BP funding UA research into oil spill
Tuscaloosa News – Jan. 3
University of Alabama researchers are getting an influx of cash from oil giant BP to study the effects of the massive oil spill on the Gulf of Mexico and surrounding lands.
About $786,000 was awarded to 18 UA scientists stationed at the Dauphin Island Sea Lab. ‘These funds will assist us in gaining a better understanding of the spill’s impact on the region’s environment and its people,’ said Joe Benson, UA vice president for research. The money is being distributed to four teams of researchers, some of whom have been working on the effects of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill since the summer. Combined, the four teams are tackling 16 projects combining researchers from UA’s colleges of Arts and Sciences, Engineering, and Human and Environmental Sciences with scientists from other institutions… According to a UA press release, funding for the Dauphin Island Sea Lab experiments is a portion of the financing promised by BP about a month after the April 20 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling platform that caused the oil spill …
NBC13 (Birmingham) – Jan. 3
WKRG (Mobile) – Jan. 3
UA predictions for 2011: Look out for chikungunya fever; Iran to cut nukes deal; apps, apps, apps
Mobile Press-Register – Dec. 30
In the 30th-edition of the University of Alabama’s annual year-end “Educated Guesses” column, faculty experts predict that Iran will cut a deal to stop developing nuclear weapons, that health threats to Americans could include dengue and chikungunya fever and that Baby Boomers will fight for Social Security …
Home foreclosures down in Calhoun County
Anniston Star – Jan. 4
… “A prerequisite for recovery of the housing market is a drop in foreclosures,” said Leonard Zumpano, professor of finance and Association of Realtors Chair of Real Estate at the University of Alabama… Zumpano said many of the foreclosures in the past year stemmed from backlogs banks were finally able to tackle. “All of the properties in trouble, many of those properties have been foreclosed and sold,” Zumpano said. “We may be seeing a bottoming out in some states … and Alabama may be one of those since there was less speculation and flipping here.”… Zumpano noted, however, that a key component the housing market’s recovery was improvement in employment rates. “The housing market is driven by employment,” he said. “But independent of that, some of the foreclosures have finally passed the market.”…Zumpano said if the decrease in foreclosures is part of larger trend however, it could mean the housing market is on the mend. “That bodes well for the spring because once mild weather begins and the days get longer, you usually see a seasonal pickup in home sales,” he said.
Black birds fall from sky, fish die off: What’s a conspiracy theorist to think?
Christian Science Monitor – Jan. 3
… Coming battles would turn out. In some cultures, birds are seen as souls occupying the liminal space between heaven and earth. In others, they are considered harbingers – often of doom. “To Taoists, for example, birds indicate the violent uncontrollable primordial willfulness of the ‘barbarians,’ ” William Doty, a religion professor at the University of Alabama and the editor of Mythosphere magazine, told the Monitor back in 2005 …