Untitled Document

Thursday, December 7, 2006

NOTE ON FORMATTING: When stories are transferred from the Web, certain punctuation marks and other marks in this report don't carry over and result in symbols and other formatting errors. To see or print the story in full without these translation errors, simply click on "full story" at the end of each item."

Total Clips: 8

	Date	Outlet
Hound helper may not be up to snuff	12/07/2006	Los Angeles Times
Take Them to The Cleaners!	12/07/2006	WTVM-TV
Opinion	12/07/2006	Press-Register
Creativity : [AU] Students present their design ideas for the Cleburne center	12/07/2006	Opelika-Auburn News
Plaintiffs: Ala. college deseg case should end, some oppose	12/06/2006	Gadsden Times, The
Plant pathologists work to keep magic of holly going all year	12/06/2006	AgProfessional
Students Working On Design for New Alabama Welcome Centers	12/06/2006	WSFA-TV
First in ovo vaccine against AI	12/06/2006	WorldPoultry - Doetinchem, Netherlands


Hound helper may not be up to snuff 12/07/2006 Los Angeles Times H. G. Reza		Return to Top
Larry Myers, professor at AU's College of Veterinary Medicine, is quoted in this story. A device promoted as a law enforcement tool to help bloodhounds detect human scents at crime scenes has come under increasing fire after its use in recent years has led to the incarceration of at least five men whose cases were later dismissed. In the latest case, a Buena Park man was freed from prison in October after serving almost a year for a carjacking and armed robbery he did not commit. He was released only after a man jailed in Los Angeles County admitted to the crime, a confession supported by DNA evidence. The scent-lifting device, known as a scent-transfer unit, or STU-100, was invented in the 1990s by Newport Beach engineer Larry Harris and a partner who has since died. Harris and a small band of Southern California supporters -- a group derided by the bloodhound-handling world as social outcasts -- have promoted the $900 machine to law enforcement. Its backers say the machine, which resembles a leaf blower, can collect human scent from an object as small as a bullet fragment and transfer it to a 5-by-9-inch gauze pad that is put to a bloodhound's nose. The dog then theoretically follows the scent to the suspect. The machine allows the scent to be presented to the dog without compromising physical evidence. But there is debate in the academic community over whether bloodhounds can reliably identify a specific suspect by his scent under any conditions. It is unknown how many arrests or convictions can be attributed, at least in part, to the device because most law enforcement officials, including the FBI, declined to comment or did not return phone calls. Civilian dog handler Ted Hamm, for one, says he has used the device in most of the 2,000 cases he has worked. Despite its heavy use in law enforcement, critics say there is no hard evidence that the device works. I think it's quackery, said Larry Myers, professor at Auburn University's College of Veterinary Medicine and an expert defense witness in scent evidence cases. The dog handlers have no idea how reliable the machine is. In 2003, a California appellate court limited the use of scent evidence in state trials, ruling that the device and its operators have to meet standards that are generally accepted as reliable by the scientific community -- a benchmark that has not been achieved. Still, law enforcement continues to use the machine to identify suspects or gather enough probable cause for an arrest or search warrant. It's just one piece of the big investigation puzzle, said Lt. Larry Lincoln, a Los Angeles County sheriff's homicide investigator. Agencies including Irvine, Buena Park and Long Beach police, the arson unit in Riverside County and the FBI have used the device. I. Lehr Brisbin, a specialist in animal behavior and canine olfaction, said tests had shown that bloodhounds -- despite their uncanny ability to detect human smells -- are often unable to sniff out the originator of a scent among a group of people. The folks making these claims never allow their dogs to be tested independently, said Brisbin, a professor emeritus at the University of Georgia. But I don't think it's intentional fraud. It's a case of ultimate faith and belief in the machine and dog, but not in science. It's like a religion. Harris declined to comment for this article, but Brisbin and Myers said the handlers who use the scent-transfer unit had been unable to explain how it works. This has hampered the admissibility of evidence gathered by the machine in state courts. I'm a dog guy, not a scientist, said Hamm, the only dog handler using the device who would