Welcome to the first edition of E-News. Letter from President Yudof Sept. 13, 2001 1. The Yudofs hit the airwaves 5. New report puts 'U' amoung nations' elite public research universities 2. Better days coming for Coffman 3. U of M student featured in Oct. Glamour Magazine 4. New U research on monarch butterflies in bio-tech cornfields 6. U of M Happenings 7. U of M Web links U IN THE NEWS THE YUDOFS HIT THE AIRWAVES MARK AND JUDY YUDOF TO CO-HOST WCCO RADIO SHOW People who can't get enough university-related news, information or entertainment can now get it straight from the top. "Beyond the U," a monthly radio show co-hosted by University of Minnesota President Mark Yudof and his wife, Judy Yudof, will premiere at 1 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 2, on WCCO Radio (830 AM). The hour-long call-in show will air on the first Tuesday of every month and focus on a variety of general interest topics, including the university, current and legal affairs, politics and the implications of new technologies. "This is a unique and exciting opportunity," said Mark Yudof. "Never before has a U of M president had this kind of opportunity to connect each month with so many of our stakeholders. On a lighter note, we also think it will be great fun to discuss the issues we talk about around the dinner table with the people of Minnesota." According to Yudof, the co-hosts will have no problem finding fodder to debate, critique and discuss. He is a former Texas lawyer and law professor whose interests include pop-science and country music, and Judy is a community volunteer who will begin serving as international president of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism in February. They have two adult children. All of which make the Yudofs a great fit for WCCO, according to Wendy Paulson, the station's program director. "Having the Yudofs on once a month gives WCCO listeners access to great information, which is what 'CCO is all about," she said. "After meeting them, I know they are warm, loving, caring, funny, real people. They will provide great entertainment that only WCCO can offer." "Beyond the U" will originate from the station's studios in Minneapolis. Guests will occasionally join the Yudofs, and listeners are invited to join the discussion by calling (612) 989-9226. The Yudofs will not be paid for doing the show. Instead, Mark Yudof said he will benefit from "the opportunity to hear from citizens throughout the state who listen to WCCO, one of the state's best known sources of news, information and entertainment." Paulson describes the show as "another extension of the strong relationship the university has with WCCO Radio." WCCO Radio also broadcasts Gopher football and basketball games and recently acquired the rights to men's hockey. NEW REPORT PUTS 'U' AMONG NATION'S ELITE PUBLIC RESEARCH UNIVERSITIES The University of Minnesota-Twin Cities ranks third among the nation's public research universities, according to a new study by the Center for Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences ("The Cneter") at the University of Florida. "This is great news," said University of Minnesota President Mark Yudof. "The study affirms that we're on the right track. Clearly, the University of Minnesota is a world-class institution and is highly competitive with the very top public universities nationally. Minnesotans can be proud." The report, The Top American Research Universities, 2001, ranks public and private universities based on scoring within the top 25 on nine measures, including the strength of the faculty, research program and private support. The University of Minnesota-Twin Cities ranks in the top 25 on eight of the nine measures. The only other public research universities that score as well as the University of Minnesota in the study are the University of Michigan and the University of California, Berkeley, both of which also rank within the top 25 on eight of nine measures. Yudof pointed to the university's interdisciplinary initiatives, such as genomics, new media and digital technology; improvements in the social sciences; the engineering departments; alumni support; improvements in undergraduate services; and the successful capital campaign. These were all assets in the survey, Yudof explained. According to the university's Institutional Research and Reporting Department, the Florida study is more comprehensive and sound than many other popular rankings. "Unlike a lot of rankings which only focus on undergraduate education or on specific graduate programs, this survey looks more broadly at all the things that make a university strong," said Peter Zetterberg, senior analyst, Institutional Research and Reporting. "Because the University of Minnesota is large with strength in many areas, we fare well in this new study." The Top American Research Universities report can be found on the Web at: www.thecenter.flu.edu. BETTER DAYS COMING FOR COFFMAN Coffman Memorial Union looks like the site of some terrible battle these days, but it will be quite a building when it reopens in fall 2002. To serve students better, it will have a 24-hour computer lab; a bookstore with a coffee shop; student services such as satellite financial aid, employment office, and registrar; lounges and study space; a food court with a wide variety of choices; and expanded student organization office space. The new design is intended to restore elements of the original 1939 building, including re-opening the original entrance under the colonnades on Washington Ave. and improving the transparency of the building by installing a virtually all-glass wall on the south face. Students voted to fund $45 million of the $71 million project through increased student fees, approximately $17.5 million will come from tenants, with the rest from university and Student Union funds. The Coffman renovation is one component of the University of Minnesota south mall development project. The other parts of the south mall project include: ® Replacing the parking ramp behind Coffman with an underground garage that will accommodate up to 1,700 cars and be accessible to student union patrons ® Adding new apartment-style residence halls behind Comstock Hall, adjacent to the new parking garage and Coffman Union. The entire project aims to restore the original Cass Gilbert master plan for Northrop mall by visually connecting the mall to the Mississippi River. To physically connect the mall to the river, planners are drawing up designs for new bridges or a single bridge to span Washington Avenue. For more on the Coffman Union renovation, see http://www.coffman.umn.edu/renovation/drawings.html. U OF M STUDENT FEATURED IN OCT. GLAMOUR MAGAZINE Jennifer Carrier, a senior at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, is featured as one of this year's top 10 college women in the October issue of Glamour magazine. Carrier, an honor student in the College of Liberal Arts who