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(03/30/10 2:59am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Spring is here. The chipmunks are coming out of their burrows, crocuses are pushing their fragile heads into the pale March sunlight and IU’s gardeners are ready to get their fingers green.That’s because Residential Programs and Services has just opened its campus garden allotments to students. The plots, located near the water tower on the East State Road 46 bypass, are part of the office’s strategy to create green spaces. Forty plots are available, each measuring 11” by 11”, at a cost of $25.This is the second year that the allotments have been available. In the past, students had to apply for a place at Hilltop Garden and Nature Center, but last year there was no more room. So University architects and housing services came together to create the new enclosure.“We threw this together,” said Tim Stockton, associate director of apartment housing, “and it worked.”The students helped organize and then create the garden. They tilled the land, cleared away rubbish and erected a fence. It wasn’t always a smooth process, but eventually it all came together.“We had a few growing pains with the fence,” Stockton said, who lent his own gardening tools to help with the plots. “I loaned them my truck — my truck will never be the same.”Last year students grew common produce such as tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers, but there were also some more exotic species.“There were some things even I didn’t recognize,” Stockton said, noting that last year he saw the garden as an experiment that can be perfected this year.“It’s an amazing place to see cultures interact together,” Garden Manager Katie Peebles said, who revelled in the opportunity to witness Asian and European gardening techniques first-hand.Peebles’ role is not only to organize the garden but to offer advice and assistance to students. She sends out a weekly gardening guidance e-mail, gives a monthly workshop and recommends books and Web sites that might help students. The University, using the registration fee, provides tools and a safe storage place for any extra equipment that the students contribute. Stockton himself took a plot last year and intends to do the same again this year.Area Coordinator of apartment housing Erna Rosenfeld said there has been a greater interest in the allotments this year, and 16 of the plots have already been taken. Stockton plans to plant flowers in any unused plots, which would not only be attractive but would keep weeds at bay.As well as providing residents the chance to grow their own food, the gardens have also acted as a meeting place for students.“It’s a good thing for the community to rally around,” Peebles said.Stockton said he hopes the gardens will encourage self-reliance, promote understanding of the environment and enrich the campus. This year he is planning on planting a line of sunflowers along the edge of the garden to beautify the view from the bypass.The plots can also serve the rest of Bloomington. One way is by donating the produce to food banks or organizations such as Martha’s Kitchen that provide meals for the homeless. Another idea that Stockton wants to promote is that the gardens can educate children about where food comes from. In the age of processed platters, Stockton said gardening can teach natural nourishment.Peebles said she believes gardening is something everyone should be passionate about, and the allotments are an expression of an innate urge.“When you want to garden, you’ll find a way,” Peebles said.
(03/30/10 1:10am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Spring is here. The chipmunks are coming out of their burrows, crocuses are pushing their fragile heads into the pale March sunlight and IU’s gardeners are ready to get their fingers green.That’s because Residential Programs and Services has just opened its campus garden allotments to students. The plots, located by the water tower on the East State Road 46 bypass, are part of the office’s strategy to create green spaces. Forty plots are available, each measuring 11” by 11”, at a cost of $25.This is the second year that the allotments have been available. In the past, students had to apply for a place at Hilltop Garden and Nature Center, but last year there was no more room. So University architects and housing services came together to create the new enclosure.“We threw this together,” said Tim Stockton, associate director of apartment housing, “and it worked.”The students helped organize and then create the garden. They tilled the land, cleared away rubbish and erected a fence. It wasn’t always a smooth process, but eventually it all came together.“We had a few growing pains with the fence,” Stockton said, who lent his own gardening tools to help with the plots. “I loaned them my truck — my truck will never be the same.”Last year students grew common produce such as tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers, but there were also some more exotic species.“There were some things even I didn’t recognize,” Stockton said, noting that last year he saw the garden as an experiment that can be perfected this year.“It’s an amazing place to see cultures interact together,” Garden Manager Katie Peebles said, who revelled in the opportunity to witness Asian and European gardening techniques first-hand.Peebles’ role is not only to organize the garden but to offer advice and assistance to students. She sends out a weekly gardening guidance e-mail, gives a monthly workshop and recommends books and Web sites that might help students. The University, using the registration fee, provides tools and a safe storage place for any extra equipment that the students contribute. Stockton himself took a plot last year and intends to do the same again this year.Area Coordinator of apartment housing Erna Rosenfeld said there has been a greater interest in the allotments this year, and 16 of the plots have already been taken. Stockton plans to plant flowers in any unused plots, which would not only be attractive but would keep weeds at bay.As well as providing residents the chance to grow their own food, the gardens have also acted as a meeting place for students.“It’s a good thing for the community to rally around,” Peebles said.Stockton said he hopes the gardens will encourage self-reliance, promote understanding of the environment and enrich the campus. This year he is planning on planting a line of sunflowers along the edge of the garden to beautify the view from the bypass.The plots can also serve the rest of Bloomington. One way is by donating the produce to food banks or organizations such as Martha’s Kitchen that provide meals for the homeless. Another idea that Stockton wants to promote is that the gardens can educate children about where food comes from. In the age of processed platters, Stockton said gardening can teach natural nourishment.Peebles said she believes gardening is something everyone should be passionate about, and the allotments are an expression of an innate urge.“When you want to garden, you’ll find a way,” Peebles said.