be interviewed for this story. He works with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department at $125 per hour. I can only say that I know it works through a lot of informal training. If people are willing to try and spend time with the dogs, they'll end up having a lot of success with the machine. Defense attorneys complain that the real value of the device is to give police probable cause to arrest a suspect when there is no physical evidence linking him to a crime. Larry Harris' dog was the excuse the cops needed to zero in on my client, said Santa Ana attorney Scott Borthwick, who represented James Ochoa, the man who was falsely accused of carjacking and robbery and released from prison in October. Never mind that he was innocent. And that the dog walked past his house four times. And that it was the only house on the block surrounded by cops. Where else was the dog supposed to go? Though Harris has sold the machine nationwide for a decade, it is best known for its use in Southern California, where about 10 operators -- known in law enforcement circles as Harris' disciples -- use the scent-transfer unit in criminal investigations. The 10, who include civilians and police officers, make up the Southern California Bloodhound Handlers Coalition. Their machine and dogs have led to false arrests in several high-profile cases. * In 1996, Irvine resident Earl Rhoney became the first person in California convicted of murder based on evidence collected by Harris and his machine. On the day he was to be sentenced, then-Superior Court Judge Tony Rackauckas, now the Orange County district attorney, threw out his conviction on grounds that the device was unreliable. Prosecutors chose to try Rhoney a second time but were forced to drop murder and burglary charges when another judge ruled that the scent machine evidence was tainted and could not be used. There was no physical evidence linking Rhoney, who has proclaimed his innocence, to the crime, which remains unsolved. He spent 3 1/2 years in Orange County Jail. * Jeffrey Allen Grant, a Long Beach resident, was arrested in 1998, suspected of being a serial rapist. Police used Harris' machine to allegedly match Grant's scent to one lifted from crime scene evidence. DNA tests cleared him four months later, and he was awarded $1.7 million by a federal jury in 2000. The real rapist was sentenced to 1,030 years in prison in 2004. Long Beach police officials declined to discuss the case. Grant could not be reached for comment. * In 2003, Josh Connole was arrested as a suspect in a string of arsons and vandalism at four SUV dealerships. Knight, a bloodhound owned by Hamm, followed the scent from a gauze pad provided by FBI agents to Connole's Pomona home. Hamm said the FBI used its own machine to vacuum the scent. The same dog, then owned by Long Beach police, was used in the Grant case, Hamm said. Connole, who came to the FBI's attention as a result of a tip, was arrested despite warnings from a federal prosecutor that agents did not have probable cause. He spent four days in jail and sued the FBI for civil rights violations. In 2005, he was paid $100,000 by the FBI and $20,000 by the city of West Covina for his mistaken arrest. A Caltech student was convicted in 2004 and sent to prison for the crimes. Connole could not be reached for comment. * Following the appellate court's ruling in 2003, murder charges were dropped against Jose Marin Flores, a Palmdale man accused of a fatal bar stabbing, because the evidence collected by the scent-transfer unit wasn't allowed into the trial. * Last year, Ochoa was arrested after Harris said he used his machine to obtain the scent from a cap and shirt left in a stolen vehicle by a carjacker. A bloodhound allegedly followed the scent to Ochoa's house two blocks away. DNA tests completed before the trial excluded him as the person who wore the items, but he was charged anyway. He served 10 months in prison before the DNA was matched to a man in custody in Los Angeles for another carjacking. Orange County district attorney's spokeswoman Susan Kang Schroeder said prosecutors would now use evidence gathered by the machine only if it can be proved to our satisfaction that it's scientifically reliable. Two national organizations of bloodhound handlers have refused to endorse the device because of its questionable reliability. Hamm defended the machine. He said a scent vacuumed into a gauze pad can be frozen in a plastic bag for years. We train our dogs to pick up scent from small items, like bullet casings and fragments; items that have been touched by someone, Hamm said. The [scent transfer unit] has proven to be a very reliable method of collecting human scent.
