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April 29
- May 5, 2005
This internal publication contains information about recent coverage
of Carnegie Mellon that appeared primarily in national newspapers, magazines
and online publications. Please note that some sources may require registration
or a subscription in order to access their information online.
Please send comments and suggestions to thomas@cmu.edu
The media coverage archive is available at www.cmu.edu/clips
From April 29 - May 5,
Carnegie Mellon Media Relations counted 165
references to the university in worldwide
publications. Here is a sample.
National News Stories
Washington Post | May 4
The Wall Street Journal | May 2
KQED-TV | May 2
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel | April 30
Student Experience
Post-Gazette | May 5
Post-Gazette | May 5
Tribune-Review | May 4
Post-Gazette | May 3
Arts and Humanities
The Chronicle of Higher Education | May 6
The New York Times | May 3
Post-Gazette | May 2
Tribune-Review | May 1
The Indianapolis Star | May 1
Post-Gazette | May 1
Tribune-Review | April 29
Information Technology
BusinessWeek | May 9
The Wall Street Journal | May 5
Tribune-Review | May 5
WTAE-TV | May 5
Biotechnology
Tribune-Review | May 4
Environment
Pittsburgh Business Times | April 29
Local News Stories
Tribune-Review | May 4
Post-Gazette | May 3
Post-Gazette | May 2
International News Stories
Gulf Times, Qatar | May 5
MySan, Germany | April 28
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National News Stories
Washington Post | May 4
The focus of the drug war in the United States has shifted significantly
over the past decade from hard drugs to marijuana, which now accounts
for nearly half of all drug arrests nationwide, according to an analysis
of federal crime statistics released yesterday..."There's been
a major change in what's going on in drug enforcement, but it clearly
isn't something that someone set out to do," said Jonathan
Caulkins, a criminology professor at Carnegie Mellon
University in Pittsburgh. "It's not like anyone said, 'We don't
care about cocaine and heroin anymore.' ...The simple answer may be
that police are now taking opportunities to make more marijuana arrests
than they were when they were focused on crack cocaine in the 1980s."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content
/article/2005/05/03/AR2005050301638.html | back to
top
The Wall Street Journal | May 2
Pennsylvania is the source of more than one eyebrow-raising transaction
by giant bond insurer MBIA Inc. MBIA already faces questions from federal
and state officials about how the Armonk, N.Y., company offset its losses
when a hospital chain whose municipal bonds it insured filed for bankruptcy
protection in 1998. At issue in that matter is MBIA's unusual effort
in persuading three reinsurance companies to cover MBIA's $170 million
exposure to the Allegheny Health, Education, and Research Foundation,
or AHERF, and whether MBIA promised in return to protect one of the
reinsurers from losses on future business...Richard Green,
a professor at the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon
University, says advance refundings always benefit creditors, not issuers,
because the issuer has to borrow more money to buy enough Treasurys
to fund the payments it owes.
http://online.wsj.com/article
/0,,SB111499514319121783-search,00.html | back to
top
KQED-TV | May 2
Frank Pietronigro is using his art to go where no artist has gone before
-- outer space. The San Francisco artist is a pioneer in space art,
a movement dedicated to building bridges between artists and space exploration
organizations. Spark takes a look at this futuristic work at the Workshop
on Space Artists' Residencies and Collaborations, which brings together
artists and scientists from around the world at the NASA Ames Research
Center in Mountain View. Space art is still a loosely defined field
that encompasses a range of interdisciplinary practices, including painting,
sculpture and performances that use space flight and/or the technologies
of space exploration. Works may be produced within an anti-gravity environment,
use materials specially designed for space travel, or be generated by
information collected from celestial bodies and phenomena. **Please
note that this video segment mentions work taking place at the Carnegie
Mellon West Coast Campus.
http://www.kqed.org/spark/artists-orgs/spaceart.jsp
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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel | April 30
Ron Dix isn't a health care economist, but he does cut the checks. Dix,
senior vice president of administration for Badger Meter Inc., has the
task of trying to rein in the rising cost of health care benefits. And
he believes that adding redundant hospital services, particularly additional
beds, will only make his job harder...Health care economists generally
fall into two camps. One group contends that competition lowers health
care bills - or at least slows their rise. The other contends that the
health care marketplace is structured in a way that limits true competition...In
a truly competitive market, buyers know the price and quality of the
product or service they are buying. That's not usually the case in health
care. Yet Martin Gaynor, a heath-care economist at
Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, said that
the research done by academic economists shows that since 1990, competition
has led to lower health care costs. "There's no question in my
mind that it drives down prices," Gaynor said. But he added, "That
doesn't mean it has to be true in every single market."
