Entries in "College of Arts and Sciences"
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January 26, 2007
Screen gems
The Plain Dealer, January 26, 2007
Seeing Billy Wilder's films on the big screen is a rare thrill, and you'll have a chance Monday night at 7 when the Cleveland Institute of Art Cinematheque presents a restored 35 mm print of Sunset Boulevard. As a bonus, movie historian and author Lou Giannetti will introduce the film and host a chat session afterwards. What keeps him jazzed about seeing a movie released 57 years ago? "It's still a great film. You look at it and realize how fresh it is," said Giannetti, a former professor of English and film at Case Western Reserve University and author of Understanding Movies. Read article.
January 24, 2007
Will gender matter? Hillary Clinton's run for the White House
WKYC-TV, Channel 3, January 23, 2007
Joseph White, professor of political science at Case Western Reserve University, was interviewed by reporter Jennifer Murphy on WKYC-TV 3 for a segment regarding New York Sen. Hillary Clinton's announcement of her bid for the presidency. View the video. Read the story.
January 09, 2007
Everson says it's sticking with Pollock
The Syracuse Post Standard, January 9, 2007
As controversy swirls over the authenticity of a group of paintings by dribble-and-drip master Jackson Pollock, the Everson Museum of Art is staying with its plan to exhibit the works this summer. Ellen Landau, a Pollock expert and professor at Case Western Reserve University, is among those who say the pieces should be considered originals. Read article.
Adult stem cells spur market rush, avoid embryo ban
Bloomberg News, January 9, 2007
Five-month-old Luis Fernando Rojo was near death in a Miami hospital, suffering with blisters and bloody diarrhea after his tiny body rejected part of a marrow transplant for a rare bone disorder. So U.S. regulators allowed Luis's doctors to try an unapproved therapy from Baltimore-based Osiris Therapeutics Inc. Osiris, which first sold shares to the public on August 4, was founded in 1992 using technology developed by Arnold Caplan, a stem cell researcher at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. Read article.
January 03, 2007
Our Top 20 stories from Earth to Pluto
Columbus Dispatch, January 2, 2007
Science produced headlines in 2006: The public and politicians, shocked by high gasoline prices, rediscovered alternative energy during the spring and summer. "We've been ignoring alternative energy for so long, bioethanol, and wind energy is becoming quietly competitive," said Tom Zawodzinski, a fuel cell researcher at Case Western Reserve University. Later in the article, Dan Akerib, a physicist and dark-matter researcher at Case, is quoted on the topic of dark matter, which is considered to be the glue of the universe. Read article.
Even as bookstores close, readers flock to writers
The Plain Dealer, December 31, 2006
Americans, especially young adults, are reading less. In the early 1990s, the United States boasted some 4,500 independent bookstores. There are only 1,800 today. In a more literary vein, Case Western Reserve University's Thrity Umrigar mined her Mumbai, India, childhood to write an evocative novel, "The Space Between Us," about an upper-class woman and her domestic servant. Read article.
December 20, 2006
Research knows no holiday
Columbus Dispatch, December 19, 2006
Many scientists who work at academic centers must squeeze their field research into a couple of months during the summer and several weeks between the end of fall classes and the beginning of winter classes. That often means working through Christmas and New Year's, and leaving loved ones behind for work. Ralph Harvey, a geologist at Case Western Reserve University, has spent 16 Christmases in Antarctica, scouring the continent for meteorites. Read article.
December 19, 2006
Lawmakers grapple with will of the people
Canton Repository, December 18, 2006
Last week, the hot-button topic at the Statehouse was not minimum wage or gun control. It was the people's will. Gov. Bob Taft issued the most significant veto of his tenure in an effort to protect local gun laws, and a university poll showed 56 percent of voters were on his side. Then the Legislature overrode his veto. Joseph White of Cleveland's Case Western Reserve University said voters should not be surprised, however, when lawmakers defy majority opinion—or even the majority opinion within their own party. Read article.
Pollock paintings not so easy to spot
San Francisco Chronicle, December 18, 2006
Finding a Jackson Pollock painting is the art world's equivalent of a winning lottery ticket. But proving a Pollock painting's authenticity isn't easy, which is why physicist Richard Taylor's theory that the famed artist's work can be identified using fractals has stirred such interest and controversy. "I firmly believe his analysis is seriously flawed," said Kate Jones-Smith, a third-year doctoral student in physics at Case Western Reserve University. Read article.