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Take Them to The Cleaners! 12/07/2006 WTVM-TV		Return to Top
AU hosts the BEST competition High school students at Lee-Scott Academy are preparing for a national robotics competition hosted by Auburn University. The team has spent hours designing a robot that can do laundry. Genius! It's the only world to describe what these Lee-Scott-students have designed. A robot that can hang laundry on a clothesline, take laundry off a clothes line, then drop it into a basket. The robot can do all three tasks, in under three minutes. "It's been great we've been able to bring some of our ideas from the classroom in our physics and calculus classes and bring them into a robot. There's been a lot of team work and it's a group effort really learned a lot from it," said design student Clay Guerin. AP Calculus and Honors Physics teacher Scott Moody says this group has given everything they have to the project. Saturday, these student will compete against 50 other teams from all over the nation. That's where Lee-Scott's marketing team comes in. "We have to create a booth which shows off our robot and gives information on our students, we have to give an oral presentation which tells about our robot," said Marketing President Shelley Snipes. Throughout this project, the students have been mentored by Auburn University engineering students and the Donaldson Corporation. Auburn hosts the South's Best Robotics Championship Competition on Saturday, in the Coliseum. 3,000 students from across the nation will be there to compete.
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Opinion 12/07/2006 Press-Register		Return to Top
A letter from Brian C. Keeter, AU's Director of Public Affairs, about the AU-ASU pharmacy program is included in these letters to the editor. Time to give smokers a break There's nothing more righteous than a non- or reformed smoker. This small group of people who are so dead-set against smokers are taking away our rights without truly researching the actual effects of secondhand smoke. Cambridge University in London has proven such to be exaggerated. By banning smoking, officials may not realize it but they condemn many restaurants and bars to close, not to mention condemning all those establishments' servers to unemployment. Studies show that many nonsmokers do not tip and that when they do, it's barely 3 percent of the tab (after they've complained about any and every little thing). Smokers do tip well. The majority of us smokers have found smoke-friendly places to go, and those businesses are booming. If you don't like the smoke in a smoke-friendly environment, then go back to your smoke-free, empty restaurant or bar and leave us alone. You have ruined life for most of us. Next, you'll try to make it illegal to smoke in our own vehicles and homes. Back off, please. WENDY HAUGEN Foley Where's the voice for social justice? Baldwin County voters have elected Republican evangelical Christians to every public office year after year, yet there continues to be no voice for social justice among any of them. Since the Democrats in Baldwin County have abdicated their responsibility to speak out on social issues, working men and women, the disadvantaged, the elderly, Latinos and African-Americans have been disfranchised. Issues of health care, prescription drugs, real affordable housing, high taxes on necessities, and education of minority and second-language children are all ignored and swept under the rug by these evangelicals. I see the reason every Wednesday and Sunday in my own church and others I visit occasionally. The pastors and parishioners talk incessantly about values and what would Jesus do, but in reality their values pertain only to their own way of life and those in the pew next to them. I have heard pastors preach the difference between believers and "the world." They teach the flock that God cares only about them and that they should shun contact with worldly things. These are the "values voters" who continually vote men and women into office who could not care less about anything other than being re-elected, but they attend the right church. While there are many serious social issues which need to be addressed in Baldwin County, the one egregious example which makes my point is the minimum wage in the county. As rich as this county is, and it is plenty rich, working men and women do not share in the wealth. Frankly, our elected officials, if they had an ounce of Christianity in them, would propose an increase in the minimum wage in Baldwin County to $12 an hour. This would put anyone with a full-time job right at or slightly above the poverty level. Since we have a service economy, we wouldn't lose any jobs; and the tax base would increase to where we didn't have to keep building more high-rise condos to pay the bills. It might even run the "big box" stores out and help the business community compete. In conclusion, we need to develop voices for social justice. If the evangelicals don't care and the Democrats are apathetic, then maybe we're back to the need for a new independent political party. We can only hope those voices, if there are any, make themselves heard before we are overwhelmed by the need for prisons and social services like other parts of the country. RUSSELL ANDERSON Gulf Shores 'Freedom from religion' problematic Anyone who would write that Americans have "freedom from religion," and any editor who would publish such a statement ("Freedom from religion is a right," Dec. 4), are obviously baiting the readers. I'll take the bait. What that writer really means is that the provision in the Constitution saying that the government must not "establish a religion" gives Americans a right never to hear or to see anything about God. It would be interesting if God were to grant such people their wish for a world without