Life at OSU

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Oregon State University’s annual homecoming weekend will feature a parade through downtown Corvallis and campus on Saturday, Nov. 1, and the OSU Alumni Association is seeking parade entries.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Storm drains on city streets have long had a useful function, taking away the runoff from rain, watered lawns and summer car washes, but a new study has found that they also can act as a haven for unwanted pests – mosquitoes.

CORVALLIS, Ore.— Oregon State University biomedical researcher Luiz Bermudez, M.D., has received a grant of nearly $1 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to study a potential new treatment for tuberculosis (TB), a contagious disease that afflicts approximately one third of the world's population

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Global and local health disparities, the effects of climate change on human health and long-term health care solutions for chronic diseases are just a few of the emerging issues in public health that will be addressed during the two-day Oregon Public Health Association Conference, scheduled for Oct. 6-7 at Oregon State University.

NEWPORT, Ore. – The development of wave energy facilities off the coast of Oregon could have significant impacts on the physical ocean and the ecological communities it supports, according to a newly published report, but most of those impacts are only beginning to be studied.

CORVALLIS, Ore.—The work of a pioneering Oregon State University archaeologist has attracted a $1-million gift to investigate the first human populations in the Pacific Northwest, coastal California and Mexico’s Baja California Peninsula.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Kaichang Li, a professor of wood science and engineering at Oregon State University, has been honored by the Wall Street Journal for his invention of a non-toxic adhesive for production of wood composite panels.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Community gardens in six Oregon counties have received grants totaling more than $20,000 to begin or improve efforts to grow produce for their neighborhoods.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – While hurricanes Gustav and Ike were pummeling the Gulf Coast with rains and record flooding, researchers at Oregon State University were studying why wave heights in the Pacific Ocean have been increasing in recent years and how this phenomenon –coupled with global warming – might affect coastal erosion, flooding and development along the Pacific Northwest coast.

CORVALLIS, Ore. –Award-winning short-story writer Jason Brown will be the first reader in the 2008-09 Visiting Writers Series at Oregon State University.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Julianne Malveaux, an activist, author and commentator on race, culture, gender and economics, will launch a new series at Oregon State University with a free public lecture on Monday, Oct. 20.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Ed Jennings, Patrick Mendenhall, John Porter and Eric Schoenstein have joined the Board of Trustees at the OSU Foundation, the nonprofit organization that raises private funds for Oregon State University.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Oregon State University has created a Web site that compiles statistics, maps and scholarly works to help people understand and shape the future of Oregon's rural communities.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – A new initiative to raise support for Oregon State University students has received a boost from alumnus Peter Johnson and his wife, Rosalie, who donated $2.4 million to endow a unique scholarship-internship program they started at OSU 10 years ago, ensuring the program will continue for generations to come.

PORTLAND, Ore. – Information technology dignitaries from around the world will convene in person and via video conference on Oct. 20 to discuss “Global Perspective on the Interest and Impact of Open Source Software in National, Regional Governments.” This groundbreaking event will kick off the four-day Government Open Source Conference (GOSCON) in Portland. Speakers and their locations include:

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Spinner dolphins have long been known for their teamwork in capturing prey but a new study using high-tech acoustics has found that their synchronization is even more complex than scientists realized and likely evolved as a strategy to maximize their energy intake.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – For the past year, leaders in the Oregon State University College of Health and Human Sciences (HHS) and at other Oregon universities have been exploring the potential of developing a new academic entity: an accredited school or college of public health. The new school would be the only such institution in the state of Oregon.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – The Oregon State University Forensics Team and the British National Debate Team will host a public debate from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 29, at OSU.

YACHATS, Ore. – The Oregon State University Extension office in Lincoln County is receiving an increasing number of inquiries from people who want to know what they can do themselves, on a local level, to become energy self-reliant.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Averill Curdy, V. Penelope Pelizzon and Jeffrey Thomson will read poetry as part of a Symposium of Younger Poets, an event designed to showcase young, diverse poets early in their careers. The event will be held on Friday, Nov. 21, beginning at 7:30 p.m. in the Valley Library Main Rotunda at Oregon State University.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – “Discovering the World Through GIS,” the eighth-annual GIS Day celebration, is set for Wednesday, Nov. 19, at Oregon State University, and organizers say hundreds of students are expected for the highly interactive, kid-oriented event.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – The move towards a degree concept called the professional science masters – a terminal degree that’s a science-oriented version of the MBA – is now picking up speed nationally, as more businesses see the need for graduates who have both business and scientific literacy.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – A new research program at Oregon State University proposes to tackle one of the major remaining problems with wind energy – how do you provide a steady, or at least predictable flow of electricity when the wind itself is never steady and often unpredictable?

