ITHACA, N.Y. -- Cornell University astronomers have been awarded a $2.1 million grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to develop and build an infrared camera called FORCAST, which will be among the main instruments aboard the space agency's newest airborne observatory. FORCAST, which stands for Faint Object infraRed CAmera for the SOFIA Telescope, will be designed to image the regions of the universe visible in the infrared. It will fly aboard an airborne observatory known as the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, or SOFIA. The first official flight of the special observatory is scheduled for July 2001. Forcast.bpf.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- After studying more than 9,500 images taken during the acclaimed Mars Pathfinder mission, scientists report in today's journal Science (Dec. 5) that surface photographs provide strong geological and geochemical evidence that fluid water was once present on the red planet. "We now have geological evidence from the Martian surface supporting theories based on previous pictures of Mars from orbit that water played an important part in Martian geological history," said James F. Bell, Cornell senior research associate in astronomy and a member of the Mars Pathfinder imaging team. MarsUpdate.bpf.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- If the planet's biota -- all the plants and animals and microorganisms -- sent a bill for their 1997 services, the total would be $2.9 trillion, according to an analysis by biologists at Cornell University. For the United States alone, the tab for economic and environmental benefits of biodiversity would be $319 billion, the biologists report in the December issue of the journal BioScience. (Vol. 47 pp. 747-757). biodiversity.hrs.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Managing a river to maintain minimum water flow or sustain a single "important species" is like teaching pet tricks to a wolf: The animal may perform, but it's not much of a wolf anymore. That is the conclusion of a six-university panel of river experts whose report, "The Natural Flow Regime: A Paradigm for River Conservation and Restoration," is published in the December 1997 issue of the journal BioScience (Vol. 47, pp. 769-784). Letting a river do its own thing -- come drought or high water -- is more complicated than anyone realized until recently, the panel agrees, but at least scientists now know why natural flow is important and how to help. natural_flow.hrs.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- With more than 3 million American children reported abused or neglected each year and three children dying from such maltreatment each day, researchers have been focusing on issues of prevention, protection and rehabilitation more than ever in recent years. To shed light on how and why families become abusive and what it takes to help such families care for their children or, failing that, to protect children from harm, Cornell University experts have authored a new book Understanding Abusive Families: An Ecological Approach to Theory and Practice. abusive.families.ssl.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Young lambs may not need inoculation against enterotoxemia type D -- otherwise known as "overeating disease" -- until past the age of 6 weeks, according to Cornell University animal scientists. Enterotoxemia type D often occurs when sheep and cattle are fed high-grain diets. The disease is of major economic concern in livestock production systems. lambshots.bpf.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Members of the U.S. military need to be tough and aggressive in defense of the country but not when it comes to spouses and children. With help from Cornell University, thousands of U.S. Army and Marine personnel, their family members, commanding officers and special family advocacy personnel are supported worldwide to enhance family stability, promote personal growth and responsibility and prevent family violence. "Soldiers and Marines and their families, especially the young families, are under enormous stress, coping with reductions in personnel levels, reassignments, frequent deployments and other unique stressors of military life. They need to be strong -- strong enough to avoid child abuse and family violence," said Marney Thomas, Ph.D., director of Military Prevention Projects for the Family Life Development Center (FLDC) at Cornell. "Our mission is to provide research-based materials, tools, trainings and other kinds of support to assist the Army and Marines with their proactive approach to violence prevention and to generally improve the quality of life for members of the armed services and their families." soldiers.abuse.ssl.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Got milk? Apparently, you do. A Cornell University study to be published in the forthcoming issue of the Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics (December 1997) indicates that heavy doses of milk advertising -- specifically those television commercials in which a poor dupe gets too little milk too late -- are influencing more American consumers into buying fluid milk and improving the financial bottom line of the country's dairy farmers. GotMilk.bpf.