News Releases
January 2005
Index to all monthsFor the full text of any story, click on the headline. Electronic queries may be made to cunews@cornell.edu.
Model finds missing carbon dioxide in tree root systems
The root systems of trees are known to be major storage banks for carbon dioxide (CO2), a major greenhouse gas implicated in global warming. Figuring out exactly how much of the carbon is held by these roots has been complicated by the difficulty of predicting the mass of the underground root systems. But now Cornell University professor of plant biology Karl Niklas and a colleague have proposed a mathematical sealing model that is able to predict very accurately size-dependent relationships for small- and intermediate-size plants, from the very smallest herbaceous plants to the world's tallest trees. In doing so, the model can determine the mass of root systems. (January 31, 2005)
'Doc' Roberts, Cornell's legendary polo coach, dies at 89
Stephen J. "Doc" Roberts, who as an undergraduate, led Cornell University's polo team to its first national championship and then, as a veterinarian, coached the university's polo team to eight national championships, died in Bath, N.Y., Jan. 21, 2005, of heart failure. He was 89. Roberts coached the Cornell polo team between 1947 and 1972, and his teams participated in 14 national championships, winning eight in 25 years. (The winning years: 1955, '56, '59, '61, '62, '63 and '66.) He was the captain of the team when he was an undergraduate. (January 27, 2005)
Peking University dance troupe to perform at Cornell Feb. 2
As part of its American debut tour, the Peking University Performing Arts Troupe will present a free performance at Cornell University, Wednesday, Feb. 2, at 7:30 p.m. in the Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts' Kiplinger Theatre. General admission will be on a first-come, first-served basis. The troupe, led by Xu Zhihong, president of Peking University, is in the midst of an 11-day tour, with stops at five universities, including Cornell, Columbia and Yale. (January 27, 2005)
Cornell Hillel Establishes the Tanner Prize, Recognizing Service to Jewish Life and to Cornell University
ITHACA, N.Y -- Cornell Hillel's Board of Trustees has announced the creation of the Tanner Prize to be awarded annually to a person, couple or family who has made significant contributions to both Jewish life anywhere in the world and to Cornell University, including, but not necessarily limited to, service to Cornell Hillel. "As Cornell Hillel is the intersection of all things Jewish and all things Cornell, it is fitting for a prize acknowledging service to both to come from the organization," said Seth M. Siegel, chair of the Cornell Hillel board, who holds both an undergraduate degree and a law degree from Cornell. "That so generous, so tireless and so visionary a leader as Harold Tanner has allowed us to name the prize for him sets a high standard for all recipients of the Tanner Prize." (January 26, 2005)
Critical step in flu virus infection
Two Cornell University researchers have found a pathway that is critical for the flu virus to enter and infect a cell. The discovery could lead to the development of antiviral medications and vaccines that would target all influenza viruses. The newly discovered pathway occurs after the virus attaches to a cell. The next stage of infection, the Cornell researchers say, involves an unknown co-receptor that allows the virus to infect the cell. (January 26, 2005)
Foods and health symposium May 22-24
Cornell University's Institute of Food Science will host a symposium, "Functional Foods, Bioactive Compounds and Human Health," May 22 to 24, on the Ithaca campus. The meeting will review the latest scientific information on how certain foods appear to have health benefits beyond basic nutrition. Intended for scientists, nutritionists, health practitioners and members of the media who cover health and nutrition, the conference will focus: the implications of dietary patterns and bioactive compounds, such as natural antioxidants, on chronic disease; whole-grain foods and body weight; the beneficial effects of berries on brain aging; vegetables and prostate cancer risk; the beneficial heart effects of grapes; the health benefits of various kinds of fatty acids; the biofortification of foods; and the evolution of dietary guidelines. (January 25, 2005)
Cornell offers distance-learning courses on grafting and organic gardening
Two Cornell University Web-based, distance-education courses in horticulture -- on organic gardening and on grafting -- will be offered in coming months. The registration deadline is tomorrow, Jan. 25, for the eight-week organic gardening course, which runs from Feb. 1 to March 31 and costs $200. The course is for gardeners who have at least some gardening experience. It will cover fertility, pest control, cultural methods, tools, and include a variety of suggested hands-on activities. The course uses organic-gardening principles to explore vegetables, flowers, lawn care and perennial plants. (January 24, 2005)
Web site supplies GIS data on Sri Lanka tsunami damage
Kinniya Hospital on the east coast of Sri Lanka was destroyed by the Dec. 26 tsunami, and its 40 patients and hospital staff are missing. It was just one of many buildings poorly prepared for actual disaster. In the weeks and months ahead, scientists and engineers will be studying damage sites all over the island to evaluate the power of the tidal wave and recommend new construction standards to help such buildings withstand the expected stresses. A new Web site at Cornell University is giving researchers the information they need as well as helping relief workers do their jobs on the devastated island. The creator of the site hopes it will serve as a model for the distribution of information in future disasters. (January 24, 2005)
