Area alumni and participants dodged rain showers and fly balls Saturday morning in the hope their team walked away not only a winner, but a bit richer for charity. The MSU Alumni Association hosted the MSU Young Alumni Softball Tournament, a first of its kind for the organization, at East Lansing Softball Complex, 6400 Abbot Road.
Inspired by a documentary he watched as a college student and the patients he now treats as a physician, John Goudreau is researching a protein called Parkin that might help prevent Parkinson’s disease. There is no cure for the disease, which kills brain cells and can cause tremors, loss of movement and psychological impairment.
Going pro twice, local BMX — or bicycle motocross — rider Greg Days has been racing since he was 10 years old. He went pro at age 17, but retired five years later to start a family, he said.
MSU’s Dean of the College of Nursing, Mary Mundt, was appointed co-chair of the new Michigan Nursing Education Council with the goal of upgrading the state’s nursing curriculum to a national level.
The Lansing Model Railroad Club was joined by the Capital Area Railway Society and the Grand Rapids Model Railroad Historical Society to host the inaugural Train Day at the Michigan 4-H Children’s Garden at MSU, and the garden plans to expand the clubs involved for next year.
the 13th annual Great Dairy Adventure on Wednesday at the MSU Pavilion for Agriculture and Livestock Education offered a way of better understanding Michigan’s largest agricultural industry. The consumer education dairy event is organized by MSU and the United Dairy Industry of Michigan, or UDIM, and is part of the Michigan Dairy Expo — the largest dairy event in the state — which squeezes in activities throughout four days.
High-tech manufacturing holds the hope for Michigan’s economic future, according to a report released Wednesday by MSU, the University of Michigan and Wayne State University. As of 2007, advanced manufacturing employed more than 380,000 citizens, about 10.3 percent of the state’s workers. On average, they earned more than $60,000 annually, which still is increasing. By comparison, employees in traditional manufacturing jobs earned about $50,000 annually.
In 2002, the emerald ash borer killed tens of millions of trees in the state of Michigan. Now, a new website created by an MSU professor identifies areas vulnerable to invasive species, such as the emerald ash borer, in an attempt to prevent outbreaks and damage to the environment. The site, metroinvasive.info, contains maps showing “hot” areas for exotic species, information useful to researchers who are interested in the human mediated dispersion of pests.
After speaking to a crowd of 7,000 Kiwanis at the 95th annual Kiwanis International Convention in Las Vegas last month, attendees voted Sue Petrisin into the international trustee position. She will serve a three-year term as a trustee and member of the governance and leadership education committees beginning Oct. 1. Kiwanis International is a service-oriented organization focusing on assisting children on a local and global scale.
As Attorney General Mike Cox and U.S. Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Holland, are locked in a statistical tie for the lead going into the Republican gubernatorial primary Aug. 3, Ann Arbor businessman Rick Snyder has been gaining ground, according to a poll released Friday by Glengariff Group Inc., of Chicago. After surveying 500 voters across Michigan, the poll shows Cox with 26.4 percent of the vote, Hoekstra with 25.6 percent and Snyder with 20.2 percent.
The MSU Anaerobic Digestion Research and Education Center — completed in April from a private grant — studies optimal ways to convert waste into energy by harvesting naturally occurring methane gas. Using methane — a greenhouse gas — also will reduce the negative effect it would have on the environment if left untreated.
Voting by absentee ballot in elections might now be easier for students living away from home. The Michigan Secretary of State announced Monday voters now can track their absentee ballots online.
MSU medical students and faculty will be able to study and complete research at Chogoria Hospital in Kenya as part of a new agreement through the MSU College of Osteopathic Medicine and Institute of International Health, or IIH. The partnership was announced Monday and sets up a program for fourth-year medical students in the College of Osteopathic Medicine to study in Chogoria, Kenya for six weeks as part of an international elective program.
For 14 days, more than 80 paddlers will travel 225 miles from Jackson, Mich., to Lake Michigan on the longest river in the state. They will pass through 18 counties, 158 townships and try to raise $20,000 for the National Kidney Foundation of Michigan, or NKFM, on the Grand River Expedition, or GRE, of 2010.
With dozens of sheep, goats, hogs and cattle, the second annual Michigan Livestock Expo was in full swing this weekend at the MSU Pavilion for Agriculture and Livestock Education. Featuring exhibitions, sales and contests, the expo will conclude Tuesday with an auction of the award-winning animals from the 8- to 20-year-old exhibitors. The expo is the largest in the state.
MSU students living in residence halls will split the cost of switching the Brody Complex’s water supply to East Lansing’s water system. The switch, which occurred during the spring semester, has doubled the amount MSU typically pays to supply water to campus buildings. MSU’s Hospitality Services and all students who reside on campus will pay for the switch through room and board rates in lieu of students living in Brody’s residence halls picking up the entire cost.
The 31st annual Michigan Agriculture Expo will be held from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday and Wednesday and from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Thursday. Held at the corner of Farm Lane and Mount Hope Road, the event is sponsored by MSU’s College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, or CANR. The expo will include a variety of exhibits, more than 235 vendors and events such as livestock handling and a toy tractor show.
MSU Extension is offering a program to help sheep and goat producers manage the internal parasites of their animals. The workshop, Integrated Parasite Management Program for Sheep and Goat Producers, will be held Saturday in Manchester, Mich.; July 31 in Union City, Mich.; and Sept.
Although the confidence for women to pursue careers has improved in recent years, they still face the issues of the everyday world. The Girls to Women Conference was started by the Women’s Center of Greater Lansing three years ago, after a junior high student confessed that she was tired of seeing her friends succumb to the pressures of school, the media and bad influences from their peers without a way to work through their issues successfully.
An MSU researcher will study links between arsenic exposure and lung cancer to determine new treatments using a recently secured $1.7 million grant. The National Institutes of Health awarded Chengfeng Yang, a physiology assistant professor with the College of Veterinary Medicine and MSU’s Center for Integrative Toxicology, a five-year general grant to study the roles of small ribonucleic acids called microRNAs in cell transformation caused by direct exposure to arsenic.