Recent CALS Spotlights

  • Arizona Is Fertile Ground for New York Matzo

    Here, on a Christian farmer’s land five miles from the Mexican border, lies the holiest of fields for some of New York’s most observant Orthodox Jewish communities. Wheat harvested on these 40 acres is destined to become matzo, the unleavened bread eaten by Jews during the eight days of Passover.

    It is not an everyday plant-and-pick operation, and the matzo made from this wheat is not everyday matzo.

    Yisroel Tzvi Brody, rabbi of the Shaarei Orah synagogue in Borough Park, Brooklyn, stood at the edge of one of the fields on Monday, stooping to rub a grain of wheat between his wrinkled thumb and index finger. Removing his glasses, he brought the grain close to his eyes and turned it from side to side, like a gemologist inspecting a precious stone.

  • 4-H Photo Project encourages entrepreneurship, creativity in Pima County youth

    A new 4-H photography project gives kids ages 9 to 18 the opportunity to sell their photos that were exhibited at the Pima County Fair online.

    The idea came to fruition when local 4-H leader, Laura Levin, decided to use online media to showcase as well as sell the 4-H kids’ work. The photos 4-H'ers submit to the county fair are posted online for sale. Each photo is credited to the child who took it and any proceeds go to the young photographer with prices on the prints ranging from $7 for a 4x6 print to $40 for a 20x30 print.

    The website that hosts the children’s photography was launched on April 18, 2012. Individual galleries have been viewed over 1,400 times now, and 15 children have sold their photos.

  • How Men and Women Cooperate

    Cooperation is essential in any successful romantic relationship, but how men and women experience cooperation emotionally may be quite different, according to new research conducted at the University of Arizona.

    Ashley Randall, a post-doctoral research associate in the John & Doris Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences in the UA's College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, has been interested for some time in how romantic partners' emotions become coordinated with one another. For example, if someone comes home from work in a bad mood we know their partner's mood might plummet as well, but what are the long-term implications of this on their relationship?

    Randall wondered how the act of cooperating, a beneficial relationship process, might impact emotional coordination between partners.

  • Report: Physical Education Should be 'Core Academic Subject'

    Daily exercise for school children is so important that physical education should be made a "core academic subject," says a new report from the Institute of Medicine.

    University of Arizona professor Scott Going, a co-author of the report, says that physical health is so important to the overall health, development and academic success for children that schools should play a primary role in ensuring an adequate level of activity.

    "We need to make physical education a core subject, just like math and English and science," says Going, professor of nutritional sciences and interim head of the department of nutritional sciences. "We felt so strongly that it's important for kids to get it for their physical health, for their mental health, that they should get it at school so that all kids have a chance of meeting the recommendation."

  • Turn Up the Heat to Turn Down Depression?

    Researchers at the University of Arizona are recruiting patients for a study exploring how heating up the body might help treat severe depression.

    Led by Dr. Charles Raison, a UA associate professor of psychiatry and member of the UA's BIO5 Institute, the study will examine the use of whole-body hyperthermia as an alternative treatment for depression. The work will build on Raison's existing research, suggesting that increasing a person's core body temperature may have antidepressant effects.

    "We've known for a long time that the brain affects the body – that how you think, how you feel can change how your body functions," said Raison, also the Barry and Janet Lang Associate Professor of Integrative Mental Health at the UA's John & Doris Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences. "I have been interested for years in the opposite, which is the impact that the body has on the brain."

  • CALS Scientist Among Two UA Faculty to Earn NSF Career Awards

    Two University of Arizona scientists received the 2013 National Science Foundation Career Award, the agency's most prestigious honor for junior faculty members.

    Shirley Papuga, assistant professor in the School of Natural Resources and the Environment, and Jonathan Sprinkle, assistant professor in electrical and computer engineering, won the awards, roughly $500,000 over five years, granted to scientists who demonstrate outstanding research, excellent education and have a particular skill at integrating both aspects.

    Papuga's work in ecohydrology and land-atmosphere interactions seeks to discover more about how arid and semi-arid ecosystems work, particularly as it relates to ongoing drought and climate change.

  • CALS Grows Gourmet Mushrooms That Recycle Waste

    The University of Arizona class is called "Mushrooms, Molds and Man." Intrigued, undergraduate Lauren Jackson decided to learn about "Kingdom Fungi" and its impact on the world.

    He was hooked in a heartbeat. Barely into the course, "I just raised my hand and asked about research opportunities." That week he started working in the lab with UA mycologist Barry Pryor.

    Today, Pryor and Jackson are growing delicious, nutritious gourmet mushrooms – while turning coffee grounds, used brewery grains, straw, newspapers, pizza boxes and other woody landscape waste into compost. "Fungi are the great decomposers of the Earth. Without them, fallen trees would be stacked up in the forest. Without them, we would not have this regeneration of soil," Jackson said.

    The UA's novel mushroom-based recycling program is "working with nature rather than against it," testing how well the mushrooms break down various materials. The next step is to grow the mushrooms on a larger scale, outside the plant sciences lab. At that point, the gourmet mushrooms could turn into an Earth-friendly cash crop.

  • Video Games Seek to Teach Smart Financial Strategies

    Can video games help people save money?

    SavingsQuest, an applied research project bringing together the University of Arizona and the Doorways to Dreams, or D2D, Fund under a Center for Financial Services Innovation grant, will test the theory in hopes of finding a mix of game features that will entice smart savings behavior.

    "Financial education only goes so far. You need to have some experience with actual products to understand how the market works and have financial capability," said Michael Staten, director of the Take Charge America Institute for Consumer Financial Education and Research and professor in the Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences.

    "That's the real objective of financial education programs – to get consumers comfortable and capable with sorting through complex options to reach a financial decision that's best for them."

  • Carnivorous Plant Throws Out ‘Junk’ DNA

    Genes – the bits of DNA that code for proteins – make up about 2 percent of the human genome. The rest consists of a genetic material known as noncoding DNA, and scientists have spent years puzzling over why this material exists in such voluminous quantities.

    Now, a new study offers an unexpected insight: The large majority of noncoding DNA, which is abundant in many living things, may not actually be needed for complex life, according to an advance online publication in Nature.

    The clues lie in the genome of the carnivorous bladderwort plant, Utricularia gibba.

    The U. gibba genome is the smallest ever to be sequenced from a complex, multicellular plant. The researchers who deciphered the DNA say that 97 percent of the genome consists of genes and small pieces of DNA that control those genes.

    It appears that the plant has been busy deleting noncoding DNA, sometimes also called "junk" DNA, from its genetic material over many generations, the scientists say. This may explain the difference between bladderworts and species with large amounts of noncoding DNA, like corn and tobacco – and humans.

  • CALS Camp Benefits Explorers of All Ages

    Camp isn't just for the kids anymore.

    "I know when I go to camp I feel like a big kid," said Kristin Wisneski, senior program coordinator with Arizona Cooperative Extension, which oversees the James 4-H Camp and Outdoor Learning Center at Mingus Springs.

    The camp, which is owned and operated by Arizona 4-H Youth Development through the University of Arizona College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, is set on 55 acres in the picturesque Mingus Mountains in the Prescott National Forest. This camp has it all – boating, swimming, fishing, hiking, softball, basketball, volleyball, horseshoes, orienteering and a challenge course, as well as hands-on learning opportunities.

    James 4-H Camp provides an ideal setting for staff retreats and UA research projects, as well as a good, old-fashioned camp experience for kids. Located about 15 miles east of Prescott Valley, the camp is open from mid-April through mid-October, and fees are offered on a sliding scale.