‘Severe Weather Phobia’
(The Times of London, July 17)

JOHN WESTEFELD, a psychologist at the University of Iowa, says that some people are so afraid of bad weather that they are almost incapacitated at the thought of impending storms. Westefeld estimates that up to one in five people could be suffering from "severe weather phobia" (the severe refers to the weather rather than the phobia). In a recent short paper in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Westefeld reported that, of a group of 139 people, about 20 percent confessed to a "moderate degree of fear" in the run-up to foul weather. Symptoms included dizziness, a sense of panic, quickened heart rate, loss of appetite, sleeplessness, and the constant monitoring of weather reports. "This is not the normal, healthy worry most people have and which motivates them to prepare for a storm," Westefeld says. "They are really, really afraid." More >>

College of Education Department of Psychological and Quantitative Foundations: http://www.education.uiowa.edu/pandq/

Medical Advances

Amidst pain, suffering, and death, the war in Iraq provides opportunities for medical developments that can save lives--at home and on the battlefield. More >>

Vampire Boot Camp

It's one bloody book after another in an intensive literary gore-fest of a summer class. More >>

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