Compiled by Joseph Hughes

Here's a sampling of recent Ohio University mentions in the media:

The recent awarding of the Fritz J. and Dolores H. Russ Prize to artificial kidney inventor Willem Kolff drew coverage from a variety of media outlets. In USA Today, reporters Dan Vergano and Tim Friend lauded Kolff as the "Father of Artificial Organs," saying over 1.2 million people remain alive today as the result of his work.

Other newspapers highlighting Kolff's achievements were the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the Akron Beacon Journal, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Philadelphia Inquirer and The Business Times Singapore.

The Plain Dealer cited Kolff's newest invention, a portable artificial lung, which he brought to the Russ Prize news conference. Other Kolff creations include the artificial eye and a balloon pump that, when inserted into the aorta can improve blood flow and reduces the heart's work during certain procedures.

"We like to try to pick things that affect people's lives," NAE president William Wulf told the Beacon Journal. "Partly, we're celebrating the individuals, and partly we're celebrating the whole collection of things that engineers have brought to the public."

In more humorous, weather-related news, the Washington Post lauded Kolff for braving the harsh winter weather to receive the Russ Prize. "Real men don't cancel dinner," reported columnist Lloyd Grove.

--> See USA Today

--> See the Philadelphia Inquirer

--> See the Akron Beacon Journal

Ohio University expert Lawrence Witmer has removed the lips of the fearsome Tyrannosaurus rex, tightened the cheekbones of the triceratops and moved dinosaurs' noses. A recent Columbus Dispatch article profiled Witmer, and how the new 73,000-square-foot Life Sciences Research Building is helping his cutting-edge work. "We kind of like to pick on Ohio State," said graduate student Andy Clifford. "We say we might not have the best damn band in the land, but we have the best damn lab in the land." Said doctoral candidate Casey Holliday, "We just got back from a big biology conference and this lab is highly regarded, one of the top four or five in the country."

Witmer, an expert on much more than dinosaurs, still loves to be queried about his more famous work. "Yes, I'll get e-mailed with questions from Mrs. Wilson's fifth-grade class in Omaha -- and I love that," he said.

Witmer was quoted in a UK science publication, the New Scientist, about recent breakthroughs revealing four-winged dinosaurs. "We need to be prepared to change some cherished notions," he told reporter Jeff Hecht. Previously split about how birds' ancestors took to the sky, researchers are now presented with a more complex picture, with avians able to fly the friendly skies via several methods. Recent discoveries, reports Hecht, may be as important as the Archaeopteryx, the famous feathered fossil found in the 1860s, first linking dinosaurs and birds.

--> See the Columbus Dispatch

A new study on the effectiveness of behavioral therapy on migraine headaches in teens by Constance Cottrell and Kenneth Holroyd, an Ohio University professor of health psychology, was featured in Canadian Business and Current Affairs in January. The research first was reported by Ohio University Health and Medical News in June 2002.

--> See the News Release (Research Communications)

Ohio University Assistant Professor of Botany Harvey Ballard was quoted in a recent Columbus Dispatch article about a researcher's quest to find the roots of tropical plants. The journey, which has taken David Johnson to Thailand, has Johnson searching for the origins of Annonaceae, which includes the North American paw paw. Thailand, said Ballard, "would be a meeting place where you'd probably have 10,000 or 12,000 species. We don't really know a whole lot about it. Dave is one of the world experts, and there aren't many. Dave is real gutsy." Ballard told Dispatch reporter Dutton that many animals could have been responsible for the spread of Annonaceae.

Joseph Hughes is a graduate student writer with University Communications and Marketing.