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- When it comes to fraternity drinking, following the leader can be a dangerous game, a new study released today (Dec. 15, 1997) shows. Leaders of fraternities, and to a lesser extent leaders of sororities, tend to be among the heaviest drinkers and the most out-of-control partiers, according to researchers at Cornell University and Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. Their national survey of 25,411 students at 61 institutions reveals that Greek leaders are helping to set norms of binge drinking and uncontrolled behavior. drinking.leaders.study.lgk.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- If your Pentium II or Pentium Pro computer runs noticeably faster than earlier models, you might want to send a thank-you note to Hwa C. Torng, Cornell University professor of electrical engineering. An ingenious bit of computer-chip architecture invented by Torng is one of the reasons for that increased speed. On Dec. 2 officials of Intel Corp., which makes the Pentium microprocessor chips, acknowledged Torng's contribution at a small ceremony in Ithaca. A plaque presented to Torng by John Miner, vice president and general manager of Intel's Enterprise Servers Group, and Justin Rattner, Intel Fellow and director of the company's Server Architecture Laboratory, recognized Torng "for his contributions to the state-of-the-art in high speed instruction decoding and execution." Torng.bs.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Last year's Christmas was anything but "white" in the Northeast. Green was the rule in most areas. "'White' Christmases are not a sure thing in the Northeast every year," said Keith Eggleston, senior climatologist at the Northeast Regional Climate Center at Cornell University, explaining that most of the region saw little or no snow on the ground for last year's holiday. The center has released this year's statistical probabilities chart for a white Christmas for major metropolitan areas and other selected cities in the Northeast. It is not a forecast. WhiteChristmas97.bpf.html

Ithaca, N.Y. -- Researchers at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle and the James A. Baker Institute for Animal Health at Cornell's College of Veterinary Medicine are reporting the development of a framework reference map of the canine genome. The article appears in today's issue of Genomics, published by the Academic Press. The ultimate goal of canine genome research is to find all the genes in the DNA sequence of dogs and make this information available to others to develop tools to better diagnose disease well before the appearance of symptoms. It is believed that dog genetics offers the hope of discovering the genetic basis of both development and behavior in a variety of mammalian species including human. dog_map.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- As winter finches move south across the Canada-U.S. border in what may be record numbers, ornithological scientists are getting their best-ever look at a massive bird 'irruption,' thanks to thousands of citizen scientists with one hand on the binoculars and the other on the computer keyboard. The scientists are monitoring BirdSource , the interactive World Wide Web database for bird information that is operated by the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society. The online database records bird sightings -- by casual backyard bird-watchers as well as serious bird enthusiasts -- and reveals where the birds are anywhere in North America. BirdSource.hrs.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Astronomers will release today (Dec. 17) the clearest Hubble Space Telescope images of mysterious cosmic spouts -- known as FLIERs -- emanating from distant objects that once were stars like our sun. FLIERs, an acronym for "Fast, Low Ionization Emission Regions," are red in color and bolt out from planetary nebulae -- clouds of ejected material from sunlike, old stars in the process of dying and exploding -- at supersonic speeds. FLIERS.bpf.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- So many craters, so little asteroid. Cornell University astronomer Joseph Veverka and a team of scientists are releasing the first close-up images of a little-known C-class asteroid, 253 Mathilde, to be published exclusively in the journal Science (Dec. 19). Until now, astronomers have been able to do little but gaze through telescopes and observe the minor planet, discovered 112 years ago. On June 27 of this year, the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) spacecraft passed within 1,212 kilometers of Mathilde and took images of the asteroid. Scientists didn't expect to find the minor planet so densely pocked with craters and so porous, as it is made mostly of carbonaceous chondrite. MathildeImages.bpf.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- November capped a cool autumn in the Northeast, making it the fifth month in a row of average temperatures below the 30-year normal, according to Keith Eggleston, a senior climatologist at the Northeast Regional Climate Center at Cornell University. The region's area-weighted monthly average temperature was 2.9 degrees cooler than normal, making it the 21st coolest November in the last 103 years. Each of the three autumn months (September, October and November) averaged cooler than normal temperatures in the Northeast. Departures from normal temperatures were generally the largest in the southwestern part of the region, as West Virginia averaged 3.7 degrees cooler than normal. Maine had the smallest departure at 2 degrees below normal. The autumn season was 1.5 degrees cooler than normal -- the Northeast's 15th coolest autumn on record. NRCC.Novmber97.bpf.