THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN- MADISON AND THE UW FOUNDATION SUMMER 2007 University in Washington, D.C., where he taught for Front Page News nearly 53 years. Sunny day, bright future greets grads Alan G. MacDiarmid (‘52 MS L&S, ‘53 PhD inorganic chemistry) received the Nobel Prize for chemistry in If the weekend of May 18-20 was a harbinger of things 2000 for his discovery that enables lightweight, flex- to come for the approximately 5,000 undergraduate ible material to conduct electricity. Applications of his and graduate students of the University of Wisconsin- discovery include anti-static film and computer screen Madison, their futures are bright. Among the students shields that guard against electromagnetic radiation. celebrating spring commencement were 12 members MacDiarmid, who died in February 2007, was the of the first class of the Pre-College Enrichment Blanchard Professor of Chemistry at the University of Opportunity for Learning Excellence, or PEOPLE Pennsylvania-Philadelphia. He is only the second Program. recipient of a posthumous honorary degree. The PEOPLE Program gives minority students a jumpstart on college by allowing them to take college- Legislators reject Union redo level classes throughout high school and to move to The state Legislature nixed plans for a major reno- campus to begin summer school. They also provide vation of Memorial Union and the replacement of minority students with a critical support network. Union South in May when the budget committee re- In his commencement message Chancellor John Wiley jected the proposed bond funding for the projects in reminded graduates that while their tuition paid for the 2007-09 state budget. what they learned in classrooms, “your time here has In October, UW-Madison students voted to increase allowed you to grow and learn new ways to apply student fees to pay for the projects, but construction that knowledge to make this a better and more can’t begin unless the state issues $126.2 million in vigorous society.” bonds. Students, not state money, would pay for the Broadway, film and TV actor Andre De Shields (‘70 buildings. Construction was scheduled for 2009. There BA L&S) punctuated his remarks with song lyrics is hope that the bonds could be issued at a later date. ranging from the Rolling Stones to a traditional Negro The Joint Finance Committee also cut $67.2 million in spiritual. He charged graduates “to keep close to your bonding for projects at the Lakeshore dorms. hearts the idea that an essential event is about to happen. We are on the cusp of a great awakening, a Governor Jim Doyle’s budget proposal called for tremendous transformation of consciousness, the light about $540 million in new bonding for academic of which shall be so exquisite as to be almost buildings at the UW-Madison, UW-La Crosse, UW- unbearable... You are the bearers of that light.” Oshkosh, UW-Parkside and UW-Superior; renovations at student unions at UW-Madison and Honorary degrees were awarded to two outstanding UW-Eau Claire; and suite-style dorms at UW- scientists. Leslie H. Hicks (‘52 MA L&S, ‘54 PhD L&S) Madison, UW-Parkside, UW-River Falls, UW-Stevens was one of the first African-Americans to earn a PhD Point and UW-Whitewater. The committe approved in behavioral neuroscience. He founded the first the academic buildings on a 16-0 vote. doctoral program in clinical psychology at Howard Page 2 Digest University lands major bioenergy award UW honors Sterling Hall victim “In the last 100 years, we’ve gone through a signi- Thirty-seven years after UW-Madison researcher ficant fraction of the oil it took hundreds of millions of Robert Fassnacht died in the Sterling Hall bombing, years to create,” said Tim Donahue, professor, the Physics Department honored him with a plaque in department of bacteriology, College of Letters and the courtyard between Sterling and Chamberlin Halls, Science, “so we have to come up with some new near the site of the bombing. strategies.” On the night of August 23-24, 1970, the bombers With the UW-Madison leading, a consortium of targeted the building’s Army Math Research Center, universities, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), where research for the military was being conducted. national laboratories and businesses will explore the Chancellor John Wiley, who knew Fassnacht from his vast potential of bioenergy with funding from a $125 days as a graduate student, expressed embarrasment million, five-year grant. The award establishes the that it took so long to honor the 33-year-old graduate DOE Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center student and father of three. He added that there are (GLBRC), where scientists and engineers will conduct lessons in this violent episode and the plaque will basic research toward a suite of new technologies to help us remember them. help convert cellulosic plant biomass, such as cornstalks, wood chips and perennial native grasses, The bombing was the