Cornell University News Service Releases

June, 2000

Index to all months

For the full text of any story, click on the filename at the end of the description. These stories are also available via anonymous FTP at cunews.cornell.edu. Electronic queries may be made to cunews@cornell.edu.

Food chain length depends on size of pond
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Surveying aquatic life from the Great Lakes to small ponds, ecologists at Cornell University and the Institute of Ecosystem Studies (IES) have found that food-chain length -- the number of mouths food passes through on the way to the top predators -- is determined by the size of an ecosystem, not by the amount of available food energy. The finding, which is reported in the June 29 issue of the journal Nature, should help resolve one of the oldest questions in ecological science: How long are food chains and what determines their length? food_chain.hrs.html (June 27, 2000)

Cornell Beef Field Day scheduled for July 22
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Beef Field Day will be held Saturday, July 22, on the Cornell University campus at Morrison Hall from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. This event is sponsored by the Cornell Department of Animal Science and the New York Beef Producers Association. Beef producers will attend workshops on improving business efficiency through beef production web sites and computer software. Producers also will increase their knowledge of beef cattle nutrition and improve their ability to appraise meat quality and food safety. There also will be a tour of the Cornell College of Veterinary Medicine. BeefFieldDay.bpf.html (June 28, 2000)

Drug tests reduce workplace injuries
ITHACA, N.Y. -- From international corporations to small local contractors, construction companies that test for drugs appear to be successfully reducing workplace injuries, according to a new Cornell University study. "While drug testing is controversial, the study provides useful data on a readily measurable outcome," says its author, Jonathan Gerber, a May 2000 graduate of Cornell's School of Industrial and Labor Relations. The study was part of his three-year independent research project. ILR Professor of Labor Economics Robert S. Smith served as adviser to the study, which has caught public attention and is pending publication in a national journal. In the past 15 years, drug testing in the U.S. workplace has gone from ground zero to widespread employer acceptance. In 1983, less than 1 percent of employees were subject to drug testing. Today, about 49 percent of full-time workers are subject to some form of workplace drug testing, according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Drug.testing.html (June 28, 2000)

$160 million New York collaboration in biology
NEW YORK, June 27 -- Three of New York's leading research institutions announced the creation of a $160 million collaborative program in basic biological research sparked by a private donor who will contribute half the total investment. The collaboration among Cornell University, its Weill Medical College, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, and The Rockefeller University will include the joint recruitment of a dozen new faculty members, reflecting the level of investment demanded by the technological demands of science today. tri.collab.lgk.html (June 27, 2000)

GENEVA, N.Y. -- Entomologists at Cornell's New York State Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, NY, have teamed up with Singer Farms in Niagara County to develop more effective methods of controlling pests that damage organically grown apples. Singer Farms is the only commercial orchard in the Northeast growing organic apples. http://www.nysaes.cornell.edu/pubs/press/current/organicent.html (June 27, 2000)

Plan for tobacco farmers: grow grapes
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Cornell graduate students Andrew Harwood and Michael Lukianoff hope to create a wine growers' cooperative and winery in Virginia that will help farmers in depressed rural communities there replace their tobacco crops with biodynamically grown grapes. The plan propelled Harwood and Lukianoff to among the top eight of the 66 teams that competed for best proposal for a socially conscious business at the University of California, Berkeley's Haas School of Business this year and notice in the national business press. Harwood.winery.plan.html (June 27, 2000)

Sun Microsystems announces Cornell University Library a 'Sun Center of Excellence for Digital Libraries'
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Sun Microsystems Inc. and Cornell University have announced plans to construct the technology platform that will pioneer the next generation model for digital libraries. In addition, as one of the leading adopters of digital library technology, Sun Microsystems named Cornell the Sun Center of Excellence for Digital Libraries. Cornell University Library will serve as an international model for the digital library environment of the 21st century. Partnered with Endeavor Information Systems, the top-selling library automation vendor, Sun Microsystems technology is the incubator for the first full-featured digital library solution, dubbed ENCompass. Just introduced to market, ENCompass now makes it possible for libraries to digitize their vast collections through the use of a standard commercial package, thereby lowering costs to libraries. The Sun-Endeavor-Cornell alliance provides the critical next step in realizing the new standard for digitizing library collections. sun.library.rel.html (June 27, 2000)

