UNIVERSITY BREAKS GROUND ON IST BUILDING TODAY
A “groundbreaking” ceremony will be held at 4 p.m. today (Oct. 26) for Penn State’s new Information Sciences and Technology (IST) Building in the Hintz Family Alumni Center on the University Park campus. To be completed in 2003, the structure is modeled after the famed Ponte Vecchio in Florence, Italy. It will arch over North Atherton Street and house IST and the Department of Computer Science and Engineering. A walkway through the structure’s core will give pedestrians and bicyclists safe access between the central and west campuses. In addition to classrooms and offices, the building will feature a Cyber Café with a video wall and interactive information kiosks highlighting the work of students and faculty members. Offering remarks at today’s ceremony will be Penn State President Graham B. Spanier; Edward R. Hintz, Jr., president of the Board of Trustees; James B. Thomas, dean of IST; David N. Wormley, dean of the College of Engineering; and David W. Reese, chairman of the IST Advisory Board. To download a brief video on IST and the new building, go to http://www.psu.edu/ur/videos/IST/. For more information on IST, visit http://ist.psu.edu/.
COCOA AND DARK CHOCOLATE SHOW GOOD LDL EFFECTS
A Penn State-led study has found that a diet high in flavonoid-rich cocoa powder and dark chocolate had favorable effects on LDL (“bad” cholesterol) when compared with a diet that limited or excluded other flavonoid sources. Penny Kris-Etherton, distinguished professor of nutrition and leader of the study, says, “Cocoa and chocolate are ‘fun foods’ and I think these results show that they can contribute to a healthy diet – especially if they are used in forms that don’t include large amounts of fat and sugar. However, cocoa and chocolate shouldn’t be considered significant sources of flavonoids in the same category with fruits and vegetables that also have fiber, vitamins and minerals.” The study was the first to compare LDL (low density lipoprotein) susceptibility to oxidation when the test subjects ate an average American diet purposely made low in flavonoids and a diet that contained about 38 grams of cocoa powder and dark chocolate. The study is detailed in the November issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. For the full story by Barbara Hale, visit http://www.psu.edu/ur/2001/chocolateldl.html.
PENN STATE, OHIO STATE STUDENTS HELP COMMUNITY
The competitive spirit between Penn State and Ohio State students will give way to the spirit of giving Saturday morning (Oct. 27) before Penn State’s home football game as nearly 200 students team up to better the community. The project, “Competing on the Field, Collaborating in the Community,” will bring Penn State students and Ohio State students together far from the parking lots and stands of Beaver Stadium. The volunteers will work at 15 different sites in the area, including Strawberry Fields, Shaver’s Creek Environmental Center, Centre Peace, Whipple Dam State Park and House of Caring. For the full story, visit http://www.psu.edu/ur/2001/psuosu.html.
PCT GETS COMPUTER SOFTWARE VALUED AT $170,000
Students in the School of Business and Computer Technologies at Pennsylvania College of Technology in Williamsport will be able to gain valuable job skills available previously only to students at institutions with large mainframe computers. Micro Focus – an industry leader in development solutions for the computer programming language COBOL – recently donated $170,000 worth of software licenses to Penn College for “Mainframe Express,” a program that allows students working on personal computers to access an interface that simulates ones used on mainframe computers. The impetus for the software donation came from the development of a new bachelor-degree major at Penn College in Business Administration-Management Information Systems Concentration. For more information, call (570) 327-4517 or visit http://www.pct.edu/pctoday/news/bus-part/microfocus1001.htm.