majors in political science and sociology of law, criminology and deviance and has a 3.86 GPA, applied to the magazine for this honor because she was attracted by the scholarship it entails. She learned in April that she had made the list and went to New York for a photo shoot. She is featured on page 187 of the October Glamour, which is currently on newsstands. Students selected for the Glamour scholarships not only have to have outstanding academic performance, but also must demonstrate public service and community activism. Carrier fits those criteria perfectly. Last summer, she interned for five weeks at South Dakota Sen. Tom Daschle's Washington D.C., office, and for 10 weeks at the White House Office of Legislative Affairs. Back in Minneapolis, Carrie, a native of Presho, S.D., works two jobs to support herself. She's a student legal administrative assistant for Legal Assistance to Minnesota Prisoners, a legal clinic for indigent prisoners in civil cases at the university, and she's a waitress. She works 40 hours a week in addition to her college load, but she said the busier she is, the more organized she is. This summer she worked at the Hennepin County Attorney's office. She also finds time to read to children at Shriners' Hospital in Minneapolis. Carrier plans to attend law school and possibly get a master's degree in public policy. She wants to be a public defender and then a judge or U.S. congresswoman. Carrier was scheduled to attend the scholarship banquet in New York Thursday, Sept. 20, but it was postponed in light of the World Trade Center tragedy. NEW U RESEARCH ON MONARCH BUTTERFLIES IN BIO TECH CORNFIELDS Milkweeds growing in cornfields sometimes support monarch butterfly larvae at the same time the corn is shedding its pollen, according to a survey of cornfields in the Midwest, Maryland and Ontario. The overlap implies that monarchs feeding next to corn genetically engineered to contain the insecticide known as Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) toxin could be exposed to the toxin. The study, led by University of Minnesota ecologist Karen Oberhauser, is published on the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Web site, www.pnas.org/papbyrecent.shtml, along with other papers dealing with monarchs and Bt toxin. The series of papers address the issue of whether "Bt corn" is harmful to monarchs in the field as well as in the laboratory. "We still don't have the data to come to the conclusion that the risks are negligible," said Oberhauser, a research associate in the department of ecology, evolution and behavior. The researchers examined milkweed and monarch densities in various habitats--cornfields, cornfield edges, other agricultural fields and nonagricultural fields--in the butterfly's breeding range during summer 2000. The study area comprised 20 plots in four regions: Minnesota and Wisconsin, Iowa, Maryland, and Ontario. Plots were in cornfields, land adjacent to cornfields or nonagricultural land, all containing milkweeds. Except for one plot each in Maryland and Iowa, cornfields contained nonBt corn. Every week, researchers examined several hundred milkweed plants and noted the number of monarch larvae and, in cornfields, whether pollen was being shed. In Minnesota and Wisconsin, corn pollen was shed during a time--mid-July through the first week in August--when the highest numbers of monarch larvae were in cornfields. In Iowa, pollen was shed during the first half of July, before the peak in monarch larvae. "The situation in Iowa is less risky for monarchs," said Oberhauser. "The farther north the cornfield, the later the pollen was shed and the greater the chance that monarch larve will be exposed to it." When the researchers calculated the percent of monarch larvae in the fields when pollen was shed, Ontario led the way with 62 percent, followed by Minnesota-Wisconsin (40 percent), Maryland (20 percent) and Iowa (15 percent). They also estimated that in general, 73 times as many monarchs come from cornfields as from nonagricultural land in Minnesota-Wisconsin. In Iowa, the figure was 80 times as many, with both corn and soybean fields contributing large numbers of the butterflies. "One of the most important conclusions of this study is that agricultural habitat is important to monarchs," said Oberhauser. "If an event that hurts monarchs or their host plant, milkweeds, should occur in cornfields, it could have population-wide impacts." Oberhauser cautioned, however, that studies by other researchers have suggested that Bt toxin is not harmful to monarchs at levels found in cornfields. But many of those studies occurred in laboratories and looked at pollen only. In cornfields, plants shed part of the anthers (the structures that produce pollen), and anthers tend to have higher concentrations of Bt than pollen does. Even the studies done in the field may have underestimated the amount of time that monarchs were exposed to toxic corn tissue. While monarch larvae don't avoid pollen on milkweed leaves, it is not known whether they also eat anther material, Oberhauser said. "I think we still don't know the effects of long-term exposure to Bt," she said. "Some lab studies may not have exposed them long enough to tell." And, even if Bt doesn't kill monarchs at levels found in cornfields, "We don't know how Bt affects factors like monarch reproduction, flight ability and size," Oberhauser said. Oberhauser's colleagues in the study were from the University of Guelph, Ontario; the University of Maryland; Iowa State University; the Southwest Purdue Agricultural Program, Indiana; the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA); and the University of Minnesota. Financial support came from the USDA, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency; Environment Canada and the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food, and Rural Affairs. For the last seven years, Oberhauser has directed the Monarchs in the Classroom project. This fall, more than 30,000 monarch eggs and larvae were given to hundreds of Minnesota schools to be nurtured by children. When adult butterflies emerge from their chrysalises, the children will release them for the species' annual migration to Mexico. U of M HAPPENINGS LINKS U at the Legislature: Read about the University's legislative request and how you can help. http://www.umaa.umn.edu/legislative/ Hey Sports Fans! Check out sports news and schedules of the U's teams: Gophers Duluth Bulldogs Morris Cougars Crookston Golden Eagles Campaign Minnesota: Learn more about this needed, long-term investment in the U. University of Minnesota Alumni Association: Your membership makes a difference. University of Minnesota Systemwide Home Page U of M E-News is a bi-monthly e-mail newsletter for alumni and friends of the University of Minnesota that offers interesting and useful news and information about the University. 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