Area studies to receive $3.5 million from Dept. of Education
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Cornell University's four national resource centers in Asian and Latin American studies received substantial three-year grants from the U.S. Department of Education totaling nearly $3.5 million. For the coming academic year, Cornell's area studies programs for East Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia and Latin America will receive $575,415 in federal funds to serve as National Resource Centers (NRCs). An additional Department of Education grant of $546,000 will support 34 fellowships for graduate students in Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) programs in East, South and Southeast Asian, Latin American and European studies for the coming year. Intrntl.studies.grants.html (June 23, 2000)

Guide aids in digitizing library resources
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Going digital is easier said than done. Especially for librarians, archivists and museum staff in charge of converting large, complex collections into digitized images that can be accessed online around the globe. To expedite the process, Cornell University preservation librarians Anne R. Kenney and Oya Y. Rieger have created a self-help reference guide called Moving Theory Into Practice (The Research Libraries Group, 189 pages). Moving Theory Into Practice is a timely and valuable reference for librarians, archivists, curators, funders, managers, system analysts, programmers, administrators, faculty and other scholars. It covers all aspects of digital conversion, from decision-making to sound practices to turning projects into sustainable digital programs. Contributions from more than 50 experts inform the text, and Kenney and Rieger provide important guidance highlighting major issues, pertinent research trends and relevant emerging technologies and techniques. lib.newbook.rel.html (June 23, 2000)

Cornell offers fiduciary income tax workshop in East Syracuse, Batavia and Binghamton in August
ITHACA, N.Y. -- An inservice tax workshop to review fiduciary income tax reporting and management will be held in East Syracuse, Batavia and Binghamton in mid-August. It is offered by Cornell University's Department of Agricultural, Resource and Managerial Economics. This workshop is ideal for accountants, tax practitioners, consultants, attorneys and financial advisers. The topics include the mechanics of fiduciary law and accounting, an introduction to fiduciary taxation, income distribution deduction, the taxation of beneficiaries and the alternative minimum tax. TaxSkool.bpf.html (June 23, 2000)

Cornell Fruit Field Day and equipment show at Geneva on August 17
GENEVA, N.Y. -- Cornell University will host the Fruit Field Day and Equipment Show 2000 on August 17 at the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station, in Geneva, NY, from 8 am- 4:30 pm. Fruit growers, consultants, and industry personnel are invited to tour field plots and learn about the latest research and extension efforts in fruit production being carried out by researchers from Geneva and Ithaca. The focus will be on all commodities key to New York’s 300 million fruit industry: apples, grapes, raspberries, strawberries, peaches, pears, cherries and nectarines. http://www.nysaes.cornell.edu/pubs/press/current/fielddaypromo.html (June 21, 2000)

Environment regs don't drive up home prices
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Contrary to popular belief, buyers of new homes should know that the costs of supporting environmental protection don't boost the prices of new houses, a Cornell University housing expert concludes. The average cost of a new home in the United States shot up 32 percent in the past decade, and some people blame much of this increase on environmental regulations. But a new Cornell study finds no empirical evidence to support these claims. environmental.housing.ssl.html (June 21, 2000)

New Department of Horticulture at Cornell is grafted from progeny to produce original shoot
ITHACA, N.Y. -- It's back to the future. Two departments of Cornell University's New York State College of Agriculture and Life Sciences -- Floriculture and Ornamental Horticulture, and Fruit and Vegetable Science -- will merge July 1 to become the Department of Horticulture. The name was retired in 1913 when horticulture was split into three departments. HortDept.bpf.html (June 21, 2000)

Potentially hazardous asteroids mapped
ITHACA, N.Y. -- A new study portrays the paths of asteroids in the inner solar system as a vast Los Angeles-style traffic system crisscrossed with superhighways along which are hurtling huge, rocky projectiles. And in the middle of the highway network, on a possible collision path, is the planet Earth. The study estimates that an armada of asteroids, 900 strong, all a kilometer in diameter or larger, present a potential hazard to life on Earth. Some pass within a few moon distances of Earth every year. "Sometime in the future, one of these objects could conceivably run into the Earth," warns astronomy researcher William Bottke at Cornell University. "One kilometer (about .6 of a mile) in size is thought to be a magic number, because it has been estimated that these asteroids are capable of wreaking global devastation if they hit the Earth." Asteroid.hazards.deb.html (June 19, 2000)