(02/22/10 11:25pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Last year was a bad year for Indianapolis-based pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly. The company faced a continued fall in stock price, government fines and bad publicity.This year looks no better. Last week, Lilly agreed to an $18.5 million settlement with the Arkansas Attorney General’s office over false advertising of the antipsychotic drug Zyprexa.But it wasn’t bad news for everyone at Lilly: CEO John Lechleiter received a 2009 compensation package of $20.9 million, according to the company’s preliminary proxy statement. The compensation package was $6.4 million higher than in 2008. Executive pay has come under increased scrutiny since the economic slump began, with both the public and politicians expressing anger about the pay awarded to company directors.Although Lilly reported a 7 percent increase in revenue during 2008, the company sold its Lafayette plant and plans to shed 5,500 staff by 2011.“There’s always going to be a tension between the CEO and the employees,” said Carol Rogers, deputy director at the Indiana Business Research Center. “Is it the job of a business to employ people or to make money?”During the next five years, Lilly will also lose patents on many of its drugs, including Zyprexa, allowing competitors to make cheap generic copies.Lilly’s poor performance doesn’t help other Indiana companies. Rogers said pharmaceutical companies cluster together, creating a group of experts who can supply the industry with the research base it needs, so Bloomington pharmaceutical companies such as Cook Medical and KP Pharmaceutical Technology, Inc. could suffer, too.IU is also reliant on Lilly for research grants totaling millions of dollars each year.The culture of increasing executive pay is not a new one. In 1949 the highest paid executive’s salary was 200 times the average worker’s pay. In 2009 the highest paid executive received a salary 15,000 times the average worker’s pay.“CEO pay is just going up since the depression,” said Tom Szymanski of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 725 Bloomington, who actively lobbies for caps on executive pay. “Workers are still suffering while CEO pay goes up. It’s just not right.”In January, President Barack Obama said he would limit executive compensation to $500,000 for companies receiving government assistance. But companies like Lilly that did not receive financial help, have no obligation to limit executive salaries and can pay whatever they want.Lauren Cislak, adviser for corporate responsibility at Lilly, said corporate pay would always be dictated by performance but declined to comment further.
