THE FATE OF THE CONDOR.
During the 1980s, California condors were very near extinction. The most prominent
cause of death was lead poisoning from eating bullet fragments in carcasses.
But the birds, North America’s largest, have been bred successfully in
captivity, and since 1992, many have been released back into the wild. In
a recent study published in Conservation Biology, however,
Vicky Meretsky, IUB assistant professor of public and environmental affairs,
says that the mortality rate of the released birds is too high for a viable
population in the wild. Thirty-five of the 104 birds released by August 2000
had died. Lead poisoning was once again the main cause of death. Meretsky
also observes that released condors who were reared by humans using condor-shaped
puppets are overly tame, unafraid of approaching humans for food. Meretsky
strongly urges that future releases be limited to birds reared by condor parents.
To prevent deaths from lead contamination, her study recommends restricting
hunters to nontoxic tungsten-and-tin ammunition in release areas.
DEAN DUO.
Astrid Merget began
her official tenure as the third dean of the IU School of Public and Environmental
Affairs on October 1. She succeeds A. James Barnes, who has returned to teaching
at SPEA. Merget was most recently associate dean of the Maxwell School of
Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. She has also served
as a senior adviser to the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services. Michael
A. Patchner has joined IUPUI as dean of the IU School of Social Work.
He was formerly associate dean and professor at the University of Pittsburgh
School of Social Work. He replaces Sheldon Siegel, professor emeritus of social
work at IUPUI, who had been serving as interim dean since July 1999.
WHEN PIGS FLY.
Wiltz Wagner
Jr. and other scientists sent pigs into weightless flight on a NASA KC-135
aircraft to study how gravity affects blood flow in the lungs. Contrary to
conventional teaching, Wagner, the Virgil K. Stoelting Professor of anesthesia
at the IU School of Medicine, and his team found that the treelike vascular
structure of the lungs is a primary determinant of blood flow. Recognizing
the combined importance of vascular geometry and gravity on pulmonary blood
flow is “an important advancement in our understanding of lung physiology,”
say the researchers in the September issue of Journal
of Applied Physiology. Back on the ground, second-year IU medical student
Eric M. Jaryszak served as principal
author of a study prompted by Wagner’s work. Jaryszak developed a video
microscopy project demonstrating that capillaries in mammalian lungs responded
to a change in blood flow in only two seconds. His research confirmed an essential
part of Wagner’s zero gravity experiments aboard the KC-135 jet. Jaryszak’s
study was also published in the September JAP, accompanied by a Web video.
Journal editors commended Jaryszak and his co-authors for “their pioneering
efforts in bringing a new publication medium to the journal.”
IT'S A GAMBLE.
It only takes a glance at the newest riverboat casino or a peek at headlines
trumpeting the latest multimillion dollar jackpot to know that gambling is
wildly popular in the United States. Thomas
Mawhinney, IU South Bend associate professor of psychology, wants to know
more about the price of that popularity. A behavioral specialist, Mawhinney
has launched a two-year research project to determine how the growth of gambling
has affected individuals and society. “How does the lure of big money
distort our view of reality, change individual behavior, and impact government
decisions?” Mawhinney asks. He plans to present preliminary research
results at a meeting of the National Association of Behavior Analysts later
this year.
MENTAL ILLNESS AT
CENTURY'S END.
Although far more Americans today are likely to accept, discuss, and seek
help for their own mental health problems, they continue to stigmatize others
who have mental illnesses, according to a study led by IU Bloomington Chancellors’
Professor of sociology Bernice
Pescosolido. Pescosolido and co-author Bruce Link of Columbia University
evaluated data from four major surveys conducted between 1950 and 1996. They
found that 12.1 percent of Americans surveyed in 1996 perceived people with
mental illnesses as violent or dangerous, nearly two times as many as in 1950.
But research shows that people with mental illnesses are no more likely to
commit violent acts than the general population, according to Pescosolido.
The new study also says that the majority of Americans today believe that
mental health problems are genetic, chemical, or stress-related, not indications
of personal deficiency or bad character. At the same time, however, a majority
of Americans are unwilling to have a mentally ill person as a co-worker or
guest in their home, regardless of his or her mental health problem.
THE ORIGINS OF PHOTOSYNTHESIS.
The advent of photosynthesis (the process by which green plants use light
to synthesize carbon dioxide while releasing oxygen into the atmosphere) is
one of the central events in the development of life on Earth. But the origin
and evolution of this life-sustaining process have long been unresolved. Although
scientists have agreed that photosynthesis originated in bacteria, they have
not agreed on which species of bacteria contains the most ancient photosystem.
In a study published in Science, Carl E. Bauer, the Clyde Culbertson Professor
of biology at IUB, and a research team analyzed photosynthesis genes from
divergent species and generated a large new molecular data set. Among other
results, they determined that non-oxygen-producing species such as purple
and green bacteria are the most ancient photosynthetic bacteria, reversing
the long-held hypothesis that purple bacteria were one of the last bacterial
species to evolve, not one of the first. See sunflower.bio.indiana.edu/~cbauer/bauerlab/
for more.