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NC State Geneticist Wins $1.35M Grant
Michael Purugganan, geneticsBroad given faculty post
Molly Broad
Auction
for the Animals is Saturday
NCSU items to be auctioned
Wolfpack
shacks
students
Photo:
Act of faith
Sept. 11 memorial
Apartments
offer hope for those living with sickle cell
leadership institute for minority youths
Obituary:
ANNE COOPER STANSEL
retired from NCSU
NC State Geneticist Wins $1.35M Grant
Sept. 24, 2004
LocalTechWire
By staff report
© Copyright 2004
RALEIGH – Michael Purugganan, an associate professor of genetics at NC State, has been awarded a five-year, $1.35 million grant to research the blooming of plants.
Purugganan is part of a team of researchers from Brown University, Kansas State, the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Max Plank Institute for Developmental Biology that will focus on what forces trigger flowering.
“We want to find out how parts of the genome responsible for controlling flowering time are evolving in Arabidopis (mustard seed),” Purugganan said. “We want a better understanding of how plants flower, and this may help us learn more about flowering in crops.”
The grant is from the National Science Foundation.
Sept. 24, 2004
Durham Herald-Sun
By JIM SHAMP
© Copyright 2004
DURHAM -- Terrence Devon Sherrod the First routinely uses his full name as a kind of artistic signature.
He says he started using it that way when he was selling his paintings. That was about a decade ago, when he could afford to buy art supplies. Before the disability from sickle cell disease, when his red blood cells clumped up in his head and struck him with a brain-damaging stroke at the age of 21.
Sickle cell disease is an incurable group of genetic disorders affecting the red blood cells. Normal red cells are shaped like round doughnuts and move through the body's blood vessels delivering oxygen. A red substance inside, called hemoglobin, gives them their color.
But a certain genetic mutation can make the cells take on a cresent-moon, or sickle, shape -- thus the name sickle cell disease or sickle cell anemia. And besides the threat of deadly or debilitating strokes of the kind that changed Sherrod's life, sickle cell disease also may be accompanied by lung blockages, sudden bouts of excruciating pain, bone damage, skin ulcers, infections, anemia, delayed growth, jaundice and other complications.
The disease used to be lethal at an early age. Today, the mean life span for people who have the disease in the United States is 46 for women and 44 for men. That means half the people with sickle cell disease live past those ages, including some in the Durham area who have lived into their 70s.
But the quality of life is stolen from most people with sickle cell disease. Many, like Sherrod, are unable to keep steady jobs because of frequent hospitalizations, fatigue and other disease-related problems. Sherrod says he's most troubled by the memory loss from his stroke.
"Right now, I'm writing a novel," he says. "I'm definitely using some autobiographical material. And eventually I hope to get back to school, finish my degree in math and go for a master's in astrophysics or astronomy. But memorizing is still tough. Before my stroke, I was told my mind was a steel trap. I could remember things for months or years. Now I might not remember you tomorrow. It's kind of like having an encyclopedia with random pages ripped out. You never know what you're going to forget. So I keep a little booklet to jot down important things that come to me. A friend told me I should probably get a [hand-held computer], but I'll need to earn some money first."
Sherrod says one sign of success for him right now would be to become one of the first of eight low-income adults accepted into the Bridges Pointe Apartments -- the result of a $265,000 housing renovation project at 722 Kent St. for low-income people battling sickle cell disease.
The apartments, scheduled to open at 1 p.m. today with a ribbon-cutting ceremony, offer a unique ray of hope to people who have sickle cell disease. The facility, a joint project of the Durham Community Land Trustees and the Bridges Pointe Foundation, is touted as the first housing in the nation geared specifically toward the needs of people with sickle cell disease.
Volunteers, staff and administrators of the Duke sickle cell center established the Bridges Pointe Foundation in 1996 to provide services outside of the scope of Duke's medical program, including job training, literacy counseling, independent living skills, crisis prevention and group support.
The group's partner in the apartment building, the Durham Community Land Trustees, develops affordable housing, with a special emphasis on revitalizing Durham's West End neighborhoods. The nonprofit group also is responsible for renovating and managing the Bridges Pointe building, a former single-family home that was converted to rental apartments and eventually became a vacant neighborhood rehabilitation target.
