UAF in the news: week of March 12, 2007

Submitted by Marmian Grimes
Phone: (907) 474-7902
03/15/07

Warming climate is taking its toll on subterranean ice
Science News
Daniel Fortier spends his summers studying the permafrost on Bylot Island, high in the eastern Canadian Arctic. While hiking there early in the 1999 field season, he distinctly heard the sound of running water yet saw no streams nearby. Read more ...

Opening doors to Native knowledge
Science
"I say that there are three sure signs of spring," says Caleb Pungowiyi, a 65-year-old Siberian Yu’pik who lives in Kotzebue, Alaska. "The ducks and the geese coming back, tourists coming back, and scientists who come back to check their instruments." Some Inuit in Alaska call these researchers Siksik, the Inuit word for the ground squirrel, which pokes its head up only in the summer. For their part, these "squirrels" have traditionally gone about their business, rarely tapping the natives for their expertise. Read more ...

UAF students to take spring break helping hurricane victims
KTVA and Associated Press
A group of University of Alaska Fairbanks students is heading south for spring break, but not to Daytona Beach. Read more ...

Dressed for success
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
Watching the country’s top collegiate shooters walk around the E.F. Horton Range at the University of Alaska Fairbanks on the opening day of the NCAA Rifle Championships Friday made you wonder how in the world they can shoot as well as they do. Read more ...

Nanooks win 8th national rifle title in front of hundreds of fans
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
More than 1,000 people turned out Saturday to the NCAA Rifle Championships at University of Alaska Fairbanks, the largest crowd ever for the national event.
The University of Alaska Fairbanks won the championship again, their eighth title in nine years. Read more ...

Alyeska pledges $500,000 to UAF
KTVA and Associated Press
The Alyeska Pipeline Service Company has pledged half a million dollars to the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Alyeska President Kevin Hostler Wednesday presented a check for 100,000 dollars, and promised four more checks for the same amount over the next five years. Read more ...

UAF provost earns service award
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
Paul Reichardt, who will be retiring as provost at the University of Alaska Fairbanks later this year, was recently awarded the Edith R. Bullock Prize for Excellence in service to the University of Alaska. Read more ...

Task force looks at future of university
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner and multiple other Alaska media outlets
In 10 years, the University of Alaska Fairbanks will be 100 years old. Last week a group of 55 university, business and government officials met at UAF to discuss what the university’s priorities should be and what changes need to be made by 2017. Read more ...

Red king crab eggs hatch in Alaska research program
SITNews
"¬Seward, Alaska - On a recent Saturday morning, red king crab number 1008 opened a flap on her underside and released several hundred tiny newborn crab larvae, each only about the size of a sharpened pencil lead. Read more ...

Alaskan author, researcher Lydia Black dies at age 81
Kodiak Daily Mirror and Los Angeles Times
Dr. Lydia Black, noted anthropologist and author of several books on Alaska Native culture and Alaska history, died this morning at the age of 81 at her home in Kodiak. Black was with family and friends at the time of her death. She died of liver failure and had been ill several months. Read more ...

Scientist urges students to tackle global warming ‘from the bottom up’
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
Tim Flannery is convinced that individual human beings can make a difference in battling global climate change.
The Australian scientist and author told a class of geography students at the University of Alaska Fairbanks on Monday that little actions by individuals would make a big difference toward creating the change needed to stem the tide of global warming. Read more ...

Bering Strait region gets first Marine Advisory Program agent
SITNews
"¬NOME, Alaska - In town only a couple of weeks, Nome newcomer Heidi Herter is already smitten with the small northwest Alaska community (pop. 3,500), best known as being the finish line for the 1,000-mile Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race. Read more ...

Adding the 49th state to the map
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner and KTVF
Greg Newby wants to put Alaska on the map — on the weather map that is.
The acting chief scientist of the Arctic Region Supercomputing Center at the University of Alaska Fairbanks said he’s often frustrated when he sees weather maps in the Lower 48 that don’t include Alaska, especially considering how important Alaska’s weather Read more ...

Funding sought for BIOS facility at UAF
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
JUNEAU — University of Alaska President Mark Hamilton and Sen. Gary Wilken called on lawmakers to fund the biosciences facility proposed for the Fairbanks campus on Wednesday.
The building, dubbed BIOS, “will enhance opportunities for students to participate in research alongside University of Alaska’s top researchers,” said Wilken, a Republican from Fairbanks and sponsor of a bill that would appropriate $105 million for the facility. Read more ...