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Microsoft YouthSpark Grants to Encourage Youth to Do Great Things

By Guest PostSeptember 23, 2012Jobs, Technology21 st, akron, alex richards, america, anthony carmona, boys, brian hughes, brighton, century, Chicago, city year, clubs, create, cristian malpica, girls, high school, ja, marlin dacruz, megan pilbeam, Microsoft, new york, newton, nfte, nonprofit, ohio, opportunity, orion casey, ozone park, ryan gomes, samantha lewis, skill, stephanie foxworth, stephen hall, tiffany hill, travis holloway, US, Washington, world, year up, youth, youthspark initiative

As part of a commitment to create opportunities for 300 million youth around the world during the next three years, Microsoft announces support for five national U.S. nonprofits that focus on youth causes. Here’s a look at how these organizations are making a difference.

REDMOND, Wash. — As part of the launch of the Microsoft YouthSpark initiative, Microsoft announced national partnerships with five major nonprofit organizations with missions to give youth the skills, education and job training they need to succeed: Boys & Girls Clubs of America, City Year, Junior Achievement USA (JA), Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE) and Year Up.

On the surface, the nonprofit grants aim to bolster programs that help youth learn important 21st-century skills, find jobs and connect with caring adult mentors. (more…)

World’s Most Powerful Digital Camera Begins Hunt for Dark Energy

By Guest PostSeptember 22, 2012Scienceancient starlight, atmospheric condition, billion years, brazil, brenna flaugher, camera, cerro tololo, Chicago, Chile, chilean andes, chris smith, dark energy, des, distant galaxy, earth, expansion, fermilab, galaxy cluster, Germany, gravitational lensing, inter american, james siegrist, kavli institute, mystery, ngc 1365, noao, observatory, physics, southern sky, spain, spiral galaxy, switzerland, telescope, united kingdom, universe, university, victor m blanco

Eight billion years ago, rays of light from distant galaxies began their long journey to Earth. That ancient starlight has now found its way to a mountaintop in Chile, where the newly constructed Dark Energy Camera, the most powerful sky-mapping machine ever created, has captured and recorded it for the first time.

That light may hold within it the answer to one of the biggest mysteries in physics: Why the expansion of the universe is speeding up. (more…)

Homing in on Higgs: Michigan Researchers Predict Summer Discovery

By Guest PostJune 4, 2012Scienceaaron armbruster, algorithms, atlas, atoms, bing zhou, CERN, Chicago, electromagnetic radiation, electrons, fermilab, forces, function, geneva, gordon kane, higgs, higgs boson, higgs field particles, homer neal, jianming qian, junjie zhu, Large Hadron Collider, laws, laws of nature, lhc, missing piece, Nature, neutrons, newton, particle physics, physics theory, protons, quarks, rudolf thun, standard model, stephen hawking, summer, switzerland, tevatron particle accelerator, university of michigan, vacuum like state

ANN ARBOR, Mich.— Whether the Higgs boson exists could be settled by the end of summer, say University of Michigan physicists involved in the search for the missing piece of particle physics’ Standard Model.

“We’re zooming in,” said Jianming Qian, physics professor in the College of Literature, Science & the Arts. “We are increasing the data set and improving our search algorithms. With certain luck, we may be able to discover it this summer, but it depends on nature.”

Qian is one of the 28 U-M researchers involved in experiments at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in Switzerland. He’ll spend most of his time through August in Geneva, where more than 1,000 scientists from around the world have been looking for Higgs since the collider turned on about four years ago. (more…)

New Bing, Available Today, Takes You from Searching to Doing

By Guest PostJune 1, 2012Technologyatlanta, bing, bing summer, Chicago, cody simpson, days of doing, doing, dosomething, exchange ideas, Facebook, heart, hola, impulse research, lafayette park, los angeles, Microsoft, msft, nasdaq, new york, pizza party, recreation center, searching, social network, the hunt, Twitter, web

In celebration of new search experience, Bing launches the Bing Summer of Doing with DoSomething.org.