But now the apartments are ready for occupancy, and the Bridges Pointe Foundation is screening potential residents.
The apartment building includes two one-bedroom apartments for people earning less than $25,000, says Selina Mack, executive director of the Land Trustees. There also are two suite-style apartments -- one for men and the other for women -- available to qualified applicants earning less than $15,000 a year. Each has three bedrooms and a common living-kitchen area.
Residents also will have to complete several classes on group living and financial management and commit to providing yearly community service work, officials say. The one-bedroom unit could potentially accommodate a parent and child, as well, Mack says.
Loans for the Bridges Pointe Apartments were secured from the Federal Home Loan Bank of Cincinnati, via CCB, Mack says, and also through the N.C. Housing Finance Agency and the N.C. Community Development Initiative.
Sherrod says that even those with sickle cell disease who aren't troubled by frequent medical crises have to either luck into jobs with good pay and group medical insurance or accept a life of poverty under Medicaid, the federal government's health insurance for the poor.
"If I had to pay for my prescriptions out-of-pocket, that would be well over $500 a month alone," says Sherrod, 32, a native of Tarboro and the oldest of seven children. One of his brothers has sickle cell anemia, while another has the trait, he says.
Sherrod was only three months shy of graduation from Fayetteville State University, with a math degree and a minor in physics, when he had his stroke. As recently as 1990, he says, he was one of the top 30 black high school students in North Carolina -- a status that allowed him to attend a leadership institute for minority youths at N.C. State University. Success seemed assured, especially with a four-year academic scholarship to Fayetteville State, he says.
Now, Sherrod says living in the Bridges Pointe Apartments would give him a measure of dignity and independence once again. And it's on a bus line, so it also represents mobility.
Even though he lives on $400 a month in disability support and Medicaid help with his constant medical bills, Sherrod says he still feels fortunate. College friends in the Durham area have helped him by providing places to stay and even financial support when his disability checks arrived late. And he gets excellent medical support from Duke University's Comprehensive Sickle Cell Center, he says.
That's where he met staff member Elaine Whitworth, who also is the Duke liaison to the Bridges Pointe Foundation. Whitworth says Sherrod fits the profile of ideal clients for the Bridges Pointe Apartments.
"Many people with sickle cell disease are forced to live with family or friends, and need this kind of boost to achieve more independence without the fear of losing their home when they have a sickle cell crisis," she says.
Sherrod says it was tough trying to pay for a place to live and for his medical care. He's now living in a friend's Durham home while awaiting confirmation of his application for housing at Bridges Pointe Apartments.
"At one point, I was renting a 12-by-12-foot room in a Durham boarding house for $300 a month," Sherrod says. "That was the cheapest thing I could reasonably find when I came here for care at Duke. But that still didn't leave enough for food or other expenses."
As he made his first visit to the Bridges Pointe Apartments this week, Sherrod says he was imagining the possibilities.
"This will be a tremendous help for people like me," he says of the expected $150-a-month rent and other amenities. "This means a lot to me after 10 years trying to stabilize my life."
It might even give him the space, and let him save the money, he says, to start painting again.
Auction for the Animals is Saturday
Sept. 24, 2004
Durham Herald-Sun
By staff report
© Copyright 2004
RALEIGH -- Second Chance Pet Adoptions is holding its fourth annual Auction for the Animals from 7 to 10 p.m. Saturday at Exploris Museum in downtown Raleigh.
The fund-raising event provides nearly 20 percent of Second Chance's annual operating funds. This year's goal is $25,000.
Among this year's auction items are trips to Anguilla, the British West Indies and Topsail Beach; a football signed by the N.C. State University football team (including Chuck Amato, Philip Rivers and T.A. McLendon), basketballs signed by the NCSU women's and men's basketball teams, weekend Harley rentals from Ray Price Harley Davidson, a home theatre surround sound system, restaurant gift certificates, a year of unlimited movies for four at Raleigh Grande/Crossroads theatres, art and handcrafted jewelry. Second Chance also will hold a raffle for an all-inclusive trip to St. Croix.