http://www.jsonline.com/bym/news/apr05/322551.asp
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Student Experience
Post-Gazette | May 5
In a collaboration with several local Jewish organizations, Carnegie
Mellon University has opened the region's first school-sponsored
kosher section at its student union food gallery. Called Kosher Korner,
it features salads, sandwiches, entrees, full meals, drinks and snacks
and a dedicated microwave. Food prices are in line with the cost of
other eating options at Carnegie Mellon. Tim Michael,
director of Carnegie Mellon's housing and dining services, said students'
annual feedback surveys led to the Kosher Korner. "It was really
identified as a section of our student body that had a need that we
weren't meeting," said Michael.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05125/499329.stm
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Post-Gazette | May 5
Not every block party offers guests a chance to stretch a giant slingshot
and launch paint-filled balloons 130 feet into the air at a public housing
high-rise. But how often do East End residents bid a jubilant farewell
to an 18-story building that is East Liberty's version of the Berlin
Wall as well as a monument to substandard public housing and abysmal
urban planning? From 1:45 to 6 p.m. tomorrow, hundreds of people will
use the slingshot to create a new piece of public art while celebrating
the demise of East Mall, a high-rise that straddles Penn Avenue and
has a date with a demolition crew in the next two weeks. The building
already has been fenced off and portions of Penn Avenue closed. Johnny
Lee, a Swissvale resident and a doctoral student in computer science
at Carnegie Mellon University, designed and built the
giant slingshot with Carnegie Mellon fine arts student Joshua Atlas,
21, of Squirrel Hill. The two men met in a class where Atlas was a student
and Lee was a teaching assistant.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05125/499339.stm
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Tribune-Review | May 4
A lot of things will go wrong on stage when the Greensburg American
Opera debuts this weekend at the Greensburg Garden & Civic Center.
The chef will spill flour and drop pans, and the people in a love triangle
will have costume failures, missing props and things falling apart.
"But that's all part of the fun," said Christina Farrell,
of Greensburg, who is founder of GAO and stage director of the show.
"Who says opera can't be fun?" Soprano Helen Gruner, a student
a Carnegie Mellon University, plays Voluptua, the young
wife [in "La Pizza con Funghi (Mushroom Pie)"]. Voluptua's
husband, Count Formaggio, is played by baritone Arthur Miller, of Oakland,
who is a voice major at Carnegie Mellon University and a member of the
Pittsburgh Opera Chorus. In "Bon Appetit," Melissa Collom
is the solo performer spoofing the late Julia Child's cooking show.
Collum and Farrell met at Carnegie Mellon, and they later performed
together with the Washington (D.C.) Opera.
http://pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review
/entertainment/arts/s_330601.html | back to top
Post-Gazette | May 3
They all mention the clothing. The tattered shirts and soggy dresses,
piled on a mass grave, that no one will touch no matter how much they
need something to wear. The kids with no clothes running through filth
in the streets. The boxes of shoes waiting to be sorted while children
go barefoot...These lingering memories are shared by three groups of
Pittsburgh-based students who found themselves along the same small
stretch of India coastline in March hoping to help victims of the December
tsunami. Coincidence brought the students together in southeastern India
-- by virtue of birth in one case, research in another, serendipity
in the third. Mohanalakshmi Rajakumar was born in Chennai,
India, but left as a young child for the United States. She studied
in North Carolina, is completing her Ph.D. at the University of Florida
and recently started working as a coordinator of student programs at
Carnegie Mellon University.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05123/497942.stm
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Arts and Humanities
The Chronicle of Higher Education | May 6
Late last month, for the sixth time since 1990, graduate teaching assistants
at Yale University went on strike. Chief among the strikers' demands
throughout the years has been that Yale recognize their union -- the
Graduate Employees and Students Organization, or GESO -- as a collective-bargaining
agent...Several GESO veterans of the mid-1990s earned their degrees
in Yale's American-studies program, where two professors -- Michael
Denning and Hazel V. Carby -- were among the few faculty members
who wholeheartedly supported the union campaign even during the 1996
grade strike...Kathy M. Newman, a protégée
of Mr. Denning, is now an associate professor of English at Carnegie
Mellon University. In Radio Active: Advertising and Consumer
Activism, 1935-1947 (University of California Press) -- a book
that grew from her dissertation -- she explores left- and right-wing
boycotts of radio programs and their sponsors during the industry's
heyday. She had originally planned to write a dissertation on the culture
of American higher education around 1900. But her union activism, she
says, played at least a subliminal role in steering her toward a study
of social movements.
http://chronicle.com/prm/weekly/v51
/i35/35a01401.htm | back to top
The New York Times | May 3
Being lonely may be hazardous to your health. In a study published yesterday
in Health Psychology, researchers at Carnegie Mellon
University reported that lonely and socially isolated students had weaker
immune responses to flu shots than their more outgoing peers. The group,
led by Sarah Pressman, a doctoral student, studied 83 healthy young
men and women in their first year of college who received their first
flu shots at a university clinic. The students first responded to questionnaires
about their social lives, and then carried hand-held computers to record
the degree of their feelings of isolation or loneliness for two weeks
after they got the shots.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05
/03/health/03resp.html | back to top
Post-Gazette | May 2
What is worse than being a lonely college freshman? Being a lonely and
sick college freshman. A study at Carnegie Mellon University
of 37 male and 45 female first-year students found that those who felt
lonely mounted a weaker immune response after they received flu shots.
Previous studies have shown a link between moods and vulnerability to
disease and that social isolation can inhibit the body's ability to
fight off infections. This new study by Carnegie Mellon health psychologist
Sheldon Cohen and colleagues found that college freshman,
who may be unmoored socially as they adjust to a new environment, may
also suffer these same ill effects.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05122/497555.stm
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Tribune-Review | May 1
Autism is more common than most serious developmental disabilities,
but its cause probably is the least understood. Scientists know that
an extra chromosome causes Down syndrome, which the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention estimate affects about half as many children
as autism spectrum disorders. Cerebral palsy, also less common than
autism, can be caused by head injuries, jaundice, infections or lack
of oxygen. The most frequent serious developmental disability is mental
retardation, which is about three times as common as autism. Although
not all the causes of mental retardation are known, several have been
identified, including fetal alcohol syndrome and a variety of genetic
conditions. But autism's origins are largely a mystery...The University
of Pittsburgh, in a collaboration with Carnegie Mellon
University and the University of Illinois at Chicago, is involved in
several world-renowned research initiatives.
http://pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review
/trib/newssummary/s_329931.html | back to top
The Indianapolis Star | May 1
Ayanah Moor sees white rapper Eminem as a contemporary
symbol of a long-standing practice -- the invention of a creative format
by blacks that goes on to influence pop culture in general. Consider
jazz, she says. Consider blues. Both moved from their roots in black
popular culture to be embraced by a broad audience. "Hip-hop is
following that legacy," Moor said recently, speaking from her office
at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, where
she's an assistant professor of art. "My work is focused on black
popular culture and its influence on the broader culture."
http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050501
/ENTERTAINMENT01/505010347/1005/ENTERTAINMENT | back
to top
Post-Gazette | May 1
Ten years out of Carnegie Mellon University, Patrick
Wilson was back, talking with this year's crop about the pitfalls ahead
and taking some master classes. He has done this before, most recently
in November 2001. Then, he had just left the lead in "The Full
Monty" and was about to start rehearsals for "Oklahoma!,"
both on Broadway...He will keep coming back to Carnegie Mellon, Wilson
says, "because I love it. I love directing. I love people who love
to work." For the students, "I'm still young and connected
enough. I think it's important for them to see someone who's an optimist.
I loved it when Holly Hunter came back."...He had worked all the
day before with Carnegie Mellon juniors and seniors. "Don't make
it about yourself," he told them of movie scenes, "make it
about the other person. I don't want to see you 'acting'!"
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05121/496082.stm
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Tribune-Review | April 29
So Pittsburgh isn't about to be demolished to make room for a new highway
-- although opponents of the Mon-Fayette Expressway might disagree --
a la Earth in "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," opening
in theaters today. But the city does have enough quirks that it sometimes
might feel like you've gone interplanetary. As the guide would say,
"Don't panic." Trib p.m. has put together its own guide for
newcomers trying to navigate that strange universe known as da 'Burgh.
Pittsburghers definitely have a different way of speaking, but the dialect
is actually very similar to those found in the Ohio Valley and other
[parts] of Pennsylvania. What makes Pittsburgh's dialect unique is the
way the locals have embraced it, says Barbara Johnstone,
a Carnegie Mellon University linguistics professor
who studies Pittsburghers and their Pittsburghese. "It's interesting
that people talk about it so much," she said. "That's a little
unusual. Other dialects, people don't talk about so much."
http://pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review
/trib/newssummary/s_329279.html | back to top
Information Technology
BusinessWeek | May 9
Outside of the software world, few know of Watts S. Humphrey.