(02/22/10 10:39pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Last year was a bad year for Indianapolis-based pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly. The company faced a continued fall in stock price, government fines and bad publicity.This year looks no better. Last week, Lilly agreed to an $18.5 million settlement with the Arkansas Attorney General’s office over false advertising of the antipsychotic drug Zyprexa.But it wasn’t bad news for everyone at Lilly: CEO John Lechleiter received a 2009 compensation package of $20.9 million, according to the company’s preliminary proxy statement. The compensation package was $6.4 million higher than in 2008. Executive pay has come under increasing scrutiny since the economic slump began, with both the public and politicians expressing anger about the pay awarded to company directors.Although Lilly reported a 7 percent increase in revenue during 2008, the company sold its Lafayette plant and plans to shed 5,500 staff by 2011.“There’s always going to be a tension between the CEO and the employees,” said Carol Rogers, deputy director at the Indiana Business Research Center. “Is it the job of a business to employ people or to make money?”During the next five years, Lilly will also lose patents on many of its drugs, including Zyprexa, allowing competitors to make cheap generic copies.Lilly’s poor performance doesn’t help other Indiana companies. Rogers said pharmaceutical companies cluster together, creating a group of experts who can supply the industry with the research base it needs, so Bloomington pharmaceutical companies such as Cook Medical and KP Pharmaceutical Technology, Inc. could suffer, too.IU is also reliant on Lilly for research grants totaling millions of dollars each year.The culture of increasing executive pay is not a new one. In 1949 the highest paid executive’s salary was 200 times the average worker’s pay. In 2009 the highest paid executive received a salary 15,000 times the average worker’s pay.“CEO pay is just going up since the depression,” said Tom Szymanski of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 725 Bloomington, who actively lobbies for caps on executive pay. “Workers are still suffering while CEO pay goes up. It’s just not right.”In January, President Barack Obama said he would limit executive compensation to $500,000 for companies receiving government assistance. But companies like Lilly that did not receive financial help, have no obligation to limit executive salaries and can pay whatever they want.Lauren Cislak, adviser for corporate responsibility at Lilly, said corporate pay would always be dictated by performance but declined to comment further.
(01/28/10 5:49am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>For most students the worst consequence of drinking alcohol is a bad headache and maybe a bad – or blank – memory.But for some of the 2,500-plus students of Asian ancestry at IU, alcohol can cause far more serious health problems.The reason for this reaction is a genetic mutation that prevents the body from breaking down alcohol toxins. Normally the toxins are converted into harmless products by the liver. If the toxins are not converted, they poison the body, causing headaches, heart palpitations and flushes in the short term.But in the long term, the condition has been linked to early-onset Alzheimer’s and an 80-percent increase of the risk of developing oral cancer.Now for the good news: Researchers at IU-Purdue University Indianapolis and Stanford University have made an important breakthrough in the treatment of this liver deficiency. They have discovered a molecule, called Alda-1, that can repair the malfunctioning parts of the liver.“When I drink my face will turn very red, my heart will speed up – Dum! Dum! Dum!” said Min Si, a junior in the Kelley School of Business, striking his chest to show just how hard his heart beats. “All the other people drink, but I cannot.”Thomas Hurley, director of the Center for Structural Biology at the IU School of Medicine, said that around one billion people worldwide suffer from this condition. “With this research we just went on a whim, and it worked,” said Daria Mochly-Rosen, chair of molecular pharmacology at Stanford University.In a healthy liver, alcohol toxins are broken down by an enzyme called aldehyde dehydrogenase 2 (ALDH2). Enzymes act as catalysts, allowing one molecule to transform into another. They are like the glass shoe in the story of Cinderella: The poor maid becomes the beautiful princess, all thanks to the shoe.In as many as 40 percent of people with Asian ancestry, ALDH2 does not work properly.If ALDH2 only converted alcohol toxins, the solution would be simple – don’t drink any alcohol. But ALDH2 can also reduce the risk of heart disease and kidney failure by removing naturally occurring toxins from the bloodstream.For decades, researchers have been trying to replace or repair the enzyme. Alda-1 is the first drug discovered that can repair a defective human enzyme, which opens up the door for the treatment of other enzyme-based illnesses. “Is this a novel idea? No.” Hurley said. “The novel thing is finally finding something that works.”Unlike most enzyme drugs, which replace the damaged enzyme, Alda-1 actually repairs the broken enzyme by altering its shape so that it becomes active. Mochly-Rosen said fixing the enzyme itself is preferable to replacing it with man-made enzymes.“If you have a mixer, and the top is broken, then things will start jumping out,” she said. “You could put Saran wrap around it, and that will make do. But if you repair the part, that is the optimum.”Although Alda-1 is the first case of repairing an enzyme, Hurley said if it can be done once, it can be done again. This could mean that other medical conditions caused by faulty enzymes, such as sickle cell anemia, could be cured using similar technology.The discovery still has its drawbacks though. It has yet to be tested for negative side effects, a process that can take years.Hurley said they are already looking for alternatives to Alda-1 because it is not easily absorbed into the bloodstream and only a small percentage actually reaches the broken enzyme. Ideally, a drug should be easily absorbed so it can be taken as a pill rather than as an injection.Mochly-Rosen said she has considered the moral consequences of the drug and added that studies suggest it would not cause a change in drinking behavior among those receiving it. In other words, a person with the condition wouldn’t suddenly become an alcoholic. Any drug would only be available on a prescription basis.As for Si, he is not overly concerned about missing out on the student drinking culture.“Maybe it is good,” he said, “because I don’t have to do anything stupid when I am drunk.”
(01/21/10 5:05am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Imagine waking up to a world with only women and no men, cats and no dogs, black and no white. This is the reality for experimental physicists. Their problem is simple: Almost half the universe is missing.The Large Hadron Collider at the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Switzerland, the machine that can find the missing half, reopened in October after two years of repairs. More than 30 IU physicists have worked on the Collider, building a part called the Atlas Detector, which collects the debris from atomic collisions to hunt for the Higgs boson, the missing piece in the Standard Model theory of physics. According to the model, every particle of matter has an opposite particle of antimatter. The “matter” is what makes up the universe that we can see; everything is made from matter. The antimatter, however, is almost entirely missing. The Standard Model explains the lack of antimatter by predicting the existence of the particle called the Higgs boson, which gives mass to everything, and can turn antimatter into matter.The Collider is a high-energy approach to finding the Higgs, where physicists smash atoms together at almost the speed of light and examine the debris, like atomic car crash investigators.“Imagine a ping-pong ball in molasses. It’s hard to push, so it feels like the molasses gives it weight,” physics professor Hal Evans said. “That is what the Higgs boson does. It is the molasses of the universe.”The advantage of the high-energy approach is that it can simulate events that would normally only occur in the center of stars. The disadvantage is the enormous cost and a lack of focus.“It’s like throwing two garbage cans at each other and seeing what comes out,” said Joshua Long, a precision researcher at the Cyclotron.The other method is the precision path, which, while relatively cheap, takes a long time to perfect. The Electric Dipole Moment Experiment at IU is a precision method, looking for the evidence left behind by the Higgs. Precision research is like an onion, with each layer revealing a more precise layer beneath.The two methods are pursuing the Higgs boson together because the strengths in one cover the weaknesses in the other. “High energy and precision are complimentary. Each one teaches you different things,” said Ed Stephenson, a senior research scientist at the IU Cyclotron Facility.Chen-Yu Liu, a physicist working at the Cyclotron, stands among the blinking lights, buzzing motors and coiled cables of her EDME, looking affectionately at the new $240,000 refrigerator. At room temperature atoms have lots of energy, which makes precise measurements impossible. To stop the “jiggling,” the refrigerator cools Liu’s apparatus to minus 459 degrees Fahrenheit, just above absolute zero. The Electric Dipole Moment Experiment that Liu is working on was first proposed 50 years ago, and so far no one has got it right. If her precision project is successful, it will prove the Higgs exists. Liu hopes to build an even more precise version of the experiment if the current one does not succeed.“Ninety percent of the time is just getting it to work,” Liu said. “To build and take ownership of the experiment – it is part of the fun.”A new generation of high energy and precision experiments is being designed even before the Higgs has been found.Evans said that the next high-energy physics project for IU is the International Linear Collider, which will be more focused than the current Collider because it will smash smaller particles together, producing less wreckage – less garbage in the garbage cans.Evans sits at a desk in Swain Hall West, on the other side of the campus from the Cyclotron. Fingers interlocked, he reflects on his commitment to the Collider.“I go to CERN whenever I can. I spent one week in fall, one in spring and I spend most of my summer there,” he said. For IU physicists, understanding is an end in itself. But for everyone else, there are more tangible benefits: the Internet, microchips and medical imaging are just some of the offshoot discoveries to come out of high-energy and precision research.“Our whole modern economy is based on discoveries made by experimental physicists,” Evans said. “The investment today is the technology of tomorrow.”
(11/19/09 5:16am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Papers can be a real drag. Long hours, pots of coffee, slaving over a keyboard until eyes turn square. Then the paper is handed in, marked up and forgotten.However, a final grade doesn’t have to be the end of the road. The Undergraduate Scholar has faithfully kept students’ work alive in print for almost 20 years as IU’s student-run academic journal sponsored and published by the Honors College“We get out-of-the-blue topics,” editor and senior Jane Barr said. “One coming up that I’m excited about is on the revival in Norwegian black metal ... just things that you would never think of.”Perry Hodge, who has acted as faculty adviser since 1995, described the Scholar as a constantly evolving institution, as new students arrive and old ones leave. Each issue is a brand new proposition for the staff and the readers.“I’m the cheerleader,” Hodge said. “I give the students help, but really it changes with the spirit of the times and the spirit of the staff.”Hodge said the Scholar is a growing opportunity for students, and the process of editing and publishing can create new career opportunities.“They let me know which parts were strongest, and which parts needed work,” said Caitlin Zittkowski, an IU alumna who had an article published in the last edition and is now interning in Indianapolis. “Being published is actually why they gave me the job.”Papers have been flooding in this semester, so the new edition will contain eight – twice as many as usual. A normal Scholar print run is 200, and copies can be found in the Edward L. Hutton Honors College building and at the Herman B Wells Library.Barr has a range of ideas for the future, including getting the Scholar online by the end of the year and adding book reviews to the spring edition.Funding has been an issue in the current cut-back climate at IU. Still, the Scholar staff remains optimistic that they will not be affected. Hodge said the Honors College has always helped the Scholar with funding.“It has been the one constant in my university life,” Barr said.
(11/11/09 4:14am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Local resident Tom Tokarski has been fighting against the continuation of I-69 for 18 years. It was then he established the group Citizens for Appropriate Rural Roads and began campaigning against the highway.But it was just recently that a plan came to action when the Bloomington City Council voted 8-1 to approve the purchase of a house on Tapp Road. This in itself is not unusual, as the council buys several properties each year for conversion to affordable homes, but the location is odd because the land lies directly in the path of the proposed I-69 highway expansion.I-69 would become an eight-lane highway running directly through the west side of Bloomington, just more than a mile from the courthouse square. The owner of the Tapp Road property could not sell her house because of the uncertainty regarding the highway. The Indiana Department of Transportation would normally buy the house as a hardship acquisition but had refused to do so until the local government in Bloomington gave approval. Both the Bloomington/Monroe County Metropolitan Planning Organization and the council have expressed opposition to I-69 and have refused to approve any plans that might endorse expansion. “I represent people who are skeptical of I-69, who saw this as an endorsement,” said council president Andy Ruff, who described the I-69 project as “nebulous.”It was at this point that Mayor Mark Kruzan developed his idea: Bloomington would buy the house instead of INDOT. This would allow the owner to sell without local government approving I-69. “I asked INDOT if it solved the problem, and they said yes,” Ruff said.I-69 has long been a contentious issue in Bloomington. “This highway is just so people from Evansville can come to Bloomington to watch basketball games,” Tokarski said. “It doesn’t make any sense. Indiana is already varicose with highways.”The highway is being built in sections, with less than 30 miles constructed so far at a cost of $30 million. The estimated expense of the whole project is more than $3 billion. Tokarski said INDOT is building the highway in sections to create leverage for more funds.“They will say that unless the highway is completed, the state will be left with miles of unconnected roads,” Tokarski said. In other words, a road to nowhere.While the purchase of the Tapp Road property has solved the problem in the short term, INDOT can still force a purchase of the land from the city at a later date. Councilman Brad Wisler, the only council member to vote against the Tapp Road purchase, said that it was “difficult to justify” the purchase for this reason. The Tapp Road purchase will be completed in early December.“My fear is that this is going to happen anyway, and we won’t be ready for it,” Wisler said.
(11/10/09 5:47am)
The Friends of the Art Bookshop is a bookstore serving IU's arts community with its selection of books rarely seen elsewhere in Bloomington.