Admission is $20 a person, which includes appetizers, wine, beer and non-alcoholic beverages.
The event is sponsored by Hammon's Catering, Budweiser, Lowe's Foods, Whole Foods and Dennis Beiting, of Most Excellent DJ Services.
Second Chance is an all-volunteer, nonprofit organization based in Cary.
Sept. 24, 2004
News & Observer
By TIM SIMMONS
© Copyright 2004
The nights are chilly, the bricks are hard and the shacks are a far cry from the apartments and dorms where they normally live.
But Ben Godfrey figures the lessons that dozens of N.C. State University students learn this week will outlast much of what they recall from any textbook.
The students have been gathered in the NCSU Brickyard since Sunday for the annual Shack-A-Thon, a fund-raiser that's expected to collect more than $10,000 for Wake County's Habitat for Humanity program.
The collection of 21 student groups spent much of Sunday building 14 shacks outside the library, said Godfrey, the NCSU Habitat president.
It's a diverse collection of groups -- including Campus Crusade for Christ, the Caldwell Scholars, the Progressive Student Coalition and the National Society of Black Engineers.
The rules of the fund-raiser are simple. The shacks must be occupied at all times by at least one member of each group.
Donations are accepted in advance, but the bulk of the money comes from panhandling.
As thousands of students pass the library on the way to classes, those in the shacks step out with cups, hats or anything else that will hold loose change and dollar bills.
"It's easier than I thought it would be," said Marcus Bennett, a sophomore who is taking several turns outside the makeshift shack jointly sponsored by the National Society of Black Engineers and the Peer Mentoring program. "People are pretty quick to give you something. If someone in a group stops, you often get at least a little bit from everyone."
Godfrey isn't sure that all of the students who participate even understand what Habitat is about when the week starts.
"What they understand right away is that setting up in the Brickyard for a week is a great way for people to notice you," Godfrey said. "It's also a great place for people to hang out during the day with friends."
Yet along the way, students also realize that Habitat is a Christian-based group that helps poor families build affordable homes and learn the skills they need to rely on themselves.
Godfrey knows of only one other campus in the nation that holds a Shack-A-Thon. Jaime Tang, NCSU Habitat president in 2001-02, said that's probably because the idea was homegrown in the mid-1990s.
It wasn't even that popular at first.
"As the story goes, some students were building a regular shack for one of the Habitat homes in the area and started talking about raising money," said Tang, whose first fund-raiser was in 1998. "So they put up a shack in the Brickyard and started asking for money. The next year, two groups set up shacks, and then the next year, a few more showed up."
When it came time for last year's event, Godfrey said, it was clear that some sort of organizational meeting was in order when the Brickyard was filled to its capacity of 14 shacks. This year, so many groups wanted a spot that NCSU Habitat was able to auction off sites.
The novelty of the event is probably wearing thin by today, though. Cool nights and days of begging have that effect.
But the groups will squeeze a few more dollars from the shacks by letting students knock them all down with sledgehammers for the price of a small donation.
It's another homegrown idea with a clever name. They call it Whack-A-Shack.
Sept. 24, 2004
News & Observer
Photo by Ethan Hyman
© Copyright 2004
Cutline: For Amber Turley, a memorial at N.C. State University on the third anniversary of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, was a chance to reflect, pray and remember. Turley, who came with her neighbor's daughter, Gabriella Talluchi, is a lance corporal in the Marine Corps Reserve. She joined the Marines after Sept. 11, 2001, and has been deployed to Kuwait and Iraq. 'Being in the military has solidified my faith,' Turley said. 'You learn about issues that are a lot bigger than yourself. It helps you realize that there is a lot more out there than in your own little world.' The memorial also gave Turley a chance to reflect on those still overseas. 'I prayed for my friends that are still over there fighting the war on terrorism,' Turley said. 'I prayed for their safety and success overseas and getting the mission accomplished.'
