2008-05-01
- Yes, the University of Illinois does get you places—sometimes at speeds exceeding 160 mph. Thanks to a sponsorship by Beverage Plus Inc., the University saw its name prominently displayed on a Dodge driven by D.J. Kennington during the recent Diamond Hill Plywood 200 NASCAR race in South Carolina....
LAS News Archive
2008-05-01 - In the human body, nerve cells communicate with other cells at blazing speeds using a sophisticated system that is still not fully understood. However, LAS researchers have shed new light on how the flow of information is regulated between these neurons and skeletal muscle cells.Information is...
2008-05-01 - Anyone who's ever wasted time looking for something, only to later find it in plain view—think of how many times your eyes passed over Waldo before you actually saw him—might be interested in the work of Alejandro Lleras. The assistant professor in psychology...
2008-05-01 - Though Cristie Labus sometimes needs a moment to explain what she wants to do with her life, it's a mistake to call her indecisive. Unlike many college students, she picked her career even before enrolling at the University of Illinois.Her choice, however, defies easy summation. The graduating...
2008-05-01 - What's in a name? Members of the Department of Speech Communication would know, as their long quest to change their title has ended with a new, more appropriate identifier: Department of Communication.The old name, assumed in 1973, became outdated as the field grew to the broader study of messages—...
2008-05-01 - College graduates typically wait about six weeks after commencement before receiving their bachelor degree certificate. The delay seemed endless to one Chicago-area doctor, however, who waited almost half a century.This month, Thomas Victor will at last be an official alumnus of the College of...
2008-04-01 - The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences gratefully acknowledges the following individuals for their excellence in teaching and advising in 2008. Their contributions are vital to maintaining LAS as a great college.Academic Advising Award Carl Niekerk, Professor, Germanic Languages and Literatures...
2008-04-01 - When the poet T.S. Eliot wrote that "April is the cruelest month," he was referring to the weather. But for those with a love for language, the last gasp of winter is becoming a time to celebrate one of literature's liveliest forms—poetry. April is National Poetry Month, and in the College of LAS...
2008-04-01 - The time has come for university rankings, cheers, and controversy—and college football is still months away. U.S. News & World Report, however, has released its latest list of best graduate schools. The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences fares well. Among graduate programs with new...
2008-04-01 - After 30-plus years of teaching, committees, and tenure reviews, professors have earned the break offered by retirement. It's just that a growing number of them don't want to stop. On a typical weekday, for example, you'll find 76-year-old Tom Phillips in heavy gloves and a lab apron, still...
2008-04-01 - When it comes to protecting teenagers from dangers on the Internet, there's such thing as being too vigilant, according to a researcher at the University of Illinois. Brendesha Tynes, an assistant professor of educational psychology and African American studies...
2008-04-01 - The road to discovering new pharmaceuticals and other vital biotechnological products just got a little smoother. LAS scientists have found a way to prevent the pH of laboratory samples from changing as the samples are cooled—a long-standing problem that has been known to throw off test results....
2008-04-01 - Here's a pop quiz: Name one link between sedimentary rock, oil exploration, and potential indicators of extraterrestrial life. You guessed it—microbes.If that one slipped past you, don't worry. It eluded scientists for years until researchers from the University of Illinois determined that microbes...
2008-04-01 - Perhaps the most curious thing about Charles Biro's jump from studying religion to practicing commercial law is that people find the conversion surprising. Consider the fact that until recently, another College of Liberal Arts and Sciences graduate worked just a couple doors down from him at the...
2008-03-01 - Sometimes it takes a little 18th-century inspiration to carry a Fortune 500 company into the 21st century. Taking his cue from the revolutionary spirit of 1776, Steven Miller helped to foster an entrepreneurial revolution in one of the oldest and largest companies in America. Miller, a retired CEO...
2008-03-01 - Catherine Kenney doesn't claim to have the answers to the age-old question of how couples should manage and control their money. But this sociologist's research into how various systems of money management affect family life shows that the outcomes can be...
2008-03-01 - It's possible that the famed Mayan temples didn't always get the royal treatment. In other words, kings may not have been the only ones who built or sponsored the temples, says an LAS anthropologist, overturning long-standing assumptions about the distinctive, stepped pyramids of Latin America....
2008-03-01 - Who says you need oceans to be one of the most internationally influential academic institutions in the nation? Not NAFSA: Association of International Educators, which recently named the University of Illinois one of the best at enacting policies and practices that prepare students for an...
2008-03-01 - God may not be a Democrat or a Republican, but he's still highly visible on this year's campaign trail. References to God and faith have been widespread among all of the candidates in both parties—a trend that took off with Ronald Reagan and continues to grow, says Kevin Coe, an LAS doctoral...
2008-02-01 - Chris Folkens began to dream of directing and producing films as a boy, after a brush with Hollywood. When he pursued that goal in earnest as a student at the University of Illinois, the Naperville, Ill., native saw the film industry's decidedly unglamorous, nitty-gritty side—and he still loved it....
2008-02-01 - Samuel Clemens had Mark Twain. Charles Dodgson used Lewis Carroll. And as was revealed recently by the online literary magazine McSweeney's, U of I English lecturer John Griswold has Oronte Churm. On its website, McSweeney's noted Griswold as the real person behind its periodic "...
2008-02-01 - The U.S. economy is sputtering amid a lingering housing slump and growing jitters on Wall Street, but whether a recession lies ahead is still anyone's guess, a trio of University of Illinois economic experts say. Economists J. Fred Giertz and Anne...
2008-02-01 - Peace has ended for the parsnips of New Zealand.After enjoying more than 100 years with few deadly threats, New Zealand parsnips are under attack. But while the party may be over for this root crop, the feast is just beginning for their arch-nemesis, the webworm, which is wreaking havoc on the...
2008-02-01 - The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences along with the College of Veterinary Medicine is home to a new $7.5 million Center for Reproduction and Infertility Research that, over the next five years, will support research on human infertility—a disease that affects 6.1 million men and women of child-...
2008-02-01 - The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences gratefully acknowledges the following individuals for their outstanding service to the institution. Their contributions are vital to maintaining LAS as a great college. LAS Academic Professional Awards Ann Tandy Lacy, Spurlock Museum Jonathan Manton,...