UA scientist may be Nobel candidate
Neurobiologist John Hildebrand was one of 10 scientists worldwide to be named an Einstein Professor by the Chinese Academy of Sciences yesterday, a designation usually reserved for individuals with the potential to win the Nobel Prizes and other top scientific awards.
Hildebrand is a regents’ professor and director of the Arizona Research Laboratories’ neurobiology division.
His accomplishments include being one of the first scientists to use the tobacco hornworm moth as a model for studying the organization of insects’ sense of smell.
That research may be used in the future to ward off insects that cause disease and damage crops.
Hildebrand was elected to the National Academy of Science last year, becoming the only person in the state to receive that honor.
As part of his new distinction, Hildebrand will spend two weeks in October lecturing in China.
While there, he will receive the Einstein Professor Award and work to develop a collaborative agreement between the UA and Beijing’s Institute of Technology.
Grad student receives memorial award
David A. Minton, a third-year planetary sciences graduate student, is set to receive the 2008 Kuiper Memorial Award, given to UA students studying planetary sciences who have excelled in academic work and research.
Minton previously worked as a graduate student at the University of Maryland and received a degree in aerospace engineering at North Carolina State University.
At North Carolina State, Minton led teams that developed Tumbleweed, a wind-powered Mars rover, as well as a Mars climate orbiter with deployable balloons.
His current work involves publishing an analysis of small planetary bodies that could explain the “”flying saucer”” appearance of Saturn satellites Atlas and Pan.
The analysis will appear in Icarus, an international planetary science journal.
The Kuiper Award is named for the Gerald P. Kuiper, who founded the UA’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory and its planetary sciences department. Kuiper died in 1973.
UA to investigate if green tea prevents prostate cancer
The Arizona Cancer Center is in the midst of a clinical study to determine to what extent Polyphenon E, a green tea extract, can prevent prostate cancer.
The study has enlisted men who have recently been diagnosed with prostate cancer and will have the prostate removed within three to six weeks after the study begins.
Each participant will take either four Polyphenon E capsules or a matched placebo with food every morning prior to the surgery.
The blood samples they provide – taken before ingesting capsules and again before surgery – will form the basis of the data showing the extract’s success in preventing the cancer.
Prostate cancer is the second-most common type of cancer found in American men, behind skin cancer.
The American Cancer Society estimates there will be 186,320 new cases of prostate cancer in 2008.
– Information is taken from university press releases.