Cornell plant breeder Steven Tanksley is winner of 2005 Kumho Science International Award
Steven D. Tanksley, the Liberty Hyde Bailey Professor of Plant Breeding and Genetics, is the winner of the prestigious 2005 Kumho Science International Award in Plant Molecular Biology and Biotechnology. The $30,000 prize is the world's largest in the field of plant molecular biology. The prize, awarded by the International Society for Plant Molecular Biology (ISPMB), is for Tanksley's pioneering work in genome mapping, comparative genomics and marker-assisted breeding of crop plants. It is funded by the Kumho Cultural Foundation of South Korea. The award citation recognizes Tanksley's "series of key discoveries with implications for understanding of genomes and crop plant improvement…. Tanksley's work is also a foundation for many other discoveries and developments in plant molecular biology and crop plant breeding. In addition, his findings have the potential to address the problems of crop production in both the developed and the developing world." (January 24, 2005)
Cornell trustees approve plan for 4.3 percent endowed tuition increase
At its meetings in New York City Friday, Jan. 21, and Saturday, Jan. 22, the Cornell University Board of Trustees approved a set of planning parameters for the 2005-06 budget that calls for a 4.3 percent tuition increase for most students in the endowed colleges. The 4.3 percent increase sets tuition for Cornell's endowed undergraduate and Graduate School students at $31,300 for the 2005-06 academic year. Currently, the tuition is $30,000. The approved planning parameters also call for essentially the same dollar increase for New York state residents enrolled in Cornell's contract colleges: an increase of $1,330, to $17,200, for academic year 2005-06. Undergraduate tuition for nonresident students enrolled in the contract colleges is planned for 2005-06 at $30,200 for entering and second-year students, and at $29,000 for third- and fourth-year students. Consultation with the State University of New York (SUNY) trustees will take place before these tuitions are finalized. (January 24, 2005)
Cornell Migrant Program opens search for new director
Blind engineering student 'reads' color as sound
Asian tsunami as an opportunity to teach about science
Cornell applauds Northwest Airlines proposal for Ithaca airport service
Board of Trustees to meet in New York City, Jan. 21-22
Susan Henry launches Asia tour by signing Memorandum of Understanding with Dharwad, India
Making plastics from oranges
Public and media invited to watch Saturn probe's descent onto Titan on NASA-TV at Space Sciences Building Jan. 14
Graphic video simulation of Indian Ocean tsunami
Mathematician William Thurston wins AMS Book Prize
Cornell President Jeffrey Lehman to give keynote address at annual GIAC Martin L. King Jr. Day Celebration, Jan. 17
Gene sequencing explains bioremediation 'bug'
Scientific delegation into Sri Lanka's wave-ravaged areas
The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS) at Cornell University has opened a search for a new director of the Cornell Migrant Program (CMP) and is welcoming e-mailed nominations or inquiries at
A melody of staccato piano notes sings out from the speakers of Victor K. Wong's desktop computer. But it is not a melody made by Bach, or Liberace, or even Alicia Keys. It is the melody of color. Wong, a Cornell University graduate student from Hong Kong who lost his sight in a road accident at age seven, is helping to develop innovative software that translates color into sound. "Color is something that does not exist in the world of a blind person," explains Wong. "I could see before, so I know what it is. But there is no way that I can think of to give an exact idea of color to someone who has never seen before." (January 21, 2005)
If there ever were a teachable moment when it comes to tsunamis, physics and fault lines, that moment is now. And Cornell University graduate student Evan Variano is making sure it's not lost. In the wake of the devastating Asian tsunami, he's taking a lesson plan he has developed -- and a portable teaching device -- to high schools in the Ithaca and Rochester areas during January to answer students' questions about the physics of tsunamis, the technology required to detect the killer waves, and the economics and sociology of developing early warning systems. (January 18, 2005)
Cornell University Vice President Tommy Bruce has issued the following statement on the proposal by Northwest Airlines to bring new air service to Ithaca Tompkins Regional Airport: "Cornell University welcomes this opportunity to bring another air carrier to Tompkins County, expanding travel options for the region. We see the proposed deal as a boon to the entire community. More transportation options will beget more transportation options. Cornell will do its part in helping make sure this initiative is a success." (January 18, 2005)
The Cornell University Board of Trustees will hold its first meetings of 2005 at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University in New York City, Jan. 21 and 22. The full board will meet from 9 to 11:45 a.m. and from 1:45 to 3:30 p.m. Friday, Jan. 21. The first 15 minutes of the afternoon session will be open to the public. The rest of the meetings and a meeting Saturday, Jan. 22, from 9 to 11:45 a.m., will be closed. The meetings will be in the Joan and Sanford I. Weill Education Center, 1300 York Ave. Among topics of discussion will be a report from President Jeffrey Lehman and reports from the chairs of the standing committees of the board. (January 18, 2005)