But within, he's a bit of a rock star, known as the "father of
software quality." Now a fellow of Carnegie Mellon
University's Software Engineering Institute, Humphrey developed the
SEI Capability Maturity Model (CMM), which helps developers produce
error-free software code efficiently and on schedule. Instead of one
error in every 10 lines of code, which made software development expensive
and lengthy, CMM-certified companies now make one error in every 1,000
lines of code...In February, Humphrey's contribution to software was
acknowledged when President Bush presented him with the National Medal
of Technology, the highest honor for innovators in America. Humphrey
isn't done innovating, however. He has taken his quality standard further,
developing the Team Software Process (TSP) and the Personal Software
Process (PSP), which further refine code writing so that there are just
60 errors in a million lines of code -- down from 20,000 per million.
http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine
/content/05_19/b3932038_mz009.htm | back to top
The Wall Street Journal | May 5
India became a software outsourcing hub by reassuring multinational
clients it could compete on quality as well as on cost. Now that quality
movement is rapidly spreading around the globe, as other countries pursue
the same strategy. The emphasis on quality is almost a no-brainer when
it comes to outsourcing such demanding work as software development,
where a small error can undermine an entire project. The gold standard
in the quality-certification business is the Capability Maturity Model,
or CMM, which sets out specific steps needed for an effective development
process to be completed. The CMM was conceived by the Software Engineering
Institute at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh,
a group funded by the U.S. government because it wanted a standardized
way to assess the work of contractors. CMM certification is awarded
by consulting firms that can charge companies to evaluate and train
their personnel in CMM methods.
http://online.wsj.com/article
/0,,SB111524914731425211-search,00.html | back to
top
Tribune-Review | May 5
Carnegie Mellon University's latest hope to win a $2
million race of robot vehicles debuts today -- short on experience,
but long on technology. H1ghlander is scheduled to be inspected and
tested this morning before officials of the Defense Advanced Research
Projects Agency (DARPA), the federal sponsor of a robot race called
the Grand Challenge. The agency next Tuesday will inspect Sandstorm
-- Carnegie Mellon's entry last year and a hopeful contestant for this
year's race as well. "I'm not at this time choosing a favorite
between these peers," said William "Red" Whittaker,
a Fredkin Research professor at Carnegie Mellon and captain of the university's
Red Team. "At this time, each of them has strengths."
http://pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review
/trib/regional/s_331189.html | back to top
WTAE-TV | May 5
Carnegie Mellon University's H1ghlander robot demonstrated
some of the skills it could use in a national competition later this
year. The H1ghlander robot is a driverless vehicle that will race through
175 miles of hostile desert terrain for a $2 million prize. On Thursday
morning, the H1ghlander was being evaluated by a team from the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). If the vehicle passes the
evaluation, it could advance to the semi-finals at California Speedway
in September. The H1ghlander is one of 118 teams hosting similar evaluations.
**Please note that the site includes video footage of H1ghlander in
action.
http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com
/news/4452413/detail.html | back to top
Biotechnology
Tribune-Review | May 4
A couple of years ago, while perusing old scientific papers, Nicolay
"Nick" Tsarevsky stumbled upon a seemingly irrelevant tidbit
about cancer. It was a classic "Eureka!" moment. Tsarevsky,
27, read that cancer cells multiply too quickly for the body to supply
them with blood vessels. Unlike healthy tissue, cancerous tumors contain
little to no oxygen. The graduate student in chemistry at Carnegie
Mellon University also knew that the chemical bond between
two sulfur atoms -- called a disulfide group -- can be broken only in
an environment without oxygen...If he could encapsulate anti-cancer
drugs in a gel containing these bonds, Tsarevsky thought, he could craft
a "magic bullet" to target tumors directly and avoid the toxic
side effects of conventional treatment.
http://pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review
/trib/regional/s_330663.html | back to top
Environment
Pittsburgh Business Times | April 29
As natural gas prices hover near record levels and are expected to increase
even further, Carnegie Mellon University and the U.S.
Department of Energy have stepped up efforts to encourage energy companies
to consider an alternative coal-based technology that could lessen their
reliance on natural gas and help bring gas prices down. The technology
involves so-called Integrated Gasification Combined Cycles, or IGCC's,
which are designed to reduce the amount of emissions sent into the atmosphere
as coal is converted into electricity. These gasification plants can
convert coal, as well as other materials, into a gas before it is burned,
sorting out carbon dioxide and contaminants such as sulfur and heavy
metals. During this process, a synthetic gas, or syngas, is also created,
which can be captured and used for power or industrial purposes as a
replacement for natural gas.
http://pittsburgh.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh
/stories/2005/05/02/story7.html | back to top
Local News Stories
Tribune-Review | May 4
About 240 area high school students will compete in the 26th annual
Pittsburgh Chemistry Olympics today while their teachers learn a new
way of conducting experiments. Eighty teams of three students each will
perform experiments and present their results in written reports. The
reports will be judged according to how many years they have studied
chemistry...80 teachers will preview a chemistry course and learn how
to use virtual laboratories in which they conduct online experiments.