God. Everyone would then be free to cheat on their income taxes, free never to keep their word or pay their debts, free to steal anyone else's property, free to rape their womenfolk, and free to kill them all. If the real God were absent, the default god, Satan, would be unrestrained to do his thing, and that thing is "to kill, to steal and to destroy." Meanwhile, that writer may wish to relocate to Iraq. That seems already to be the state of affairs there. JEP HILL SR. Mobile Pharmacy program a 'wise investment' The Press-Register editorial of Dec. 3, "Region will benefit, despite Auburn tactics," correctly identified the need to address southern Alabama's shortage of pharmacists as quickly as possible. However, it missed the point about the efficacy of the new pharmacy program offered by Auburn University and the University of South Alabama. Auburn and USA joined forces, recognizing that a national shortage of professional pharmacy instructors is a critical obstacle to training and educating otherwise qualified and interested students. Thanks to technology, the curriculum will soon be available on both campuses. Students in Auburn and Mobile will benefit from the resources and expertise each university has to offer, yet without the costly and lengthy process of duplicating facilities and hiring new faculty. Given the severe fiscal demands facing public universities, the new Auburn-USA partnership is a wise investment for both institutions. More important, by immediately opening the pipeline for pharmaceutical education, residents in the Gulf Coast region will more quickly benefit from expanded pharmacy care. BRIAN C. KEETER Director of Public Affairs Auburn University Auburn
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Creativity : [AU] Students present their design ideas for the Cleburne center 12/07/2006 Opelika-Auburn News Amy Weaver		Return to Top
Within a year, a group of industrial design students from Auburn University will see their interior design concepts used to renovate the Cleburne Welcome Center in Heflin. Eighteen third-year students were given the task this semester of developing concepts to update the inside of the 21-year-old building in Cleburne County on Interstate 20 west of the Georgia state line. The project was funded by a $25,000 grant awarded to the Alabama Bureau of Tourism and Travel, who in turn "hired" the AU students. Six teams of students presented final concepts in Montgomery Wednesday to members of ABT&T, Department of Transportation and welcome center employees. Students visited Cleburne and other welcome centers for background research. By talking to employees and visitors, students learned needs, likes and dislikes. Cleburne Manager Fran Bowman said she was looking for a concept that moved the help desk away from the center of the 1,800-square-foot room, had an easy to clean tile floor, and perhaps carpet behind the help desk. Seeing concepts with new brochure stands, a wall-size Alabama map and plasma screen TVs as well were unexpected, but no one frowned on the efforts to make the centers more user-friendly and informative. Associate Professor Randy Bartlett said the current interior was outdated and visually inconsistent. Brochure stands, for one, were all different styles. Students addressed the main concerns related to adequate storage and brochure racks, easy to clean floors and counters, and improved lighting with various concepts, while also making visitors want to visit the welcome center and not just the restrooms in the attached building. David Calvert, Zach Griggs and Wright Currie believed their concept was intriguing enough it would not only get visitors inside but would get them to visit Alabama. Their idea was heavily technology based with a WiFi kiosk and brochure racks with touch-screen navigation. Estimated cost for the interior, which also included a new help desk, a 6-foot glass map, and beverage station, was $101,000. Visitors could use the computers to surf the Internet for places to stay or see in the state. The four regions of Alabama were color-coated on the 6-foot map to match four brochure racks. Each rack had a touch-screen which helps visitors figure out where the particular brochure they wanted was located among the rack. Drew McDowell, Stephanie Schultheiss and Chris Shallenberg developed an interactive interior for the state's biggest attractions, including sounds from the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail, stalactites and stalagmites like those at DeSoto Caverns, and a race car simulator to show what it’s like at Talladega Superspeedway. Estimated cost is $175,000. Cost rose more for Nancy Bridges, Cecilia Firouzabadi and Chris Weed, who besides adding flat screen TVs and new brochure racks like the other teams, called for creating two dormer windows for the roof to improve natural lighting and redesigning the front entrance to be more inviting. Estimated cost was $220,000. Wright said this was the first time any of the students created a full-scale model or took on a project that would have statewide repercussions. "We basically got thrown into the real world," he said. "It was a lot of fun and we learned a lot." Clark Lundell, head of the department of industrial design, said the best aspects of all six designs will be blended together by a class next semester to create a singular design. The final idea will then become the new interior at Cleburne. "Our's is going to be a design model for all the others," said Bowman. "We are excited to be the first. Everyone else is going to be jealous." ABT&T Director Lee Sentell said the DOT also will likely incorporate ideas from the students into the new construction of the welcome centers at Ardmore and Lanett. "We want to implement ideas that will encourage people to stay in Alabama," he said. The final cost has yet to be determined, he added.
