New Block M to connect UM-Dearborn to maize and blue tradition
University of Michigan-Dearborn Chancellor Domenico Grasso and student leaders recently unveiled what is hoped will be a focal point for new traditions: a granite and bronze UM-Dearborn Block M on the sidewalk near the campus’ University Center. Grasso said the Block M is a nod to one on the Diag at the Ann Arbor campus. Legend has it that if a U-M student steps on the bronze M bad luck will come his or her way. More specifically, students are told that if they step on it before taking their first blue book exam, they will fail the exam. Grasso said the idea is to unify the U-M campuses through a “shared idea, but that doesn’t mean that the tradition needs to be the same. As a campus, you decide.”
Prevention Research Center of Michigan receives federal funding
The Prevention Research Center of Michigan at the School of Public Health has been awarded one of 25 nationwide Prevention Research Center grants from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The program funding supports applied public health prevention research. For more than 20 years, the center has collaborated with community partners in Flint and across Michigan to foster safer, healthier futures through high quality community-engaged public health research and interventions. This funding allows the center to expand its work through partnerships with the School of Public Health, the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine-Division of Public Health, Kettering University, the Healthy Flint Research Coordinating Center, and a variety of community-based organizations.
Group prenatal program brings expectant moms together
Katherine Pasque, assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology in the Medical School, and certified nurse midwife Melisa Scott have introduced a new offering to the Von Voigtlander Women’s Hospital: a group prenatal program offering patients a tenfold increase in the time they spend with their OB-GYN care team. Modeled after the nationwide CenteringPregnancy program, group prenatal care brings together six to 12 women — some new mothers, some veteran mothers — who have due dates within four weeks of one another. They meet to discuss the challenges of pregnancy, childbirth and the postpartum period. A provider acts as a facilitator. At the monthly meetings, the expectant moms help each other complete a weight and blood pressure check, have one-on-one time with a physician, participate in interactive learning discussions, and build a community with other expectant moms that supports positive health behaviors. Partners and support people may attend as well. Because of a growing demand among mothers to join the group, more Von Voigtlander professionals are going through CenteringPregnancy training, officials said.
International effort launches to determine best CO2 utilization tech
A tool to identify promising carbon dioxide utilization technologies will be expanded and advanced through a $1.5 million project funded by the Global CO2 Initiative at the University of Michigan and Climate-KIC, the European Institute of Innovation and Technology’s Climate Knowledge & Innovation Community. Carbon dioxide capture and utilization technologies aim to remove greenhouse gases from the air and turn them into useful, profitable products. The tool, the Techno-Economic and Life Cycle Assessment Guidelines for CO2 utilization technologies, is designed to evaluate various approaches to this strategy to mitigate climate change. The new project, ‘CO2nsistent,’ will run for three years.
— Compiled by Safiya Merchant, The University Record