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Gene R. Wheeler, director of finance and administrative operations in the College of Human Ecology, Cornell University, has been named assistant dean for finance and administration in Cornell's College of Veterinary Medicine. As chief business officer for the human ecology college, Wheeler was responsible for financial planning and monitoring, budget development and implementation, personnel management, business activities and facilities projects. He led the college's 1994 effort to codify and implement records retention standards, procedures that later served as a model for the university's records retention policy, introduced in 1997. wheeler.hrs.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Cornell University Police received a report this morning from a Forest Home Drive resident at 7:29 a.m. of a smell of diesel fuel and an oil slick on Beebe Lake on the Cornell campus. Personnel from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), Cornell Environmental Health and Safety and the Office of Environmental Compliance, and local fire departments are on the scene. Environmental Health and Safety has placed petroleum booms in the water in Fall Creek at the east end of Beebe Lake in an attempt to stop the spread of the contamination. Officials say some materials have gone downstream on Beebe Lake, but they have not determined how long the fuel has been in the lake. Beebe.Lake.contam.sm.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Cornell University freshmen will not be assigned to university housing in Collegetown and some residences on North Campus will house only freshmen next fall, Jean Reese, interim director of Campus Life, announced Nov. 21. Reese's announcement included a number of changes that will be made in residential housing arrangements for the 1998-99 academic year, as the university begins adopting elements of the new seven-point action plan for campus housing unveiled by President Hunter Rawlings housing98-99.jp.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- The Executive Committee of Cornell University's Board of Trustees will hold a brief open session when it meets Dec. 11 at 2 p.m. in the Fall Creek Room of the Cornell Club of New York, 6 E. 44th St., New York City. The public session, for the meeting's first 20 minutes, will include a report from President Hunter Rawlings, an update on statutory college affairs, and a report of the Buildings and Properties Committee. exec.committee.jkp.html

ITHACA, NY -- What's 120 feet long, weighs 127 tons, and connects central campus and north campus at Cornell University? It's the new footbridge overlooking Triphammer Falls, Beebe Lake and Fall Creek, and it will be placed in service beginning at 7 a.m. Tuesday, Dec. 9. The old span, which was closed in the summer of 1995 because structural components had deteriorated, has been completely rebuilt at a cost of $782,000. The original footbridge was designed to be a temporary span, but remained in use for about 35 years. footbridge.dis.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Ithaca Police have identified the body of a person found in Cascadilla gorge Dec. 2 as Robert Battig, 29, a Cornell University graduate student in mathematics. Battig enrolled in the doctoral program in mathematics in fall 1992 and was scheduled to receive his doctorate in May. He was a recipient of a Sloan Dissertation Fellowship this year. battig.obit.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Cornell University officials released this update on drinking water today (Dec. 5) at 8:15 a.m.: "The entire campus has been switched to alternate water sources, the city of Ithaca and Bolton Point plants. The university's water distribution and building systems have been flushed to eliminate residual contaminant levels throughout the system. water.restriction.lifted.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- The legal battle that threatens to keep Steven Spielberg's slavery film, Amistad, from opening next week moves to the Internet. The Legal Information Institute (LII) at Cornell University has devoted a world wide web site to the case, in which one of Hollywood's major players is accused of plagiarism by an award-winning author. The web site premiered this morning (Dec. 5) and is located at . amistad.dg.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- An undergraduate student at Cornell University died of an undetermined illness at Cayuga Medical Center Wednesday, Dec. 3. Kianweng (Kenny) Chong, 21, a citizen of Malaysia, was pronounced dead at Cayuga Medical Center at 8:14 p.m., after being taken there by ambulance from Cornell's Gannett Health Center. chongobit.lgk.