August 2024 Media Highlights

NPR — What drove last year's surge in Chinese migrants at the southern border? - "We spend a ton of money and create a lot of fear, but we don't have any good credible evidence [that we should be afraid]," said Rebecca Hester, an associate professor at Virginia Tech who studies migration. "It's good political theater to say 'What if? What if?' and to look like you're hard on crime and hard on immigration. But it's not really helping." 

NBC News (also Yahoo News) — Common low-calorie sweetener may be riskier for the heart than sugar, study suggests - Do the findings indicate that erythritol is worse overall than high-calorie sugar? Valisa Hedrick, a registered dietitian at Virginia Tech, said a diet high in sugary foods can lead to elevated blood glucose levels that are also linked to stroke and clotting risks. Hedrick wasn’t involved in the Cleveland Clinic study.

New York Times — Entrenar puede mejorarte el ánimo. Te decimos cómo - Google translation: Scientists believed that the high you get from exercising comes exclusively from endorphins, which act as natural opiates in the brain and relieve pain. But in recent decades, researchers have discovered a more complex cocktail of other key feel-good chemicals that are produced during movement. Each ingredient plays a different but complementary role, said Julia Basso, an associate professor at Virginia Tech who runs a lab that studies the effects of exercise on the brain. “These neurochemical substances really work together,” she highlighted.

US News & World Report — X-Factor: How Elon Musk Is Influencing the Presidential Election - Cayce Myers, professor of communication at the Virginia Tech School of Communication, says voters likely don’t look to Musk for election guidance. But that doesn’t mean the platform isn’t helpful to Trump. “What Musk brings to Trump in the interview is a platform audience that is enormous,” Myers says. “And so what you have with Musk – who's one of the most followed people on Twitter – if he does this interview and posts it on X, it would be a lot of views and it's going to outperform typical broadcast or cable interviews.”

CGTN — Jadrian Wooten on debate over the economics of hosting the Olympic games - “I think when you look at it from an investment standpoint, the answer is absolutely not. Generally, sports economists are pretty consistent on this. When you think about investing in, whether it's the Olympics or World Cup, or whatever the mega event is, it's really just not worth it from an investing standpoint.” (transcription)

CNN Romania — Motivele din spatele deciziei lui Harris de a-l alege pe Walz vicepreședinte. Karen Hult: „Provine dintr-un mediu agricol, mai rural” - Karen Hult: “In the context of the United States, what the vice presidential candidate brings to the table, from both parties, is the strengthening of the person running for the presidency. In this case, former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris. I think to some extent Governor Walz was a surprise to most people in particular because he's not as well known nationally as some of the other people she was considering for vice president.”

Fox LiveNow - DNC Day 4: Hours away - Virginia Tech Professor Cayce Myers joins LiveNOW from FOX to preview the final evening of the Democratic National Convention. Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to officially accept the presidential nomination.

Washington Post - Why musicians are smart to embrace AI - To a trained ear, these songs are relatively easy to recognize as AI-generated. “They’re all very ‘mid’ in timbre, conception, performance and structure,” said Eric Lyon, a composer, computer musician and professor at Virginia Tech. “The synthetic guitar solo is unnaturally regular. ... There are noticeable artifacts in the vocals.”

CNN - A West Virginia boy died after a collision during football practice. It’s the third student football player death this month - But when it comes to studying the effectiveness of helmet coverings alone, (Virginia Tech) lab research shows the soft-shelled caps can reduce the acceleration and force in simulated hits. But in real-life studies of college football players using them on the field, the helmet coverings have shown no benefit.

Forbes - 38 Great Colleges With Less Admissions Stress - The stress-less 38, listed below, are scattered across the country, from New York to Georgia to Utah to California, and include big, public research universities like the University of Wisconsin-Madison (enrollment: 51,296) and small, private colleges like Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania, with just 2,762 students. The list also includes two highly-respected science and technology focused schools: California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo and Virginia Polytechnic Institute, as well as universities known for their stellar sports teams, including Clemson University and the University of Connecticut.

Forbes - NSF Invests $72 Million In Four University Pandemic Research Centers - The NSF Center for Community Empowering Pandemic Prediction and Prevention from Atoms to Societies at Virginia Tech University will examine the genetic, molecular, cellular and chemical rules of life that dictate virus-host interactions. Its researchers will study how pathogens may lower host barriers to infect a cell, how they may linger in the environment, and how previously approved drugs may be utilized to treat infections. The collaborating institutions include Cornell University, Meharry Medical College, the University of Michigan and Wake Forest University.

Technical.ly - The sweltering summer was rough for Virginia’s Data Center Alley, where cooling costs energy - At Virginia Tech, mechanical engineering professor Jonathan Boreyko and team are experimenting with materials that optimize heat transfer via “jumping bubbles” created by boiling water. The bubbles are used to carry energy and heat away, he said, and can be used to control temperatures in large-scale buildings like data centers or nuclear power plants.

El Pais (Spain) - La fulminante privatización de la investigación en inteligencia artificial - (The devastating privatization of artificial intelligence research) Translation: Beyond the big names, today there is a whole generation of researchers tempted by company salaries. Around 70% of PhDs in artificial intelligence end up in the private sector, compared to only 21% in 2004. Since 2006, the number of employees hired in the academy has not grown, while the company has multiplied its recruitment of graduates eightfold, according to figures from a study by scientists from MIT and Virginia Tech.

FOCUS (Germany) - Wie Sie einen guten ersten Eindruck machen - (How to make a good first impression) Translation: What does it take for the first encounter with a stranger to go well? A research group investigated this in a laboratory experiment with more than 300 Canadian students. Chloe Hudson from Virginia Tech University and her team recorded various facets of social behavior and conversation skills. As they report in the "Journal of Experimental Psychology: General," those who show a high degree of cognitive empathy are the most popular at the first encounter.

DIE WELT (Germany) - Auf der Jagd nach dem Weißen Hai - (On the hunt for the great white shark) Translation: Jeremy Jenrette is pursuing a different approach to track down the population. The researcher from the US university Virginia Tech has joined forces with his colleague Francesco Ferretti for the "White Shark Chase"  to find the Mediterranean sharks. He is relying less on tracking devices and observations. Instead, he is imitating the animals' strategy - only that instead of blood, he is tracking their "genetic scent trail". Water samples should tell him where they are.

Age Australia - Not everyone finds exercise rewarding. Here's how to make it more tolerable - Each ingredient plays a distinct but complementary role, says Julia Basso, an assistant professor at Virginia Tech who runs a lab studying the effects of exercise on the brain.