In-depth reporting by Illinois Public Media News
Listen to the latest Illinois Public Media Newscast:
Play now:
Story category: science
Double Transplant Improves Quality of Life for Some Diabetics
Story air date: Thursday, December 23, 2010
Type 2 diabetes – the kind related to obesity and an unhealthy diet – gets a lot of attention these days. But there’s another, less common, form of the disease – type 1 – that can also lead to life-threatening complications. Reporter Véronique LaCapra went behind the scenes at a St. Louis hospital, for the transplant operation that got one woman off dialysis, and made her diabetes-free.
(Photo by Véronique LaCapra)
Audio archives:
Play now:
Download: mp3 file
Story links:
Story categories:
health • health care • scienceWhy Haiti Collapsed After the Quake
Story air date: Tuesday, February 16, 2010
A University of Illinois researcher back from Haiti says it was hard to separate his scientific work from the crisis surrounding him. Scott Olson is a professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering. He and a team of other geo-engineers examined if a process called liquefaction shook the Haitian soil so much that it could no longer support the structures on top of it – like the giant cranes at the capital’s only port. The destruction blocked valuable aid from getting to victims. Olson sat down with AM 580’s Tom Rogers to talk about the trip in both scientific and human terms.
Audio archives:
Play now:
Download: mp3 file
Story categories:
environment • science • University of IllinoisDanish UI Student Heads Home to the Copenhagen Climate Summit
Story air date: Thursday, December 10, 2009
Adam Lentz is taking a week from his studies at the University of Illinois to go back to his home town in Europe. But it’ll be a working break – his home is Copenhagen, where representatives from the world’s countries have gathered to hammer out an agreement on climate change. Lentz is a Fulbright graduate student studying natural resources and environmental science. When he was an undergraduate at the University of Copenhagen, he was the president of the Union of Danish Natural Resource Students. He’s going to the Copenhagen summit to monitor its progress, and he sat down with AM 580's Tom Rogers to talk about his expectations.
Audio archives:
Play now:
Download: mp3 file
Story categories:
environment • government • United States • science • University of IllinoisThe Movies and Science
Story air date: Friday, May 29, 2009
Researchers have found an opportunity for public education in a Hollywood blockbuster. “The DaVinci Code” offered a rich backdrop of religious history in laying out its plot. And in its sequel “Angels and Demons,” author Dan Brown injects physics – the Vatican is threatened by a bomb planted by the shadowy organization the Illuminati. Its explosive charge is based on antimatter stolen from CERN, the Swiss particle physics laboratory that produces antimatter in its Large Hadron Collider. Physicists want to step in with some caveats. University of Illinois professor Kevin Pitts says CERN, the collider and antimatter are very real, but he tells AM 580's Tom Rogers that antimatter’s potential is just starting to be realized.
Audio archives:
Play now:
Download: mp3 file
Story categories:
arts and culture • entertainment • science • technologyAstronaut, UI Alumnus Looks Beyond NASA's Shuttle Program
Story air date: Thursday, May 07, 2009
NASA is preparing for a phase-out of its space shuttle program. The shuttle will be replaced by the Orion space capsule. But there will be a 4 to 5 year gap in between the last shuttle launch and the first voyage of the Orion. AM 580’s Jeff Bossert talked with the commander of the most recent shuttle mission, University of Illinois graduate Lee Archambault, for his thoughts on the future of the US space program:
