Volume 124 Issue 41
kansan.com
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
HEALTH
DAVID F. MCKINNEY/UNIVERSITY RELATIONS
Sarah Kieweg, assistant professor of mechanical engineering at the University Kansas received a $1.3 million grant to expand her research into developing a gel that can help protect women from HIV.
Researchers seek prevention for HIV
CLAIRE MCINERNY
cmcinerny@kansan.com
HIV prevention has a new advocate at the University. Sarah Kieweg, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, received a $1.3 million grant from the National Institute of Health to continue developing a preventative gel for the virus.
"This microbicidal gel needs to protect all the vaginal surfaces. It needs to be spreading where it needs to go and keeping the drug where it needs to be, so the basics of the research involve examining the fluid mechanics of how that gel will spread around". Kieweg said in an Oct. 7 news release.
The team of researchers, which also includes Carl Weiner, chair of obstetrics and gynecology at KU Medical Center and Kyle Camarda, associate professor of chemical and petroleum engineering, are developing an instrument that predicts how the gel moves, to make sure the gel is as effective as possible against HIV and other STDs.
Weiner is testing the instrument and used it in normal exams with a few dozen women so far. He said Keiweg and her team are at the halfway point with developing this tool.
The goal for the team's instrument is to perfect the gel's physical and chemical barrier for women against HIV and other STDs. If completed, the instrument will help create other drugs for women's sexual health.
Camarda's group focuses on the design of polymeric liquids for the gel. He and his team are focused more on the structure of the product, avoiding extensive experiments that will not be effective.
"It's like designing a better hammer," Weiner said. "For building better houses and better furniture."
The school of engineering and its researchers are not only excited about the opportunity to advance health care for their own research, but for the bigger picture as well.
"I think a focus on women's health, and particularly women's health in poorer nations, is an excellent idea for an academic project," Camarda said. "We
ANTI-VIRUS GEL FACT BOX
WHAT IT IS:
A gel that is targeted mainly toward women to help prevent the spread of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections
WHO DEVELOPED IT: Researchers at KU Medical Center. The team is lead by Sarah Kieweg, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering.
HOW IT WAS MADE POSSIBLE:
Kieweg received a $1.3 million grant from the National Institute of Health
Health
WHEN IT WILL BE AVAILABLE: The gel is still in the developmental stages.
If you have questions about HIV or other STIs, contact Watkins Memorial Health Center at (785) 864-9500
can have an impact on society in ways that corporations or other entities may not be able to implement. And I very much enjoy seeing practical results of the computational research that goes on in my lab."
Edited by C.J. Matson
HITTING THE RIGHT NOTE
Music students rescue festival across Atlantic in German city
CONTRIBUTED BY JÄNIS PORIETIS
ISAAC GWIN
editor@kansan.com
This summer, nearly 5,000 miles away in a small, picturesque German town, fears bounded as a cultural heritage was on the threshold of vanishing forever. Hope would come in the form of an extraordinary plan of action involving student musicians: one that would fundamentally unite two cities on opposite ends of the earth.
Since 1951, Eutin, a Lawrence sister city of some 17,000 people located in northern Germany, has held an annual summer music festival, attracting between 30,000 and 40,000 visitors from across Europe during the months of July and August. The festival has come to symbolize a strong, collective identity for the citizens of Eutin, while also bringing in a yearly economic stimulus that local business owners could depend on. Despite the festival's vital role in the community, a lack of financial oversight was threatening to close the doors of the festival for
CONTROBLED BY JANIS FORELKS
The entire University Symphony Orchestra and a cast of opera singers from the School of Music traveled nearly 5,000 miles to sister city in Eutin, Germany to help save and revive a bankrupt music festival in July.
good, bringing about a plea for assistance that the University would answer with the entire University Symphony Orchestra and a cast of opera singers - altogether some 70 students. In the fall of 2010, after learning of the festival organizers' file for bankruptcy, a group of local merchants known as the Eutin Trade Association began considering ways to save and revitalize the ebbing event. In December, Hans Wilhelm Hagen, treasurer of the Eutin Trade Association, contacted David Neely, KU director of orchestral activities, and proposed the idea of bringing over student musicians from the University to comprise the festival.
David Neely and Robert Walzel, dean of the KU School of Music, led a team of five students to Germany to perform a teaser concert in January. The show sold out and local newspapers caught on to the story. The city and state then approved funding for the summer music festival.
CONTRIBUTED BY JÄNIS PORIETIS
An annual music festival located in Northern Germany had been threatened with cancellation until the University Symphony Orchestra stepped in to help. Along with a cast of opera singers, the groups gave their time to perform with the community.
The Show Must Go On
Upon their arrival in Eutin, the orchestra immediately started rehearsals for their first performance. Expectations for the festival were high. Being accustomed to professional musicians, there was much
speculation in the community as to just how well a student orchestra would perform.
"One great thing about it for the students was they really got a sense
CAMPUS
SEE SYMPHONY PAGE 3
University receives "red light"
BOBBY BURCH
bburch@kansan.com
The University received the lowest possible ranking for a U.S. academic institution for expressive rights on campus, according to the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, also known as "FIRE"
FIRE issued the University a "red-light" rating in 2011 for two policies in its "Housing Handbook" that the group considers to restrict freedom of speech.
"Without free speech and the full exchange of ideas on a college campus, students are only going to get part of the picture" said Azhar Majeed, FIRE's associate director of legal and public advocacy. "One's education at the college level consists of more than just classes and exams. It includes the conversations that you have with your fellow students, with your professors and other people in the college community."
FIRE ranks colleges and universities on a rating system comprised of three colored traffic lights; green, yellow and red. Of the 390 academic institutions FIRE evaluated in 2011, 67 percent received a red-light ranking.
Red-light institutions have "at least one policy that both clearly and substantially restricts freedom of speech," according to FIRE's website. A yellow-light ranking means that the institution has some policies that ban or regulate protected speech. FIRE assigns a green-light rating to a college or university if it's unable to find a policy that obstructs free speech rights.
FIRE
The University of Kansas is among 261 academic institutions in the U.S. that received a "red-light" rating in FIRE's report entitled "Spotlight on Speech Codes 2011: The State of Free Speech on Our Nation's Campuses"
FIRE is a nonprofit educational foundation that unites civil rights and civil liberties leaders, scholars, journalists, and public intellectuals.
FIRE claims that the University's "Housing Hald book" contains two harassment and sexual assault poli-
FIRE's core mission is to protect the unprotected and to educate the public and communities of concerned Americans about the threats to these rights on our campuses and about the means to preserve them.
These rights include:
· Freedom of speech
· Legal equality
· Due process
· Religious liberty
· Sanctity of conscience
cles that limit free speech. One University policy that the group takes issue with states that harassment includes conduct that "purposely humiliates another person, stalks another person, or makes degrading comments or prank phone calls."
Majeed said that FIRE has problems with these University policies in two ways.
cies conflict with the Supreme Court's definition of harassment outlined in Davis v. Monroe County Board of Education, which states such conduct must be "so severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive that it can be said to deprive the victims of access to the educational opportunities
First, he said, the University's poli-
Index
CLASSIFIEDS 7
CROSSWORD 4
CRYPTOQUIPS 5
SPORTS 8
DPINION 5
SUCKUK 4
SEE SPEECH PAGE 3
Don't forget
in contents, unless stated otherwise. $ \textcircled{2} $ 2011 The University Daily Kansan
Today is the last day to pick up tickets at Allen Fieldhouse or online at KUathletics.com.
Today's Weather
Forecasts done by University students. For a more detailed forecast, see page 2A
HI: 53
LO: 29
Brr, it's cold!