BEND, Ore. –William Ripple, a professor of forest ecosystems and society at Oregon State University, has been selected to receive the 2008 Earle A. Chiles Award, presented by the High Desert Museum in Bend.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – If you're a cancer cell, you want a protein called Bcl-2 on your side because it decides if you live or die. It's usually a trusted bodyguard, protecting cancer cells from programmed death and allowing them to grow and form tumors. But sometimes it turns into their assassin.

CORVALLIS, Ore. –Stephen Sparks, one of the leading volcanologists in the world, will present the 2008 Thomas Condon Lecture at Oregon State University on Wednesday, Dec. 10.

PORTLAND, Ore. – Children who don’t get the food they need are at a high risk for life-long health problems. A new online course has been developed by the Childhood Hunger Initiative of Oregon and Oregon State University’s Ecampus program to help teach health care professionals how to better identify families that are experiencing hunger and poor nutrition.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – David S. Luft, the Horning Professor in the Humanities in Oregon State University’s History Department, will give a free public lecture on the humanities on Monday, Nov. 10, at OSU.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – A new study by researchers in Oregon and British Columbia has found that survival of juvenile salmon and steelhead during their migration to the sea through two large Northwest rivers – the Columbia and the Fraser – is remarkably similar despite one major difference.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Helen Diggs, a nationally recognized leader in veterinary medicine and animal welfare, has been named director of the Lois Bates Acheson Veterinary Teaching Hospital at Oregon State University. Diggs, who also will serve as associate dean of OSU’s College of Veterinary Medicine, will begin her new duties on Feb. 1 (2009).

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Reser’s Fine Foods of Beaverton, Nosler of Bend and Solar Summit of Philomath are among the Oregon companies that will receive the 2008 Excellence in Family Business Awards at a ceremony to be held Nov. 20 at the Oregon Zoo in Portland.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Oregon and Hawaiian researchers have found that a woman’s weight does not seem to affect sexual behavior. In fact, overweight women are more likely to report having sex with men than women considered to be of “normal weight.”

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Oregon State University professor Marie Harvey has been given the 2008 Carl S. Shultz Award for Outstanding Lifetime Achievement from the American Public Health Association’s Population, Family Planning and Reproductive Health Section.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Improved techniques have been developed by microbiologists from Oregon State University to assess the threat from whirling disease, a deadly parasitic infection of rainbow trout and other salmonids, and new reports are outlining some of the most likely areas to which it could spread.

CORVALLIS, Ore. -- Oregon State University’s commitment to promote diversity on campus has received a national “best practices” award for college programs.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Hal Schudel changed the shape of the Christmas tree – and the entire industry. Founder of Holiday Tree Farms Inc., the largest Christmas tree grower in the world, Schudel popularized the lush, triangle-shaped, plantation-grown conifers that decorate many homes and offices during the holiday season.

SALEM, Ore. – Water experts and owners of wells will meet on Dec. 11 in Salem to learn about and discuss growing concerns over Oregon's limited groundwater and to identify potential solutions.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – A new study suggests that exposure of a fetus to common carcinogens during the late stages of pregnancy may be even more harmful than exposure after birth, causing long-lasting genetic damage that could lead to cancer in childhood, young adulthood or even middle age.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Oregon State University student Taryn Luna is one of 20 students nationwide to be selected to attend the New York Times Student Journalism Institute for members of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists in Miami in January.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Men who engage in risky sexual behavior with other men report much higher rates than average of experiencing severe childhood sexual abuse, according to a new study in the November issue of the International Journal of Child Abuse & Neglect.

NEWPORT, Ore. – For years, scientists have wondered why only males of the rarely seen family of beaked whales have “tusks,” since they are squid-eaters and in many of the species, these elaborately modified teeth seem to actually interfere with feeding.

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. – A community of microbes, living in a frigid layer of gas hydrates deep beneath the Arctic permafrost, has piqued the interest of scientists who say a better understanding of that environment is important because it is both a potential fuel source and record of climate change.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Researchers in forestry and geosciences from Oregon State University have been named fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the world’s largest general scientific society.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Seven people from across the state were inducted into the Oregon 4-H Hall of Fame this month during an Oregon State University Outreach and Engagement awards banquet.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – A new study has found that surfers may unintentionally ingest 10 times more water than swimmers or divers, putting them at higher risk of contracting gastrointestinal illnesses when surfing in contaminated waters.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – A majority of Oregonians who recently participated in a series of water forums don’t believe the state has enough water to meet all of its basic needs, including those of wildlife.