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Fall 2016

The music of life

In Yakima’s Garfield Elementary School, Principal Alan Matsumoto ’75 is hearing music ring through the halls after school. With 100 percent of the students facing poverty, the afterschool Yakima Music en Acción (YAMA) gives them the opportunity to transcend their circumstances with instruments.

YAMA, based on a Venezuelan program called El Sistema, brings professional musicians to the school to teach Garfield students how to play violins, cellos, and other instruments in ensemble groups.

The program launched four years ago with just seven students. Matsumoto says he first heard about El Sistema from Stephanie Hsu, who had recently graduated from training and now leads YAMA. … » More …

Fall 2016

Targeting the brain’s “bad opioids”

The stark reality of drug abuse hit home for Brendan Walker when two college classmates overdosed on heroin and Xanax. Their unsettling deaths steered Walker toward a career in the neuroscience of psychology and addictions.

Today, the associate professor of psychology and member of the Neuroscience Program at WSU is a leader in the study of alcohol and opioid drug dependence. His research is advancing the development of new pharmacotherapy treatments for addiction.

“Alcohol and abused opioids have a lot of similarity,” says Walker. “They both manipulate very powerful primitive systems in the brain that are critical for our motivation.”

One of those systems … » More …

Fall 2016

The glassblowers

Glass is a snob, and that’s a good thing for science. For the most part, glass doesn’t interact with other substances. Essentially inert, glass is perfect for containing the otherwise uncontainable: strong acids, bases, and solvents.

Glass is, of course, also fragile. That’s why Norbert Kruse, a chemical engineer at WSU, had to take a glassblowing class when he was a chemistry student in Berlin in the early 1970s.

“We had to do our own repairs!” Kruse recalls. These days, researchers at WSU don’t have to know glassblowing to keep their labs running. Scientific glassblower Aaron Babino takes care of that.

WSU contracts with Babino, … » More …

Fall 2016

Talkback for Fall 2016

Another close encounter with outer space

Fifty years ago, 1966, I graduated from WSU and then went to work for NASA Ames Research Center at Moffett Field, California. I spent the next 40 years exploring our solar system. WSU gave me the “right stuff” to be a part of sending a “spacecraft where no spacecraft had gone before.” I was in the Pioneer Project and we sent the first spacecraft to the outer planets, Pioneer-10, to fly beyond the orbit of Mars through the asteroid belt and encounter Jupiter in 1973. After the flyby of Jupiter, Pioneer-10, on an escape trajectory from the Sun … » More …

Fall 2016

Fat furnace

Body fat has gotten a bad rap in recent years. It’s understandable given that 70 percent of American adults are reportedly overweight or obese, costing $190 billion per year in related medical bills. But new research shows not all fat is created equal.

Washington State University professor of animal sciences Min Du says our bodies are equipped with both good and bad types of fat that naturally work together to balance weight and metabolism. The process—along with a little help from diet and exercise— involves an intricate interplay between white, beige, and brown fat—or adipose tissue.

“When most people think of body fat, they’re … » More …

Fall 2016

Get out the tweet

Social media’s effect on political participation and civility

In the nonstop flow of Twitter, Facebook, and other social media, it’s hard to avoid comments and news about politics, especially in a presidential election year. Many worry the geyser of political rhetoric and uncivil comments might discourage some from participating.

That’s not always the case, says Porismita Borah, an assistant professor in the Murrow College of Communication at Washington State University since 2012. As a doctoral student at the University of Wisconsin and at WSU, she researches emerging technology and how it affects politics. She coauthored a study in 2008 that found young people became … » More …

Spring 2016

Talkback for Spring 2016

Traditions

Thank you for the article in your Fall 2015 issue about Stevens Hall and their tea cups. I lived there from 1968–1972. It was a great place to live and an interesting time of old traditions (passing an engagement ring around a circle of residents until it stopped at the engaged) to moving on to more modern ones (like allowing men to visit up on the floors and rooms). Through it all were the beautiful teacups and wonderful friends, some of which I still keep in touch with after 43 years!

Gayle Hunt ’72

Serving with distinction

As a WSU alumnus, I … » More …

Summer 2016

Colonizing the stars

Traveling to the stars is one thing. Living there is another.

Washington State University is tackling challenges that could enable future astronauts to survive indefinitely on Mars and other extraterrestrial locations.

At the Voiland College of Engineering and Architecture, for example, a team of students designed a domed habitat that could be built robotically from Martian or Lunar soil with a special 3D printer. Dubbed the WazzuDOME, it was selected by NASA as a finalist in a design competition last year and earned the team a trip to the world’s largest science fair, the annual Maker Faire, in New York City.

“We took … » More …

Summer 2016

A team approach to health care

Matt Wild is battling ALS and knows what’s coming.

He has nothing but praise for the treatment professionals that the U.S. Veteran’s Administration and his personal physician have assembled for him. But it was an experience with health science students at WSU Spokane in February that left him feeling optimistic about the future of medical care.

“They brought together students from different aspects of the health sciences,” recalls Wild, who was diagnosed in early 2015 with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a neurodegenerative condition often referred to as Lou Gehrig’s disease. “Each team was able to look at my case with this cross-over of training and … » More …

Take a walk and call me in the morning - thumb

Summer 2016

Make your community walkable

Step It Up! is the U.S. Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy’s campaign to promote walking and walkable communities. The following whiteboard animation video highlights that walking can be an easy form of physical activity that fosters social connections and shows how we can all get involved to make our communities more walkable.

The nonprofit Walkable and Livable Communities Institute, headquartered in Port Townsend, supports and teaches communities interested in walkability. They describe their vision “to create healthy, connected communities that support active living and that advance opportunities for all people through walkable streets, livable cities and better built environments.”

For example, they offer … » More …