Story Ideas for Media 9/17/12
News
Ohio State Plays Key Role in Development of World’s Most Powerful Digital Camera. Ohio State University researchers developed the software that will run a powerful new camera designed to answer one of the biggest mysteries in physics.
The Dark Energy Camera (DECam), located on a mountaintop in Chile, took its first photos of the night sky this week. The camera will help researchers involved in the Dark Energy Survey (DES) to explore why the expansion of the universe is speeding up.
As the world's most powerful camera, the survey's DECam creates images with file sizes as large as 1 gigabyte as it photographs wide swaths of the sky. This presents astronomers with a problem: how to quickly transfer the data from one giant image out of the camera so the next image can be taken -- while still preserving all the detail that's critical to the survey's mission of mapping the universe's dark energy.
Because of new software developed at Ohio State University with partners in the DES collaboration, DECam will be able to save each 1-GB image in less than 18 seconds -- a significantly shorter time than previous astronomical cameras, according to Klaus Honscheid, professor of physics at Ohio State.
CONTACT: Pam Gorder, (614) 292-9475; gorder.1@osu.edu
Ohio State is “Military Friendly.” The Ohio State University is one of the nation's top institutions for veterans for 2011, according to G.I. Jobs magazine. The publication ranks Ohio State's Columbus campus as a "Military Friendly School" for the fourth year in a row. The honor places Ohio State in the top 15% of all colleges.
This year, more than 2,000 military and veteran students, and their family members, are expected to attend Ohio State – reflecting a national trend of the increase in college attendance through the Post-911 GI Bill. To better serve this group of students, Ohio State is launching the new Office of Military and Veterans Services to assist students with accessing their educational benefits and the university academic resources they need for success. SEE: http://www.militaryfriendlyschools.com/mfslist.aspx
Research
Your Body Doesn’t Lie: People Ignore Political Ads of Candidates They Oppose. A recent study examined people’s bodily responses while watching presidential campaign ads - and discovered another way that people avoid political information that challenges their beliefs.
In the last days of the 2008 campaign, researchers had people watch a variety of actual ads for Republican presidential candidate John McCain and his Democratic rival Barack Obama while the viewers’ heart rates, skin conductance and activation of facial muscles were monitored.
The results showed that partisan participants reacted strongly to ads featuring their favored candidate, but barely responded to ads featuring the rival candidate.
In comparison, people who didn’t favor one candidate over the other showed similar physiological response patterns and intensity to ads for both Obama and McCain.
This suggests that partisan participants weren’t really paying attention to the ads featuring the candidate they opposed even as they watched them, said Zheng Wang, lead author of the study and assistant professor of communication at Ohio State University. SEE: http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/selectattention.htm. CONTACT: Jeff Grabmeier, (614) 292-8457; Grabmeier.1@osu.edu
Events
Media Registration Open for EcoSummit 2012 – through Sept. 24. Ohio State hosts international environmental conference – Sept. 30-Oct. 5. More than 1,500 delegates from 75 countries will visit Columbus and Ohio State for EcoSummit 2012 Sept. 30-Oct. 5. The weeklong EcoSummit brings together the world's most respected minds in ecological science to discuss restoring the planet's ecosystems. It is the first time the EcoSummit has been held in North America. In addition to the academic conference, delegates will participate in mid-conference field trips to central-Ohio ecological sites.
To obtain credentials, please email your first and last name, news organization, country, email address and if you will attend EcoSummit in part or in whole to ecosummit2012@osu.edu. In addition to this basic information, please provide a copy of your media credentials. CONTACT: Amanda Wurst (614) 224-8114. SEE: www.ecosummit.org.
Farm Science Review – Sept. 18-20. The 50th annual Farm Science Review takes place Tuesday through Thursday, September 18 through 20 at the Molly Caren Agricultural Center in London, Ohio. Ohio's premiere farm show attracts more than 140,000 visitors from across North America. Visitors attend field demonstrations, see the latest in agricultural equipment, services and products and take advantage of Ohio State agricultural research, education and expertise. SEE: http://fsr.osu.edu/media.
Wexner Center opens new exhibit featuring work of photographer Annie Leibovitz – Sept. 22. Annie Leibovitz’s large and distinguished body of work encompasses some of the most well-known portraits of our time. Leibovitz has chosen three discrete components for the show.
The first, the Master Set, consists of 156 images she selected a few years ago as the definitive edition of her work, drawn from the thousands of professional assignments she has had over the years and augmented by more personal images of her family.
Also on view are images from the Pilgrimage project, featuring a series of photographs of interiors, landscapes, and talismanic objects attached to historical figures—Abraham Lincoln, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Emily Dickinson, Georgia O’Keeffe, Annie Oakley, and Elvis Presley, among others. Finally, a special lobby display features portraits and related working prints taken by Leibovitz of artists who have appeared at the Wexner Center over the years. SEE: http://www.wexarts.org/ex/index.php?eventid=6355.
The person listed as the CONTACT will have the most current information about the story. Call on our media relations staff for help with any Ohio State story: Liz Cook, (614) 292-7276 or cook.17@osu.edu; Jim Lynch, (614) 247-4110 or lynch.270@osu.edu; or Amy Murray, (614) 292-8385 or murray-goedde.1@osu.edu