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Plaintiffs: Ala. college deseg case should end, some oppose 12/06/2006 Gadsden Times, The Associated Press		Return to Top
This is an update on a 1970 higher education desegration case that involved AU. It also appeared in the Southwest Florida Herald Tribune, The Gainesville Sun and the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer. A federal judge is expected to issue an order next week that would bring an end to Alabama's long-running college desegregation case, but some oppose the move, saying more still needs to be done. U.S. District Judge Harold Murphy said at a fairness hearing Tuesday that he would deliver an order next week in response to the plaintiffs' proposals to end court proceedings. Attorneys for both sides said they expect him to accept their agreements and dismiss the case, which began in 1981. The plaintiffs have not agreed that the vestiges of segregation have been totally eliminated, state Rep. John Knight, D-Montgomery, a plaintiff, said at the hearing Tuesday. Rather, we have agreed that the defendant State of Alabama and defendant universities have complied with the decrees issued by the court and that it is not practicable to obtain further relief in court. Willie Strain also spoke at the hearing in Birmingham federal court, which was held to consider objections to the ending the case. Strain filed a lawsuit in 1970 that led to a court order banning discrimination at the Auburn University-based Alabama Cooperative Extension Service, where he was assistant director of communications. He now heads the Alabama Black Faculty Association and said ending the case would thwart progress, including the need for historically white universities and the state's two-year college system to boost their ranks of black faculty and administrators. He also said the state should do more to help low-income black students financially when they attend historically white schools. The Birmingham News reported that in a conversation before the hearing, Knight told Strain, We firmly believe that we've gotten all we can get out of this. Murphy, based in Rome, Ga., has made numerous trips to Alabama over the years to preside over the case, which stemmed from the U.S. Department of Education's 1979 finding that there were still traces of segregation in Alabama's college system. The federal agency sued the state in 1981 after university leaders failed to agree on a plan to correct the problem. Plaintiffs alleged there was a lack of programs and facilities and few white students at historically black Alabama A&M in Huntsville and at Alabama State University in Montgomery, and not enough black students, faculty and administrators at the predominantly white schools. Knight said that when the case's mandates fully end as expected in 2014, ASU and A&M each will have received more than $200 million for such things as new academic programs, endowment trusts, diversity scholarships, new buildings and improvements. Murphy oversaw two of the three major higher education trials in the suit and issued far-reaching rulings in 1991 and 1995. The case had appeared headed for another major trial, but the plaintiffs and historically white universities began working on agreements to avoid one. Later, a surplus in the state education budget made money available to help meet Alabama A&M's request for additional building and repair funds, as well as the plaintiffs' request for a meaningful need-based scholarship program. The expected end of the case won't end the plaintiffs' claim that Alabama's property tax system is a barrier to higher education for many black and low-income students because it doesn't generate enough revenue. Murphy rejected that claim, and it is now before the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
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Plant pathologists work to keep magic of holly going all year 12/06/2006 AgProfessional		Return to Top
Austin Hagan, extension plant pathologist at AU, is quoted in this story. ST. PAUL -- Long ago, holly was thought to have magical powers because its leaves kept their green color even during the severest of winters. Boughs of holly were hung in homes to keep bad spirits at bay and good spirits nearby. Today, the real magic of holly stems from its ability to bring beauty to homes every holiday season, say plant pathologists at The American Phytopathological Society. According to Mike Benson, professor of plant pathology at North Carolina State University, American and English hollies, with their dark-green glossy foliage and bright red berries, are the hollies most commonly used for greenery in homes during the holiday season. Plant pathologists work with nurseries that grow hollies to keep the plants healthy and in ample supply by managing the plant diseases that affect holly. "Plant diseases such as web blight, black root rot, and root-infecting nematodes can prove challenging for nurseries and some of these disease problems can occur on hollies once they are planted," Benson said. Plant parasitic nematodes, which are microscopic roundworms, live in the soil and attack holly roots. As