REDMOND, Wash. — June 1, 2012 — Do you ever feel like you’re spending too much time searching and not enough time doing? If so, you’re not alone. According to a recent survey conducted by Bing and Impulse Research, nearly 75 percent of people spend more time than they would like searching for information online. Time wasted searching is a thing of the past with the new Bing design, which brings together information from the Web, experts and enthusiasts, and your friends to help you do more — available today at https://www.bing.com.

Only Bing brings together the best search with people from social networks, including Facebook and Twitter. In celebration of this new search experience, Bing is joining forces with DoSomething.org to launch the Bing Summer of Doing, designed to inspire people to do amazing things, including giving back to their communities. (more…)

In Conversation: Sir Peter Crane

By Guest PostMarch 6, 2012Environment, Sciencebuckingham palace, Chicago, energy, England, environmental changes, environmental issues, epa, evolutionary biologist, field museum, ginkgo, glaciation, interdisciplinary component, j gustave speth, liquid natural gas, manhattan, nature conservancy, nuclear plant, peace corps, Prince Charles, royal botanic gardens, school of management, sir peter crane, som, state department, street trees, ted snyder, urban system, Wall Street, world wildlife fund

Evolutionary biologist Sir Peter Crane has been dean of the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies (F&ES) since 2009. A former director of Chicago’s Field Museum and chief executive of England’s Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, he recently spoke with Yale News about F&ES’ internationalism, the role of business in environmental management, and what it was like to be knighted at Buckingham Palace, among other topics. The following is an edited version of that conversation. (more…)

‘Daughter of the Struggle’

By Guest PostFebruary 17, 2012Culture, Entertainmentactivist, american, american family, ayanna gregory, black american studies, black history month, Chicago, civil rights, civil rights movement, daughter of the struggle, dick gregory, fear, god, gore recital hall, human rights, jerry rhodes, john wayne, king, lillian, martin luther king, new england, plymouth, racial bigotry, roselle center, soul singer, university of delaware, Washington

*Ayanna Gregory celebrates heroes of civil rights movement*

Wearing a mauve-colored dress with flared sleeves that flowed with each dance step, soul singer, educator and activist Ayanna Gregory celebrated the history of the American civil rights movement with an evening of song and spoken word before an enthusiastic audience on Wednesday evening, Feb. 15, in the Gore Recital Hall of the University of Delaware’s Roselle Center for the Arts.

During her performance, “Daughter of the Struggle,” Gregory recalled what it was like growing up as one of 10 children of Lillian and Dick Gregory, the standup comedian who used his comic skills to tell Americans that segregation and racial bigotry were no laughing matter. (more…)

At Kartemquin Film Screening, ‘Interrupters’ Speak About Stopping Violence

By Guest PostDecember 14, 2011Culture, Generalalex kotlowitz, ceasefire, Chicago, conflict resolution, documentary, footsteps, gangs, gary slutkin, graduations, kartemquin films, prison, ricardo cobe williams, troubled past, uchicago t shirts, ulysses floyd, violence, violence interrupter, violent crimes, woodlawn

Ricardo “Cobe” Williams isn’t shy about admitting his troubled past.

“For most of my life, I was part of the problem,” Williams told a group of students in the Master of Arts Program in the Humanities (MAPH) last month.

But Williams, who spent a combined 13-and- a-half years in prison, has dedicated his life to preventing others from following in his footsteps. (more…)

Fast Times in Physics

By Guest PostNovember 29, 2011Scienceatomic clocks, beams of neutrinos, c, Chicago, einstein, equation, Europe, faster than light, fermilab, Japan, marvin marshak, minos, neutrinos, northern minnesota, opera, physicists, scientific world, soudan underground laboratory, speed of light, subatomic particles, time, university of minnesota, vacuum, vibrations of cesium atoms

A U physicist will help determine if neutrinos can outrace light

Back in 2007, a physics experiment clocked elusive subatomic particles called neutrinos going faster than light.

That wasn’t supposed to happen. If the speed of light in a vacuum—denoted “c” by physicists—isn’t the universal speed limit, it would mean that Einstein put the wrong number in his famous E=mc² equation.

University of Minnesota physicist Marvin Marshak was part of the experiment, called MINOS. It clocked beams of neutrinos shot from Fermilab, a national physics lab near Chicago, to a detector 457 miles away in the Soudan Underground Laboratory in northern Minnesota. (more…)

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