UPCOMING LECTURES, ENTERTAINMENT AND EVENTS
In order to present live renditions of the national anthem during this season’s Lady Lions and Nittany Lions home basketball games, open auditions for anthem singers will take place from 1 to 2 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 28, on the Center Stage at the Nittany Mall. On the audition panel will be the Penn State Cheerleaders, the Nittany Lion and local celebrity judges. Each selected singer will perform before one home game and receive up to four tickets to the event. For more information, call (814) 863-1571.Nancy Marie Brown, director of research publications and policy for Penn State, “Medieval Icelandic Sagas and Modern Icelandic Realities: The Writing of ‘A Good Horse Has No Color,’” 12:15 p.m. Monday, Oct. 29, in 102 Kern Building, Comparative Literature Luncheon series. Participants may bring their own lunch or utilize Kern Cafeteria. For more information, contact Daniel Walden at mailto:dxw8@psu.edu.
The Academy of St. Martin in the Fields chamber orchestra will perform at Penn State’s Center for the Performing Arts at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 1, in Eisenhower Auditorium. Section one and two prices are $32 and $22 for general audience members; $27 and $19 for students; $17 and $9 for Penn State University Park campus students; and $10 and $6 for children 12 and younger. For tickets, group sales or information, contact the Arts Ticket Center at (814) 863-0255; outside the local calling area (800) 278-7849; or visit http://www.cpa.psu.edu.
Dorreen Yellow Bird, a community journalist and columnist for the Grand Forks (N.D.) Herald, and Marie Arana, editor of The Washington Post Book World, will visit Penn State in November to present free public lectures and work with students as part of celebrations for Cultural Heritage Month. At 6 p.m. Friday, Nov. 2, Yellow Bird will present “Writing from a Native American Perspective in a Community Where Few American Indians are Present” in 113 Carnegie Building. At 6 p.m. Friday, Nov. 16, Arana will present “American Chica: Two Worlds, One Childhood” in the same room. Contact Steve Sampsell at 814-865-8801.
Santiago Vaquera, professor in the Department of Spanish, Italian and Portuguese at Penn State, “Limit, Divide, Gateway: Re/thinking the Borderlands,” 12:15 p.m. Monday, Nov. 5, in 102 Kern Building, Comparative Literature Luncheon series. Participants may bring their own lunch or utilize Kern Cafeteria. For more information, contact Daniel Walden at mailto:dxw8@psu.edu.
Kip Thorne, the Feynman Professor of Theoretical Physics at the California Institute of Technology and the author of “Black Holes and Time Warps: Einstein’s Outrageous Legacy,” will lecture on “Gravitational Waves: Probing Black Holes, Neutron Stars, and the Earliest Moments in the Universe” at 8 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 6, in 101 Thomas Building. For the full story, visit http://www.science.psu.edu/alert/Wave10-2001.htm.
Walter E. Williams, economist and author of “More Liberty Means Less Government--Our Founders Knew This Well,” will speak on “The Role of Government in a Free Society” at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 8, as part of Penn State Altoona’s Distinguished Speaker Series at the campus’s Adler Athletic Complex. Tickets for the free event are available at the Penn State Altoona Bookstore. For more information, contact Marty Jo Irvin at (814) 949-5096 or mailto:mji2@psu.edu.
San Francisco-based landscape architect Cheryl Barton, “Landscape Stratigraphies,” 8 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 8, in 112 Walker Building, John R. Bracken Lecture Series. For more information, call (814) 865-9511 or visit http://www.artsandarchitecture.psu.edu/news/10-23barton.html.
“Live Transmission,” a documentary film on the Performative Sites Symposium that was held at Penn State in October 2000, will premiere at 4 p.m. Friday, Nov. 9, in the Palmer Museum of Art’s Lipcon Auditorium. Charles Garoian, professor of art education and director of the School of Visual Arts, Yvonne Gaudelius, associate professor of art education and women’s studies, and Barbara Bird, assistant professor of communications, will lead a panel discussion following the screening. The symposium brought internationally known artists and scholars together to explore the intersections of art, technology and the body in contemporary culture through performance art. Kino-light, a faculty and student filmmaking group, documented the event using the latest digital technologies. For more information, contact Tracy Weaver at (814) 863-2104 or mailto:tdw3@psu.edu.