Sept. 24, 2004
News & Observer
By JANE STANCILL
© Copyright 2004
CHAPEL HILL -- UNC President Molly Broad received a guaranteed five-year term as a professor in UNC-Chapel Hill's School of Government on Thursday, though it won't begin until she retires as leader of the University of North Carolina system.
Broad, 63, has not said when she plans to step down. When asked during the summer, she said, "Someday." On Thursday, she said through a spokeswoman that there was no set timeline for her retirement.
The faculty appointment was approved Thursday by UNC-CH's Board of Trustees. Broad will hold the position of "professor of the practice," which is not a tenured job but a title reserved for professionals who teach based on their particular career expertise.
Her salary will be paid not by the Chapel Hill campus but by the UNC system's Office of the President, said Richard "Stick" Williams, trustee chairman at UNC-CH. "When she comes, the funding comes," Williams said.
The approval Thursday formalizes a handshake deal that Broad made with leaders of the UNC Board of Governors when she was hired in 1997. She had been promised a faculty position upon retirement, but the agreement was never inked in a contract.
In May, the UNC system board signed off on a plan to give Broad the same deal it has offered retiring chancellors in recent years -- a one-year, fully paid sabbatical and, thereafter, a faculty position at 60 percent of the former salary.
Broad's current salary is $312,504. If she retired at that salary, her annual faculty pay could be $187,502. The average annual salary for a full professor at UNC-CH was $106,300 in 2003-04, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education.
The faculty appointment has been in the works for months. Last year, UNC system board members began efforts to honor the promise they had made to Broad.
Michael Smith, dean of the School of Government, said UNC-CH Chancellor James Moeser asked him whether the school would be interested in having Broad on the faculty. Smith began discussions with Broad, and the two determined it would be a good fit, he said.
No specific role is planned for Broad, Smith said, but she has expertise in leadership, strategic planning, information technology and economic development. Those are all subjects taught in the school.
"I'm satisfied there are enough really good areas of overlap; there will be a good match," Smith said.
He said he could imagine Broad teaching core courses for public administration graduate students. "I think the students would just be thrilled to have her as a professor," he said.
Smith said faculty members at the school were unanimous in their approval.
Williams added that faculty were assured that Broad's appointment would be more than "a political hire."
"Once they realized she would be an active and engaged faculty member and part of the extension service of the School of Government, they were very supportive," he said.
Broad's predecessors -- C.D. Spangler and William Friday -- both stepped down at 65, but there is no mandatory retirement age in the UNC system.
(News researcher Becky Ogburn contributed to this report.)
Sept. 24, 2004
Pew Initiative on Food and Biotechnology; checkbiotech.org, Switzerland
By staff report
© Copyright 2004
North Carolina State University professor of sociology and anthropology Thomas Hoban describes himself as, at one point, being "caught up" in the enthusiasm over agricultural biotechnology – the logical next step in a long line of technical innovations in farming.
Now, he's a bit uneasy about it.
"The technology is becoming more complex. We are making changes to plants that will have impact the human diet," he says. "The first crops were designed to impact farmers by saving them money and time. These new products will have direct impact on people. We need more regulation – not less – of the emerging products that are designed to be active in the human body."
Hoban’s main concern is that strong regulatory programs in the US have been short-changed by the current Bush administration. "They have gone back to [an] approach of ‘taking the shackles off the industry.’ The FDA ignored the consensus recommendation from their 1999 public hearings to require the biotechnology industry to simply notify the FDA before they release a new product [leaving such notification voluntary.]"
This summer, Hoban warned the USDA’s Advisory Committee on Biotechnology and 21st Century Agriculture that biopharming and transgenic animals could cause consumers to rally against all food biotechnology because more and more consumers believe potential risks aren’t being discussed openly.
"As the technology jumps from being fairly simplistic, adding a single gene to a plant, to basically reshaping plants at will, we have to start getting more open with the public," he says. "The more we use [the technology] and the more complicated it gets, there are going to be greater risks."
Hoban’s connection to agriculture began in childhood playing on neighbor’s farms outside Chicago. In 1970, he entered the University of Colorado to study ecology, but was having so much fun with the hippie lifestyle he was asked to leave school.