DHARWAD, INDIA -- Susan A. Henry, the Ronald P. Lynch Dean of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS) at Cornell University, launched a monthlong trip in Asia by signing a memorandum of understanding with Dr. S.A. Patil, vice chancellor of the University of Agricultural Sciences in Dharwad, India, on Jan. 11. It is the third such agreement that CALS has established with universities in southern and western India. "India is a great crucible of change in the modern world," said Henry. "The agreement we are signing will facilitate the exchange of students, faculty, and technology, and the joint development of new answers to serious challenges in the realms of food security, nutrition, and environmental protection." During her trip, Henry will travel to India, Bangladesh, China, Hong Kong and the Philippines. She will explore future collaborations and partnerships with universities throughout Asia, talk with alumni as well as current and prospective students, and celebrate the college's 80 years of accomplishment in the region with former and current partners in Asia with whom the college has had longstanding relationships. She will further communicate Cornell President Jeffrey Lehman's vision of Cornell as a "transnational" university. Lehman visited Asia last July and again in November. (January 17, 2005)
A Cornell University research group has made a sweet and environmentally beneficial discovery -- how to make plastics from citrus fruits, such as oranges, and carbon dioxide. In a paper published in a recent issue of the Journal of the American Chemical Society (Sept. 2004), Geoffrey Coates, a Cornell professor of chemistry and chemical biology, and his graduate students Chris Byrne and Scott Allen describe a way to make polymers using limonene oxide and carbon dioxide, with the help of a novel "helper molecule" -- a catalyst developed in the researchers' laboratory. (January 17, 2005)
Cornell University's Department of Astronomy is inviting the general public and the media to witness, on NASA-TV, the historic first landing of the Huygens probe on the surface of Saturn's largest moon, Titan, at an open house tomorrow, Friday, Jan. 14. The open house, in the third-floor Spacecraft Planetary Imaging Facility (SPIF) of the Space Sciences Building, will be from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Visitors will be able to view the reports and images of the scientific data returned by the robot vessel from the Saturnian moon as presented on NASA-TV. The first pictures from Titan are expected to arrive between 5 and 6 p.m. (January 13, 2005)
Cornell University researchers have created a video simulation of the deadly Dec. 26 Indian Ocean tsunami that shows in graphic detail how the massive wave system spread outward from the epicenter of an undersea earthquake northwest of Sumatra, Indonesia. The simulation makes it clear how the tsunami struck the coastlines of Indonesia, Thailand, Sri Lanka and India with such devastating force, then continued as far as East Africa. (January 12, 2005)
William P. Thurston, professor of mathematics at Cornell University and a world-renowned mathematician in the area of topology, has won the 2005 American Mathematical Society (AMS) Book Prize. The award, which is given every three years, recognizes "an outstanding research book that makes a seminal contribution to the research literature, reflects the highest standards of research exposition, and promises to have a deep and long-term impact in its area." The prize was awarded Jan. 6 in Atlanta, Ga. The prize honors Thurston's book Three-dimensional Geometry and Topology, edited by Silvio Levy. The book describes Thurston's "geometrization program," a major event in modern mathematics that has the celebrated Poincaré Conjecture as a corollary. (January 12, 2005)
The annual Greater Ithaca Activities Center (GIAC) community program to celebrate the life of Martin Luther King Jr. will be Monday, Jan. 17, from 11:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The program is free and open to the public. The 11th annual event will include a buffet luncheon, performances by local choirs and a keynote speech by Cornell President Jeffrey Lehman. (January 10, 2005)
"The born-to-dechlorinate bug" is what Cornell University researchers called Dehalococcoides ethenogenes Strain 195 when they found the bacterium obligingly detoxifying the pollutant PCE, or perchloroethylene (a chlorinated solvent used for dry cleaning), in sludge from an Ithaca, N.Y., sewage treatment plant. Their discovery led to two questions: Might cultures of the naturally occurring microorganism serve as bioremediation agents to clean up sites where solvents such as PCE and TCE (trichloroethylene) -- used to clean metal parts -- had been dumped or spilled? And what on earth had the bug been eating before synthetic chlorinated compounds were invented some 50 years ago? Sequencing of the Strain 195 genome at the Institute for Genomic Research (TIGR), Rockville, Md., which is reported in the latest issue of the journal Science (Jan. 7, 2005), helps resolve the second question. An up-and-coming bioremediation industry, based on Strain 195, answers the first. (January 3, 2005)
Philip Liu, Cornell University professor of civil and environmental engineering, will lead a delegation of American scientists from the National Science Foundation's Tsunami Research Group and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) into the tsunami-ravaged areas of Sri Lanka, Jan. 9-16. The scientists will examine inundation areas, estimate wave heights, determine the precise arrival time of the tsunami, scour the area for geological evidence and sediment deposits and examine structural damage. "The goal here is to obtain information to further our understanding of these waves, with the hope of improving predictive capabilities and help future development of tsunami warning systems," Liu wrote in a letter to Gen. Asoka Jayawardhama of Sri Lanka's defense ministry. (January 04, 2005)