Apple phytochemicals fight cancer
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Time to adjust an old adage: It's the phytochemicals in the apple each day that keep the doctor away. A combination of plant chemicals, such as flavanoids and polyphenols -- collectively known as phytochemicals -- found both within the flesh of apple and particularly in the skin -- provide the fruit's anti-oxidant and anti-cancer benefits, say Cornell food scientists. AntiCancerApple.bpf.html (June 16, 2000)

The Cornell Tradition receives a Daily Point of Light Award
ITHACA, N.Y. -- The Cornell Tradition was named the "Daily Point of Light" for May 29, by action of the Corporation for National Service, the Points of Light Foundation and the Knights of Columbus, which sponsor the awards. Given each weekday, a Daily Point of Light Award honors an individual or organization that makes a positive difference in the lives of others. Originated during the administration of President George Bush, the program was reinstated Jan. 1, 1998, by the joint actions of President Bill Clinton and former President Bush. Cornell.Trad.Points.html (June 16, 2000)

Park fellows open the doors to college for urban teens
ITHACA, N.Y. -- A new program developed by three Cornell University students promises to help more of Ithaca's urban teens get into college. It's among the 16 Leadership Service Projects developed by Park Fellows at Cornell's Johnson Graduate School of Management, along with a venture capital fund for socially responsible local businesses and first-aid training to help police dogs injured in the line of duty. College.Connex.html (June 14, 2000)

Board of Trustees Executive Committee meets in New York City June 22
ITHACA, N.Y. -- The Cornell University Board of Trustees Executive Committee will meet in New York City Thursday, June 22. The meeting will be held in the Fall Creek Room of the Cornell Club of New York, E. 44th St. exec.comm.June00.html (June 14, 2000)

Hyperactive Cdc42 causes malignant growth
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Cancer researchers at Cornell University have learned how some proteins receive the marching orders that dispatch them to initiate signaling pathways and produce malignant cell transformation. The discovery offers new potential targets for anti-cancer drugs to block tumor growth. Reporting in the June 15 issue of Nature (Vol. 405, No. 6788, pp. 800-804), a team led by Richard A. Cerione, professor of molecular medicine and chemical biology, describes what happens when normal protein traffic in cells runs wild: A hyperactive form of the molecular switch called Cdc42 increases the shuttling of other proteins throughout the cell, disrupting the orderly process of cell growth. traffic_protein.hrs.html (June 14, 2000)

Less-coercive policies boost child support
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Although child-support policies can help enforce child-support payments and increase the level of awards, their effects are very different, depending on whether the children are born to unwed parents or to divorced or separated couples. A new Cornell University/University of Colorado study finds that for unwed mothers, state child-support guidelines increase the probability of the mothers receiving child-support awards, often increasing the size of the awards. But for divorced or separated women with children, the guidelines appear to have little effect in boosting awards. childsupport.ssl.html (June 13, 2000)

Cornell-led Listeria Outbreak Working Group wins USDA award
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The Listeria Outbreak Working Group, a collaboration of scientists and public health professionals organized by Cornell University, has won the prestigious U.S. Department of Agriculture Honor Award, one of the highest awards bestowed by the agency. The listeria group, led by Martin Wiedmann, Cornell assistant professor of food science, was singled out for its effort in 1998 and 1999 to discover a food-borne listeria outbreak in many states. The award was made in the category of "Ensuring food for the hungry and a safe, affordable, nutritious food supply." USDA.Listeria.bpf.html (June 13, 2000)

Campus projects will affect traffic
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Cornell University's Facilities Management reports that a number of projects during the coming months will affect vehicular and pedestrian traffic on campus. -- Beginning June 12, the Dwyer Dam Bridge on Hoy Road, near the Route 366 intersection, will be closed to all vehicular traffic for scheduled repairs. The bridge will reopen to one-lane, "local-traffic only" July 3, with both lanes reopening Aug. 4. Pedestrian traffic on the bridge will be allowed throughout the project. Campus.roadwork.final.html (June 8, 2000)

TCAT expands service beginning June 12
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Beginning Monday, June 12, Tompkins Consolidated Area Transit (TCAT) buses will serve Aldi's Supermarket, the Ithaca Farmers' Market and the Park View Health Care Campus. Bus route 13 will provide service off of Third Street and Route 13 to Aldi's, Monday through Saturday from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m., and to the Ithaca Farmer's Market on Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. TCAT.route.changes.html (June 8, 2000)

