In the News
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April 26, 2022
Testing a person’s blood for the presence of circulating melanoma cells may help identify skin cancer, while allowing the patient to skip invasive biopsies, according to research by Sunitha Nagrath, professor of chemical engineering: “Circulating tumor cells have the potential to pinpoint treatment resistance and recurrence. (They) can be a valuable biomarker to noninvasively monitor for disease progression.”
UPI -
April 26, 2022
“It’s all a function of where you’re going to be and how many people are going to be there, if it’s a closed or open space and of course the local conditions,” said Rafael Meza, professor of epidemiology and global health, who was not surprised by the decision to lift the mask mandate on public transit — a decision that has divided experts over whether it makes sense from a public health standpoint.
The Hill -
April 26, 2022
“It feels noisier than ever in terms of how people perceive the virus, its severity, its risks, the risks to others. We don’t have a consistent algorithm that we’re all following,” said Kate Cagney, professor of sociology and director of the Institute for Social Research, on the transition from a world of stay-at-home orders, business closures and universal masking requirements to a choose-your-own-pandemic experience.
Vox -
April 25, 2022
“I think Putin has effectively abdicated from leading Russia. He put the pursuit of power, his imperial ambitions and his lingering desire to restore the Soviet Union above the future of the Russian people,” said Ukraine native Maxim Sytch, professor of management and organizations.
Poets and Quants -
April 25, 2022
Despite how sophisticated some wearables have become at tracking and interpreting data while we sleep, they can’t precisely measure what our brains are doing, says Cathy Goldstein, associate professor of neurology: “These are a proxy for sleep, not sleep as traditionally defined. … It’s kind of like when you track your calories. It doesn’t change anything, but it gives you recognition of the problem.”
The Washington Post -
April 25, 2022
Scott W. Campbell, professor of communication and media, said the video of a teen’s fatal fall at an Orlando amusement park may be important to an investigation, but is too graphic and doesn’t have enough of an educational purpose to be widely accessible: “Consumers have to steer social media companies to become better, more democratic places. That takes being mindful of how social media influences the way we think about and experience the world.”
The Wall Street Journal -
April 22, 2022
A smartwatch that tracks the wearer’s heart rate can be used to monitor disease progression in people with COVID-19 and may predict how sick they will become, according to research by Srijan Sen, professor of psychiatry, and Daniel Forger, professor of mathematics, and computational medicine and bioinformatics. “What we realized was knowledge of physiology, how the body works and mathematics can help us get more information from these wearables,” Forger said.
UPI -
April 22, 2022
“When (social media) content moderation is too reliant on detecting profanity, it ignores how hate speech targets people who have been historically discriminated against. Content moderation overlooks the underlying purpose of hate speech — to punish, humiliate and control marginalized groups,” wrote Libby Hemphill, associate professor of information and research associate professor at the Institute for Social Research.
VentureBeat -
April 22, 2022
“From the original Indigenous dispossession until now, people in the place we call Detroit are persistently having their homes taken away from them,” said Damani Partridge, professor of anthropology and Afroamerican and African studies. “Illegal property tax foreclosure is the newest form of dispossession. This has not only affected residents’ bank accounts, but also their mental health. They need and want cash compensation now.”
Detroit Metro Times -
April 21, 2022
“It seems very clear to me that that officer violated his constitutional rights,” said Michael Steinberg, director of the Law School’s Civil Rights Litigation Initiative, on the fatal shooting of motorist Patrick Lyoya by a Grand Rapids police officer. “He’s obviously not cooperating with being arrested. He doesn’t want to be arrested but it’s not like the suspect is hitting back or doing anything other than trying to get up and get away.”
USA Today