the nematodes feed on plant roots, the diseased roots can no longer provide nutrients and water like healthy roots can. Above ground, the lack of nutrients and water create symptoms such as yellowing, dwarfing of leaves, and poor growth. "Members of APS, through their university and government research programs, have identified specific holly cultivars that are resistant to nematode attack," said Benson. "These resistant cultivars can be grown in the landscape where nematodes have been a problem in the past," he said. Black root rot, a fungal disease caused by a soilborne pathogen, affects hollies in much the same way as nematodes. The name of the disease comes from the black color of the spores produced by this pathogen in infected roots. Plant pathologists have devised several methods of prevention for black root rot including lowering the soil pH, selecting disease resistant holly cultivars, and drenches of fungicides to prevent the disease in nursery plants. Another disease that impacts holly health in the landscape, especially Japanese holly, is dieback, said Austin Hagan, extension plant pathologist at Auburn University. This disease usually occurs during hot and dry weather conditions. "Dieback is caused by a fungus that gets into the plant and girdles the branches. This causes the branches to slowly die back to just above the soil line," Hagan said. The best way to manage this disease is to prune out the dead or dying branches. "If managed correctly, a holly plant that gets dieback one year usually won't have it the following season," he said. The American Phytopathological Society is a non-profit, professional scientific organization. The research of the organization's 5,000 worldwide members advances the understanding of the science of plant pathology and its application to plant health. SOURCE: APS news release.
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Students Working On Design for New Alabama Welcome Centers 12/06/2006 WSFA-TV		Return to Top
Several students at Auburn University are getting a jump start on their careers. Their project involves re-designing Alabama's welcome centers. Fifteen students have been working for an entire semester to design a state of the art welcome center to attract visitors. They showcased their model on Wednesday for the new center on the Alabama-Georgia border on Interstate 20. WSFA 12 News will let you know if the state chooses their design plans.
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First in ovo vaccine against AI 12/06/2006 WorldPoultry - Doetinchem, Netherlands		Return to Top
This story is about the development of an avian influenza vaccine at AU. The world's first in ovo, or egg-injected, vaccine to protect chickens against avian influenza has been developed. The vaccine was developedby an Auburn University veterinary professor in collaboration with researchers at Vaxin of Birmingham. The research, which has been published in the scientific journal Vaccine , would provide 100 percent protection once an outbreak's strain is determined. "We have proven the principle, which is the major step in leading to commercially produced vaccine that could be vital to the poultry industry," said Haroldo Toro, the Auburn University professor. "When an outbreak occurs, we would determine the strain and quickly create a vaccine within three months specifically for it." The researchers inserted a gene from a low pathogenic avian flu virus strain (H5N9) into a non-replicating human virus which was then injected into developing chicken embryos still in the egg. When protection induced by the vaccine was tested against two highly pathogenic avian flu viruses, a Vietnam H5N1 strain and a Mexican H5N2 strain, the results showed 68 percent and 100 percent protection, respectively. "These strains have slightly different genetic makeups which account for the different percentages in protection," said Toro, who is also collaborating on this project with the Southeast Poultry Research Laboratory. "Our results indicate that we can provide effective protection against any strain after incorporating the gene of the field strain into our vaccine construct." In the case of an outbreak of avian influenza, mass vaccination programmes around the perimeter region would help to reduce the risk of further dissemination of the field virus to neighboring areas. "We can vaccinate lots of birds in a quick, cost- and labor-saving manner which otherwise would not be possible," Toro said. "Most poultry operations already have automated injection machines to vaccinate against Marek's disease, injecting up to 40,000 eggs per minute. Our vaccine is produced through cell cultures, so we can easily make enough vaccine for thousands of birds." Toro's research is funded through a USDA programme set up in 2004 for universities to study avian influenza. The next step is gaining federal approval to commercially produce the vaccine. "We are looking at two or three years for federal approval, but it might be much sooner if an outbreak occurs," he said. "We have a very good tool against avian flu. No one has done this before."
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