December 05, 2006
Theoreticians ponder why we exist: Scientists debate how anthropic reasoning predicts cosmological constant
MSNBC.com, December 4, 2006
The emergence of humans in the universe might not tell us anything concerning the fundamental constants of nature as scientists have speculated, new theoretical findings argue. The idea known as the anthropic principle states that human existence is possible only if fundamental constants such as the speed of light or the strength of gravity are not higher or lower than what is observed. However, theoretical physicist Glenn Starkman of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland and cosmologist Roberto Trotta at Oxford University in England take issue with how anthropic reasoning predicts the cosmological constant. Read article.
December 04, 2006
The case of Pollock's fractals focuses on physics
New York Times, December 2, 2006
In an article published this week in the prestigious science journal Nature, two physicists contend that a method intended to identify complex geometric patterns in the seemingly chaotic drip paintings of Jackson Pollock is flawed and may be useless in the increasingly convoluted world of authenticating Pollock's work. The article, written by a physics professor and a physics doctoral student at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, provides a new twist in the mystery surrounding a group of small drip paintings discovered several years ago in a storage locker in Wainscott, N.Y. In 2004, before the examination of the disputed paintings, a physics doctoral student at Case Western, Katherine Jones-Smith, became interested in Taylor's published reports about Pollock and fractals and made the research the subject of a presentation. Read article.
Just how precise is the balancing act that maintains life?
Wall Street Journal, December 1, 2006
If the laws of physics and the fundamental constants of nature were the slightest bit different, the world would not exist, at least in the form we see it. For years, many scientists viewed anthropic reasoning as "the last refuge of scoundrels," says cosmologist Lawrence Krauss of Case Western Reserve University. "It was what you resorted to when you couldn't think of other explanations. But science has always tried to explain why the universe is the way it is…" Read article. (subscription required)
November 30, 2006
Case researchers say artwork analysis flawed
The Plain Dealer, November 30, 2006
A Case Western Reserve University physics student and her colleague have added a new twist to a nasty feud about whether a group of recently discovered paintings is the work of renowned artist Jackson Pollock. The Case research, published today in the prestigious journal Nature, casts doubt on a method a fellow scientist had used to suggest that the paintings weren't real Pollocks. Read article.
November 28, 2006
Case student named Rhodes Scholar
Crain's Cleveland Business, November 27, 2006
A Case Western Reserve University student is one of 32 students selected in the United States to become a Rhodes Scholar in 2007. Shaan Gandhi, a fourth-year biochemistry and chemistry major from Battle Creek, Mich., will study at the University of Oxford to obtain his master of science in integrated immunology. Read article.
Natural evangelism
The Toronto Star, November 25, 2006
Somewhere along the way, a forum this month at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, Calif., which might have been one more polite dialogue between science and religion, began to resemble the founding convention for a political party built on a single plank: In a world dangerously charged with ideology, science needs to take on an evangelical role, vying with religion as teller of the greatest story ever told. Lawrence Krauss, a physicist at Case Western Reserve University known for his staunch opposition to teaching creationism, found himself in the unfamiliar role of playing the moderate. "I think we need to respect people's philosophical notions unless those notions are wrong," he said. Read article.
November 27, 2006
Case senior teaches other students about joys of living in Cleveland
The Plain Dealer, November 24, 2006
Jeffrey T. Verespej is much, much busier than you, but he still finds time for a nightlife. The 21-year-old senior at Case Western Reserve University is majoring in pre-law with minors in political science and German studies. The former football player still finds time to act as a campus tour guide and appear in plays. Read article.
November 21, 2006
Picking up the pieces
The Columbus Dispatch, November 21, 2006
When Ralph Harvey scans Antarctica's icy terrain, it becomes clear just how rough-and-tumble the solar system was four billion years ago. At a minimum, the inner solar system had a rough coming-of-age moment," said Harvey, a Case Western Reserve University geologist who spends a month or so in November and December with a team that combs icy Antarctic wastes for meteorites. Read article.
November 17, 2006
Try Thanksgiving takeout and let someone else cook
The Plain Dealer, November 15, 2006
How many will be at your house for Thanksgiving? Twenty? Thirty? That's a lot of turkey, not to mention all the fussy side dishes. With all the prep, that's a day or two in the kitchen to carve out of an already jammed schedule. Add to that, societal pressure for the chef, usually a woman, to produce the perfect meal. "It becomes a gendered performance," said Susan Hinze, a Case Western Reserve University sociology professor. Read article.
November 16, 2006
City schools failing in science
The Plain Dealer, November 16, 2006
Among 10 major American cities, Cleveland had the smallest percentage of fourth- and eighth-graders proficient in science, according to 2005 test data released today by the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Since 2002, the district has been in a partnership with Case Western Reserve University that provides intensive training for math and science teachers. Read article.
November 15, 2006
Think tank will promote thinking: advocates want science, not faith, at core of public policy
The Washington Post.com, November 15, 2006
A group of prominent scientists and advocates of strict church-state separation yesterday announced formation of a Washington think tank designed to promote "rationalism" as the basis of public policy. The small public policy office will lobby and sometimes litigate on behalf of science-based decision making and against religion in government affairs. Lawrence M. Krauss, an author and theoretical physicist at Case Western Reserve University, said the scientific community has done a "poor job" of explaining its logic and benefits to the public. Read article.
November 10, 2006
Gender was a crucial factor in women's election gains
The Plain Dealer, November 10, 2006
Column written by Karen Beckwith, Case Western Reserve University political science professor
The 2006 midterm elections have resulted in a record number of women being elected to the U.S. House and to the Senate. Because two-thirds of female congressional candidates were Democrats, women contributed mightily to the Democratic victory in the House. Women will constitute at least 16 percent of the 110th Congress, and the House of Representatives stands to select Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat of California, as the first female Speaker of the House in U.S. history. Gender was crucial in the 2006 midterm elections in Ohio, but not in ways that might have advanced specific women's policy issues, such as equal pay, women's rights or reproductive issues. Read article.
November 08, 2006
Sawyer easily defeats Fink
Akron Beacon Journal, November 8, 2006
Former Congressman and Akron Mayor Tom Sawyer handily defeated incumbent Deborah Owens Fink in the District 7 state school board race Tuesday. Sawyer was drafted to run by Help Ohio Public Education, formed by scientists critical of Fink's attempts to change the state science curriculum. The group's founders, Case Western Reserve University professors Patricia Princehouse and Lawrence Krauss, have contended that the changes were an effort to insert religion into the science curriculum. Read article.
November 07, 2006
The campaign that never happened
Amherst Times, November 5, 2006 (column)
Autumn arrived: the leaves began to fall and the political signs sprouted up in people's yards. For a week or so there was excitement about the "tight" Senate race—a virtual tie according to some polls taken in September—but then abruptly Sherrod Brown, the Democratic challenger, seemed to leap into the lead, ahead by double digits in late October. I have to admit, I was a bit puzzled. Was it Ohio's economy and the war in Iraq? It certainly has begun to seem that our election system is in trouble. A 230-page report commissioned by Cuyahoga County on its May 2 primary fiasco was made public in late October, and revealed widespread concerns about the reliability of the AccuVote electronic voting machines. Similarly, Vicki Lovegren, a mathematics lecturer at Case Western Reserve University who has become a local advocate for election integrity, said, "If you're a computer scientist, you're nervous," adding: "When you have electronic voting machines, it doesn't take a conspiracy of many people. One person can affect the outcome without anyone knowing." Read article.
November 06, 2006
'Star Trek' inspires Case speech therapy
The Plain Dealer, November 4, 2006
Think Wizard of Oz on board the Starship Enterprise. As an unseen force behind a curtain calls the shots, a virtual reality "holodeck" transports its users to a fast-food restaurant and beyond. The woman behind the curtain—and the concept—is Stacy Williams, an assistant professor of communication sciences at Case Western Reserve University. And the idea she has championed for almost a decade, inspired by the reality simulator of "Star Trek" fame, is about to go into use at the Cleveland Hearing and Speech Center. Read article.
November 03, 2006
Case acting program draws rave reviews
The Plain Dealer, November 3, 2006
This summer, six students from Case Western Reserve University's graduate acting program showcased their talent in New York City. All six were signed by major talent agencies. "It is unheard of for an entire class to get signed and especially by agencies of this quality," said Paul Fouquet, casting director at Elissa Myers Casting Agency in New York. Read article.