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- In the introduction to his new book, In the Past Lane, Michael Kammen, the Newton C. Farr Professor of American History and Culture at Cornell University, tells the story of a chair. "In 1928 two artisans were asked to repair the official yet well-used president's chair at Cornell University. In the small circular space behind a medallion displaying the carved bust of Ezra Cornell (located at the top of the chair, on the back), they discovered a closely folded slip of paper wrapped in tinfoil and tied with coarse thread. Translated from German, a single didactic sentence, written in script in 1868 when Cornell opened its doors to students, declared: 'Go out into the world and testify to what is born, even in prison walls, from strength, from patience, and from loving toil.' The chair had been built on commission in a Prussian jail." In the Past Lane (Oxford University Press, 1997) brings together writings from more than a decade, covering the broad spectrum of Kammen's recent interests, including the social role of the historian, the relationship between culture and the State, uses of tradition in American commercial culture, American historical art, memory distortion in American history and the contested uses of history in American education. Kammen.pc.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- For the second year in a row, three students from Cornell University are among a select few Americans who have been chosen for the British Marshall Scholarship. The students, from various fields of study at the university, are Daniel Klein, a senior College Scholar with emphases in math, computer science and linguistics; Jeremy Lack, a senior in industrial and labor relations with an emphasis in biology; and Jeffrey Tompkins, a 1997 graduate in government. Marshall.Scholars.sfm.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- The George Jean Nathan Award for Dramatic Criticism for the 1996-7 season has been awarded to Ben Brantley, chief drama critic of The New York Times, Elinor Fuchs, author of The Death of Character (Indiana University Press), and Todd London, artistic director of New Dramatists and columnist for American Theatre magazine. The Nathan Award, designed to "stimulate intelligent play-going," has been given annually since 1958 for "the best piece of dramatic criticism, whether article, essay, treatise or book," published during the theatrical year. The prize of $10,000 is administered by the Cornell University Department of English, under the terms of a trust established by author and critic George Jean Nathan (1882-1958), who graduated from Cornell in 1904. It is considered one of the richest and most distinguished prizes in American theater. nathan.pc.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Area 10th-grade students participating in the Access to College Education (ACE) program will gather on the Cornell University campus Friday, Dec. 12, to learn about the hospitality industry. Students will attend a conference titled "The Hospitality Industry/Hospitality Education," beginning at 9 a.m. in Cornell University's Statler Hotel. About 100 students, guidance counselors and parents are expected to participate in a variety of activities, including hotel tours, food preparation demonstrations and a buffet luncheon with students from the School of Hotel Administration and presentations on careers and hospitality education. Hotel School faculty, staff and students will be on hand to answer questions. This is the second year in a row that the Hotel School has prepared a program for students in the ACE program. ACE_97.dg.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Charles Walcott, professor of neurobiology and behavior, has been appointed to a two-year term as director of the Cornell University Division of Biological Sciences. A past director of the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, Walcott replaces Peter Bruns, the professor of genetics who headed the intercollege Division of Biological Sciences for 10 years. BioScience.hrs.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Sarah E. Thomas, the Carl A. Kroch University Librarian at Cornell University, has announced the appointment of Jerry Caswell as associate university librarian for library information technologies, effective in March 1998. Caswell.pc.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- José Edmundo Paz-Soldán, visiting assistant professor of Hispanic literature in Cornell University's Department of Romance Studies, is one of five winners of the Juan Rulfo Prize for his short story "Dochera." The prize, named for Mexican novelist and short-story writer Juan Rulfo, author of Pedro Paramo, is the most prestigious short-story award for literature written in Spanish. Based in Paris, the award is sponsored by Radio Francia Internacional, Centro Cultural de Mexico and Le Monde Diplomatique. Edmundo.pc.html

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Got milk? Apparently, you do. A Cornell University study to be published in the forthcoming issue of the Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics (December 1997) indicates that heavy doses of milk advertising -- specifically those television commercials in which a poor dupe gets too little milk too late -- are influencing more American consumers into buying fluid milk and improving the financial bottom line of the country's dairy farmers. GotMilk.bpf.html

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