Four years later, Hoban got serious, enrolled in the University of Illinois and earned an undergraduate degree in biology in 1978. In 1986, he earned a doctorate in rural sociology from Iowa State University. Soon after, he took his current position at North Carolina State University studying how people respond to change and to new technologies.
For 15 years, Hoban has kept his finger on the pulse of public acceptance of biotechnology. In 1989, he conducted a survey for the North Carolina Biotech Center to find out how the public viewed biotechnology. Shortly after that, he began speaking around the country to actively endorse the benefits of agricultural biotechnology. "I was fairly excited about the potential," Hoban says.
When the Europeans began making loud noises against the technology, Hoban initially laughed them off. "I thought look at how silly these Europeans are. They don't understand the benefits our farmers are receiving," he says.
Four years ago, Hoban's views began to shift as he took a more critical look at several of the surveys he had conducted. While most of them showed consumers had a favorable opinion of agbiotech, Hoban believes the surveys didn't tell the whole story.
"We were consistently finding 65 to 70 percent of Americans were answering positively to questions such as do you believe there is a benefit from it. Most of them thought it was a good idea," Hoban says. "But, in retrospect, they were answering based on little awareness and knowledge. We were asking people to speculate on things they really didn't know anything about."
He began focusing more on the sizeable "minority" expressing opposition to agricultural biotech. "Polls may show that two out of three express support for biotech. That also means one quarter oppose it and 10 percent don't have an opinion," he points out. "In this country, at least 25 percent of people have always been negative. That number has jumped in recent years."
Hoban believes the minority should be taken more seriously because they tend to be more educated about the issue and more politically active. Many of them have already dropped out of the traditional farming food chain and buy organic.
Hoban is worried about how little people know about the technology. "Polls still show the vast majority of American consumers do not understand that they already have been eating genetically engineered foods," he notes. "When they find out, they resent the fact that no one told them scientists were changing their food."
To some degree Hoban believes crop and agricultural scientists, who actively support the technology, made the mistake of dismissing the public in a case of "scientist knows best."
"However, when consumers are nervous, food companies get nervous," Hoban says. "Agriculture still doesn’t get it that the rules have changed. They no longer call the shots, Walmart does!"
Hoban believes the potential for cross contamination of GM crops designed to make pharmaceuticals with conventional food crops could prove devastating to consumer trust in the food supply. "The bottom line is that the food retailers, processors, and others have gone on record that food crops should not be used to produce pharmaceuticals," he says. "You probably don't want that stuff in food. You don't want to be the food company identified as having plastic or pig vaccines in your corn flakes."
Hoban thinks the Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture need to be informing people more and should require companies to disclose if their products contained GM products.
"The FDA practices of voluntary pre-market notification and substantial equivalence are no longer valid," Hoban maintains. "It is time for the US to learn from the EU about regulation."
Sept. 24, 2004
News & Observer
ANNE COOPER STANSEL OF PAWLEYS ISLAND, SC died Thursday, September 23, 2004 in SC.
Born November 4, 1927 in Socastee, SC she was the daughter of the late Thomas Bethea Cooper, Jr. and Sallie Lucas Cooper. Mrs. Stansel attended Winthrop College and retired from NC State University. She was also a retired realtor. Mrs. Stansel was a member of St. James The Fisherman Episcopal Church in Shalotte.
Surviving are her husband, David B. Stansel; sons, Robert E. Hamilton, Jr. of Litchfield Beach and William B. Hamilton and wife Donna of Ocean Isle, NC; daughter, Patricia Anne Hamilton Collins and husband Herbert M. "Chip" Collins of Winder, GA; stepsons, David B. Stansel, Jr. of Coral Springs, FL and Richard B. Stansel of Raleigh, NC; step-daughter, Jane Weiseman of Blacksburg, VA; seven grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.
Memorial services will be 10:30 AM, Saturday at St. James The Fisherman Episcopal Church followed by a committal service in the Prayer Garden.
An inurnment service will be 3:00 PM, Saturday at Lakeside Cemetery in Conway.
In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to St. James The Fisherman Episcopal Church, Prayer Garden, PO Box 68, Shalotte, NC 28459.