culmination of a time of anti- to sources of energy for everything from cars to Vietnam War protest that often turned the campus electrical power plants. into the scenes of tear-gas filled riots. The blast at 3:42 a.m. was so powerful that pieces of the stolen The new grant, the largest federal grant in UW- van containing the ammonium nitrate bomb landed Madison history, is part of a larger Wisconsin Bio- on an eight-story building three blocks away. Twenty- energy Initiative, a statewide effort focused on the six buildings in the area sustained damage. development of fuel and energy resources from non- food sources in ways that promote regional economic growth and responsibly steward the enviroment. The Helping parents stay connected new center and the larger Wisconsin Bioenergy Initia- The new UW-Madison Parent Program, which debuts tive will put the state and its partners in the vanguard this summer, will take more active steps to keep of bioenergy research nationally and internationally. parents informed about their offspring’s key mile- The Great Lakes region and the Midwest represent the stones, provide bulletins on urgent campus messages third largest economy in the world (after the United and be a central point of contact for parent services. States as a whole and Japan). They have a rich The program is based on a 2005 survey of UW- scientific and technological legacy, a productive cor- Madison parents that indicated more support was porate structure and one of the world’s great concen- needed. Parental interest is increasing largely due to trations of biomass in their agricultural and northern their bigger financial stake in a successful college forest lands. experience. According to program director Nancy Cellulose makes up the walls of plant cells and is the Sandhu, assistant director of Visitor and Information main constituent of plant tissues and fibers. It is Programs, parents had a good experience with the typically used to make paper and textiles, but vast admissions and campus visits process and summer quantities of material containing now unusable orientation, but “felt like they dropped off the map cellulose, ranging from cornfield stubble to paper after the freshman year started.” pulp waste, are readily available. Some new communications initiatives include a Parent Program Web site (www.parent.wisc.edu), a monthly newsletter, Parent Notices and a Parent Hotline and e-mail service. Digest Page 3 Tuition reciprocity agreement reached research in stem cell biology and regenerative medicine. Regenerative medicine is an emerging The 40-year tuition reciprocity agreement between multidisciplinary field that seeks to develop Minnesota and Wisconsin will remain intact. This technologies to repair or replace diseased or defective means that Wisconsin residents wishing to attend a tissues and organs. public college in Minnesota can still pay the lower Wisconsin in-state tuition fee. Minnesota students will Kamp and Svendsen estimate that as many as 50 UW- pay a slightly higher in-state tuition to attend Madison faculty are engaged to varying degrees in Wisconsin public colleges. stem cell research and regenerative medicine. The new center will serve as a focal point for research by Minnesota threatened to pull out of the agreement helping to develop core facilities, a seed grant this year because the tuition differential that program, funding for post-doctoral fellows and Wisconsin pays Minnesota annually was put in educational and outreach programs. The new center Minnesota’s general fund rather than being also will help attract the best faculty and students to distributed to the state’s schools. The money will now Wisconsin. go into Minnesota’s University fund. The center currently is a virtual one with no building but with administrative and support capacity to Health & Biotech News effectively serve key areas of research and education. New Stem Cell and Regenerative A honey of a healer Medicine Center opens When one of her diabetic patients developed an open To further strengthen and sustain its leadership in the sore that refused to heal, Dr. Jennifer Eddy, assistant companion fields of stem cell research and professor, family medicine, UW Health Eau Claire regenerative medicine, the UW-Madison established a Family Medicine Clinic, suggested that she try a new Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine Center dollop of honey. Within months, the sore had healed. (SCRMC) this spring. Eddy has successfully used honey therapy before. The announcement of the new center was timed to Now with funding provided by the Wisconsin coincide with a public lecture by famed devel- Partnership Fund for Health and the American opmental biologist Ian Wilmut, creator of Dolly, the Academy of Family Physicians Foundation, Eddy is cloned sheep. The lecture set the stage for a critical conducting the first randomized, double-blind central entity under which the UW-Madison campus controlled trial of honey for diabetic ulcers.