Research Blog
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It takes a (global) village
When the residents of Lwala, Kenya, raised $900 for a one-way ticket to send Milton Ochieng' to college in the United States nearly a decade ago, they could not have envisioned that he would return to build a medical clinic in the heart of their rural village near the shores of Lake Victoria. Read MoreApr 21, 2011
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Vanderbilt: Laboratory for health care reform
Vanderbilt University Medical Center is a laboratory for health care reform. Increasingly, Vanderbilt researchers are applying their expertise in informatics, genomics, drug discovery, basic science and clinical medicine to the solution of critical problems in patient care. Bedside checklists and electronic “dashboards” developed at Vanderbilt, for example, enable doctors and… Read MoreApr 15, 2011
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Beyond knot theory
I’ve always been fascinated, and occasionally frustrated, by the tendency of string, yarn, rope and wire – any thing that is long, thin and flexible – to knot and tangle. Fields Medal winner Vaughan F.R. Jones Clearly, I’m not the only one. Mathematicians have been studying knots… Read MoreApr 14, 2011
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Big Bang or Big Bounce?
There is a new dark-horse entry in the cosmological sweepstakes. Cosmologists Alan Guth, left, and Paul Steinhardt In the last 50 years, the Big Bang theory has gradually become the standard scientific model for how the universe began and has been written into the grade school science… Read MoreApr 5, 2011
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Science fair tickles the brains of participants
Brain Blast 2011 featured 35 different ways to learn about the brain, guided by Vanderbilt neuroscience graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, faculty members and other volunteers. More than 100 neuroscientists participated. Read MoreMar 28, 2011
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Insights on NSF funding from agency’s deputy director
Cora Marrett, nominated to serve as deputy director of NSF, speaking at the NSF regional grants conference at Loews Vanderbilt March 21. (Susan Urmy / Vanderbilt) The Loews Vanderbilt Hotel was bustling with scientists, engineers and research administrators March 21 and 22 when Vanderbilt University hosted its… Read MoreMar 24, 2011
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Worm grunting on NPR
Gary Revell shows some of the worms he has collected using worm grunting (Ken Catania) “What is worm grunting?” That is one of the questions that moderator Richard Sher asked panelists last weekend in a rerun of a pre-recorded edition of “Says You!” – the popular… Read MoreMar 11, 2011
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Future of the Parable of the Lost Sheep
Vanderbilt physicist Robert Scherrer supplements his scientific research with writing science fiction stories. Bob Scherrer is bicultural: Not only is he a practicing theoretical physicist, but the chairman of Vanderbilt’s physics department is also a published author of science fiction. Several years ago we did a… Read MoreMar 3, 2011
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Hal, make room for Watson
HAL 9000 from the movie 2001 and WATSON from the Jeopardy competition Hal, make room for Watson. When it defeated two of the all-time champions of the television game Jeopardy this week, the IBM computer named Watson joined Hal 9000 in the ranks of… Read MoreFeb 18, 2011
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When events conspire
Caving expert John Hickman, who accompanies Bachmann on his underground expeditions, rappels down to the entrance of the Snail Shell Cave near Murfreesboro, Tenn Have you ever had the feeling that events beyond your control are working in your favor? That certainly seems to have been the case in the… Read MoreFeb 1, 2011
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Scientists of the future
School for Science and Math students Katie Roland, left, who attends Hume-Fogg Academic Magnet School, and Isaiah Bolden, who attends Martin Luther King Jr. Magnet High School, with the School for Science and Math’s director, Angela Eeds, Ph.D. (Mary Donaldson / Vanderbilt University) Report after report, it… Read MoreFeb 1, 2011
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How universities can help fill the “pipeline” with important new drugs
Bringing a new drug to market is an increasingly daunting – and expensive – task. Today it costs more than $1 billion and takes more than seven years, on average, to complete the human studies required for a drug to be approved for marketing. Only about one in five drugs… Read MoreJan 27, 2011
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Trillion, trillion everywhere
The number trillion has popped up in the news several times in recent weeks. On January 11, for example, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey-III – a scientific consortium that includes Vanderbilt – announced that it had created the largest digital image of the sky and is releasing it to… Read MoreJan 20, 2011
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Hope endures in Haiti
Seven years ago this month, I was in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, with a contingent of Vanderbilt University AIDS researchers and health care professionals. That was before the earthquake and subsequent cholera outbreak riveted international attention once again on this, the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere. Yet hope endures, even in… Read MoreJan 19, 2011
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Health care reform at the “grass-roots” level
Health care reform will likely remain a hot-button issue through the 2012 election. But while the pros and cons of last year’s health reform legislation are debated in Congress and on the campaign trail, considerable efforts are underway at the grassroots level to redesign the way health care is delivered… Read MoreJan 15, 2011