UAF in the news: Week of Dec. 17, 2007

Submitted by Marmian Grimes
Phone: 907-474-7902
12/21/07

Episode 3: Physiology of the season
American Physiological Association Lifelines
In this special holiday edition of the podcast, we’ll talk to Perry Barboza of the Institute of Arctic Biology at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and Lisa Leon of the U.S. Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine in Natick Massachusetts. Read more ...

White House Christmas tree puts spotlight on national parks
Summit Daily and several other state and national publications
ANCHORAGE, Alaska--Fairbanks painter Kesler Woodward was thrilled when first asked to adorn a Christmas tree ornament for the White House."¨"¨The last time he’d been asked to do anything that crazy was when he painted the Alaska Easter egg during the Reagan administration, he said Monday. Read more ...

Bugs bust holiday spirit
KTUU
ANCHORAGE, Alaska -- A plane load of Christmas trees that arrived in Anchorage last Sunday brought with them more than a little holiday cheer. Read more ...

Northern sea ice takes a big hit in 2007
Alaska Report
For the past few years, vanishing northern sea ice has been a theme of many talks and posters here at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union, which draws about 15,000 scientists to the Moscone Center during the weeklong conference. At a press conference here on Wednesday, Dec. 12, 2007, scientists revealed that the ice on top of the northernmost ocean took a punch in the summer of 2007 that might be a knockout blow. Read more ...

Ominous arctic melt worries experts
Associated Press and multiple publications worldwide
WASHINGTON (AP)--An already relentless melting of the Arctic greatly accelerated this summer, a warning sign that some scientists worry could mean global warming has passed an ominous tipping point. One even speculated that summer sea ice would be gone in five years. Read more ...

Cracking the red king crab mystery
Far North Science and Alaska Report
Alaska scientists allied with fishermen have gathered giant red king crab in a quest to raise them in a lab and learn how to trigger new population growth in the wild. Read more ...

Carroll crowned Miss Alaska USA
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner and other statewide media
Courtney Carroll, a student at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, was crowned as Miss Alaska USA on Dec. 8. Read more ...

Along came a spider
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
When she was a kid growing up in Salcha, Brandi Fleshman was terrified of spiders. The thought of the little arachnids crawling out of the shadows sent chills chasing across her skin. Read more ...

The truth behind the reindeer that don’t ’fly’
Yubanet
Just one night each year, nine tiny magic reindeer pull Santa and his toy-filled sleigh around the world. They are Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen and Rudolph, and it’s said that these mythical animals are the only reindeer that can fly. Read more ...

Brown’s work pays off with GNAC honor
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
At the start of the season, the Alaska Nanooks were all but forgotten by the Great Northwest Athletic Conference. They’re getting noticed now. After getting picked to finish last in conference play in the GNAC preseason poll, the Nanooks have opened the season 7-1, and are now drawing notice, as Sheena Brown was named the conference’s Player of the Week for Dec. 10-16. Read more ...

Aboriginal role model Ken Kane mourned as ’champion for Yukon’
Whitehorse Star
Ken Kane is being remembered by the Champagne and Aishihik First Nations (CAFN) as a role model for all aboriginal people in the territory."¨The chief and council of the first nation expressed their sadness early this afternoon following Kane’s death Monday at Whitehorse General Hospital, following a battle with cancer. Read more ...

Are Santa’s reindeer males?
LiveScience
Impossible, scientists say. Here’s why: Here on the ground, male reindeer shed their antlers at the end of the mating season in early December, while females sport their thinner antlers throughout the winter. Read more ...

Earth’s climate has and will continue to change
SITNews
"¨My memories of growing up in New York include a blanket of snow on the ground from about Thanksgiving until March. After I moved to Alaska a few decades ago, the snow Back East seemed less dependable on each winter visit, with rain often wiping it out. I thought maybe I had noticed a change, but memories are the most unreliable of data sets. Read more ...

Beauty program to open at UAF campus
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
The University of Alaska Fairbanks Tanana Valley Campus has been granted permission by a state board for a cosmetology pilot program. Campus officials described the incoming program, which was developed following interest from Fairbanks beauticians, as the first of its kind in Alaska. Read more ...

Faculty snapshot: Brandon Browne studies volcanoes
Orange County Register
Browne’s research is focused on trying to understand how volcanic eruptions are triggered, how magma ascends to the surface during Vulcanian and Pelean style (e.g., dome building) eruptions, and the Holocene-aged volcanism of the southern Sierra Nevada. Browne has conducted volcano research in California, Oregon, Washington, Alaska, Japan, Kamchatka, and Mexico. Read more ...

Editor’s note: "UAF in the news" will be on a one-week hiatus for the holidays. Look for the New Year’s edition on Jan. 4, 2008.