How neutron stars get their kicks
ROCHESTER, N.Y. -- What is the origin of the kick that causes the furious acceleration of the newly born neutron star? In an attempt to answer this question, Dong Lai, an assistant professor of astronomy at Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., proposes two possible ways of firing up the kick. He calls them the "mass rocket" and the "neutrino rocket." Lai presented his theories today at the 196th meeting of American Astronomical Society at the Convention Center in Rochester, N.Y. His presentation was part of a symposium, "Supernovae Here and There." DongLai.astronomy.deb.html (June 7, 2000)

Viburnum leaf beetles invade New York state
ITHACA, N.Y. -- The larvae of the viburnum leaf beetle -- a ravenous pest that feasts on cultivated and native viburnum shrubs, reducing them to skeletal remains -- emerged during early May in western and central New York state, Cornell University entomologists say. And in late May the beetle was found for the first time in Owego, N.Y., just a few miles from the northern Pennsylvania border. ViburnumBeetle.bpf.html (June 7, 2000)

Cocaine use while pregnant may cause ADHD
ITHACA, N.Y. -- A connection between cocaine use during pregnancy and attention dysfunction in children is suggested in a study by researchers at Cornell University and the University of Kentucky. The study finds that rat fetuses exposed to cocaine levels comparable to daily recreational use in humans show lasting dysfunction specifically in the area of attention. Researcher Barbara J. Strupp, associate professor of psychology and of nutritional sciences at Cornell, says the findings can be applied to humans. cocaine.prenatal.ssl.html (June 5, 2000)

Cornell Reunion 2000 is June 8-11
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Former ambassador Paul Wolfowitz, currently dean of the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, will discuss "Back to the Future? Will This Century Be as Bloody as the Last?" Friday, June 9, at 9 a.m. in the Proscenium Theatre in the Center for Theatre Arts. He is a member of the Class of 1965, which is hosting the forum. Dean at Johns Hopkins since 1994, Wolfowitz previously was undersecretary of defense for policy - the principal civilian official responsible for strategy, plans and policy - under Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney. From 1986 to 1989, he served as U.S. ambassador to the Republic of Indonesia. He also has held various federal government positions in the state department and has held teaching positions Yale University and the National War College. Raised in Ithaca, where his father was a professor of mathematics at Cornell, Wolfowitz is a graduate of Ithaca High School. reunion.2000.advance.html (June 5, 2000)

Reunion weekend panel addresses hatred
ITHACA, N.Y. -- A panel of experts will lead a symposium titled "Community, Communication and the Responsibility of the Individual" Friday, June 9, from 4 to 5:15 p.m. in Goldwin Smith Hall D at Cornell University, during the university's annual alumni reunion weekend. The symposium is free and open to the public. A 13-year-old kills his teacher; teen-agers shoot at each other at the National Zoo, catching mothers with little children in the crossfire; a 34-year-old attorney from a wealthy Pittsburgh suburb goes on a rampage -- his victims include the elderly Jewish woman next door, three Asians working at a local restaurant and a black man at a karate school. These are just some of the more recent tragedies that have shaken the United States, compelling many to seek more and better means to effectively address the root causes of these eruptions of hatred and violence. Reunion.symposium.sm.html (June 5, 2000)

Book advises on parenting college students
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Your college freshman finally comes home for a break, dumps the laundry on the floor and disappears for most of the week. Your daughter is devastated: She was rushed but received no sorority bids. Your college junior wants more money in order to live in an apartment or for him to go on an expensive "educational" trip. Your son seems so stressed at college but won't say much any more. What's going on? What should you do? What shouldn't you do? The answers are in a new nuts-and-bolts parenting book for your child's college years -- so often fraught with concerns, conflicts and crises unique to this stage of life. The book, "Don't Tell Me What to Do, Just Send Money: The Essential Parenting Guide to the College Years," is written by adolescent and young adult development experts Helen E. Johnson and Christine Schelhas-Miller (St. Martin's Griffin, 2000). It offers strategies and advice for reshaping parental relationships with emerging adult children during the college years and coping with the major issues that parents of college students face. parenting.book.ssl.html (June 2, 2000)