"We think that normal chemistry courses have become too mathematical
and not enough real chemistry, so we've created an online tool that
enables kids to design and perform their own experiments," said
David Yaron, associate professor of chemistry at Carnegie
Mellon University. He will present the virtual chemistry laboratory.
http://pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review
/trib/regional/s_330727.html | back to top
Post-Gazette | May 3
Cary Sherman's opinion piece on Sunday, "Mellifluous Discord: Universities'
High-Speed Internet2 Used by Students to Pilfer Music," was as
one-sided and illogical as the whole Recording Industry Association
of America he represents, as president. Sherman suggests that universities
should remind users of "the necessity of responsible use of network
resources." In my computer science class at Carnegie Mellon,
"Introduction to Computer Music," I spend a little time doing
just that. I teach students how, historically, the major recording labels
have dominated the recording industry, refusing to record some of America's
greatest artists, including Louis Armstrong. (His first recordings were
manufactured by a former piano company in Indiana, which was sued by
the major labels of the day for patent infringement.) Mr. Sherman, is
this an example of "a climate where creativity is valued"
that you are seeking? **Please note: the writer of this letter to the
business editor is Carnegie Mellon professor Roger Dannenberg.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05123/497993.stm
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Post-Gazette | May 2
At the world headquarters of Antakamatics Inc., the decor is equal parts
dorm room and thrift store. Christmas lights hang from the ceiling,
and toy cars sit on the window sill. There are shrines to everything
from the railroad industry's glory days to Mister Rogers. Chief Executive
Officer Jim Antaki makes no apologies for it, noting
that the hammock hanging from his office walls is useful for all-nighters.
"I really loved Ray Bradbury as a kid, and they always started
his TV show from his office -- it was kind of like a TGI Fridays, but
18-times more dense with stuff," Antaki says. "He would start
the show and say, 'People ask me where I get my ideas. I tell them:
Right here. These things inspire me.' I guess I might be the same way."
Antaki is an engineer whose business consists of commercializing an
eccentric mix of innovations, from heart pumps to harmonicas. He's also
a biomedical engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon
University, where he has a more spartan office.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05122/496925.stm
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International News Stories
Gulf Times, Qatar | May 5
QATAR’S chances to become the first country in the Middle East
to host robotic rover experiments for planning Mars exploration have
received a shot in the arm. The sand dunes in the southern parts of
the country have excellent potential as a site for development and testing
of technology for robotic mobility, an expert told Gulf Times. "Although
there are many sandy deserts in the world and on Mars, Qatar offers
the added advantage of accessible academic and technical infrastructure,"
Dr David Wettergreen said in an e-mail from the US.
An associate research professor at the Robotics Institute of Carnegie
Mellon University (Carnegie Mellon) in Pittsburgh, Dr Wettergreen
had been on an exploratory visit of Qatar in March this year... The
researchers, who have worked together for many years on various projects,
were inspired to visit Qatar by their friend and Carnegie Mellon in
Qatar dean Dr Charles E Thorpe, a world-renowned robotics
expert.
http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_
no=35557&version=1&template_id=36&parent_id=16 | back
to top
MySan, Germany | April 28
Carnegie Mellon University will award diplomas May
7 in Greece to its first international class of graduates enrolled in
the MSIN (Master of Science in Information Networking) program offered
by Carnegie Mellon’s Information Networking Institute (INI) in
collaboration with Athens Information Technology (AIT). Carnegie Mellon
President Jared L. Cohon will preside over the event
and offer remarks. Students from India, Bulgaria, Romania, Lebanon,
Greece, the Ukraine and the United States will participate in a diploma
ceremony featuring Pittsburgh entrepreneur and Carnegie Mellon Trustee
John G. Rangos as the keynote speaker. "INI programs
are leading the way in integrating technology, policy and business to
educate the leaders of tomorrow," said Pradeep K. Khosla,
dean of Carnegie Mellon’s College of Engineering and co-founder
of the Carnegie Mellon educational collaboration in 2001. The new 29-member
graduating class enters the marketplace with competitive problem-solving
skills and the technical savvy so essential for success in today’s
fluid global marketplace, according to Dena Tsamitis,
head of Carnegie Mellon’s Information Networking Institute.
http://www.mysan.de/article91759.html
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