In the News

Mark Siegler, the Lindy Bergman Distinguished Service Professor in Medicine; David Cronin, Assistant Professor of Transplantation in Surgery; and Michael Millis, Associate Professor in Surgery, were interviewed for a Thursday, May 24 New York Times story about their recent article published in The New England Journal of Medicine. The three University physicians wrote in the journal article about the risks to living organ donors for adults who need liver transplants. “I suspect that if we had full reporting of the complications and mortality of the operation from the U.S. and Europe, we would discover that there are more complications and additional deaths that have been thus far unreported,” said Siegler. Two additional stories about the doctors’ journal article appeared in The Wall Street Journal and the Chicago Tribune.

David Levin, Associate Professor in Germanic Studies and the Committee on Cinema & Media Studies, was a guest on WBEZ Radio’s Odyssey program on Friday, May 11. The show also featured Trevor Griffiths, the British playwright of The Piano, which is currently in repertory at Court Theatre; and Hank Sartin, a freelance film journalist and preceptor in the MAPH program at the University. The program featured a discussion of adaptations from film into theater.

Tanya Luhrmann, Professor in the Committee on Human Development, wrote an op-ed that appeared in the Monday, May 21 Los Angeles Times. Luhrmann argued against a device being considered in California called involuntary outpatient commitment, which would enable a judge to require a mentally ill patient to report for and accept psychiatric treatment. “The schizophrenic man who pushed Kendra Webdale off the New York City subway platform in 1999 didn’t need involuntary commitment. He had asked for help repeatedly. He was failed by a system with inadequate resources that had repeatedly turned him away,” wrote Luhrmann.

Leon Kass, the Addie Clark Harding Professor in the Committee on Social Thought, wrote an essay urging a ban on human cloning that was published in The New Republic on Monday, May 21. “Human nature itself lies on the operating table, ready for alteration, for eugenic and psychic ‘enhancement,’ for wholesale redesign,” wrote Kass, who also cited Aldous Huxley’s 1932 Brave New World as a novel of futuristic advances that today’s biotechnology is catching up to every day.

The University Graduate School of Business’ fifth annual Edward L. Kaplan New Venture Challenge was covered in Darcy Evon’s i-Street column in the Chicago Sun-Times Monday, May 28. The business plan competition awarded four teams early financing for their businesses. Steven Kaplan, the Neubauer Family Professor of Entrepreneurship and Finance in the GSB, started the competition with financial support from Edward Kaplan, founder and CEO of the Chicago technology company Zebra Technologies.

Bruce Cumings, the Norman & Edna Freehling Professor in History, was interviewed on WBEZ-Radio’s Worldview program Thursday, May 10. Cumings discussed the strategic situation in Japan and Korea in the wake of possible changes in American foreign policy in that region.

The dedication program at Shakespeare School, featuring the University’s North Kenwood-Oakland Charter School and Ariel Community Academy was reported on in a segment of the WBBM-TV newscast Thursday, May 10.

Emily Teeter, Research Associate and Curator of Egyptian and Nubian Antiquities in the Oriental Institute; Lanny Bell, Associate Professor Emeritus in the Oriental Institute; and Mark Lehner, Research Associate in the Oriental Institute, were interviewed on a program titled Mummies, Tales from Egyptian Crypts, which was broadcast on the History Channel Friday, June 1.

Rashid Khalidi, Director of the Center for International Studies and Professor in Near Eastern Languages & Civilizations, was a guest on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered program on Thursday, May 31. Khalidi, an expert on Middle Eastern history, discussed the death of Faisal Husseini, a prominent Palestinian leader in Jerusalem.

Eve Van Cauter, Professor of Endocrinology in Medicine, was interviewed for a report in the Chicago Tribune on the dangers of sleep deprivation. Van Cauter, a leading sleep researcher at the University, has conducted studies that show how humans suffer physically from the loss of sleep. “Studies are beginning to show that no matter what system you look at––whether it’s memory, learning, the immune system, endocrine system or sugar metabolism––when you look at these systems in subjects who are sleep deprived on a chronic basis, you find negative effects,” she said. Following the article published Sunday, May 27 on Page 1, the Chicago Tribune also published an editorial on the subject that quoted Van Cauter in its Friday, June 1 issue.