Tag Africa
Homo naledi had a tiny brain but it looked a lot like ours
Scientists and nonscientists alike have often associated larger brains with greater intelligence, but a new study may challenge that notion. “Maybe brain size isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” says John Hawks, one of the study’s corresponding authors.
Two faculty receive summer humanities research support from the NEH
Summer Stipends support continuous full-time work on a humanities project for a period of two consecutive months. The stipends support individuals pursuing advanced research that is of value to humanities scholars, general audiences or both.
Fahey, Chazen, Thomas-Greenfield to receive honorary degrees
Honorary doctorates recognize individuals with careers of extraordinary accomplishment, with sustained and uncommonly meritorious activity reflecting UW–Madison values.
Ebola vaccine inches toward human clinical trials
The need for an Ebola vaccine is acute. Periodic outbreaks of the disease in sub-Saharan Africa, including an epidemic between 2013 and 2016, caused major loss of life and serious economic disruption.
Bringing cheap and accurate tuberculosis tests to Africa
Researchers are developing a "robust, simple and inexpensive way to increase the sensitivity of an existing TB test" by integrating a step very similar to a pregnancy test.
Chimpanzee deaths in Uganda pinned on human cold virus
Scientists investigating an outbreak of respiratory disease in a community of wild chimpanzees in Uganda were surprised and dismayed to discover that rhinovirus C was killing healthy chimps.
Increased vegetation boosts rainfall in the Sahel, researchers find
The large semiarid region of Africa just south of the Sahara routinely experiences pronounced droughts that can last decades, threatening food security in the area.
Health access program bridges micro-finance, health for Uganda’s poor
Former Badger Kevin Gibbons runs a non-profit that merges microfinance and health-care access in Uganda by helping taxi drivers buy motorcycles.
African professionals, activists among 2017 Mandela Washington Fellows at UW–Madison
The fellowship, sponsored by the State Department, brings 1,000 leaders between the ages of 25 and 35 from across Africa to universities for six weeks.
Trailblazing African history scholar Jan Vansina dies
Vansina's work led to acceptance in the academic world of oral traditions as valid sources of history, countering the once-prevalent attitude that cultures without texts had no history.
UW study to examine women’s roles in peacemaking
The University of Wisconsin–Madison is hosting a project designed to explore women’s existing roles in African peacemaking and to see what lessons can be gleaned from their mostly informal initiatives.
Mandela Washington Fellows learn leadership during visit to UW
Twenty-five young African leaders came to the University of Wisconsin–Madison campus for a six-week academic and leadership institute June 17 through July 31 as part of the Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders, sponsored by the U.S. Department of State and hosted by the UW–Madison African Studies Program.
Memorial for Garissa attack victims Thursday afternoon
An interfaith memorial on Bascom Hill at 12:30 p.m. Thursday will pay tribute to the 147 students killed at Garissa University College in Kenya on April 2.
In Sierra Leone, a chance to learn from Ebola
When Yoshihiro Kawaoka and members of his research team first arrived in Sierra Leone in December 2014, the consistent wail of ambulance sirens was a frightening reminder that the Ebola virus was there, too.
Suspending Kenya travel a difficult move
For the first time since 2007, Susan Gold, a nurse clinician at the University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics, won’t be heading to Kenya this year to help teens learn to live with HIV/AIDS. The 10 students who would have traveled with her in the Global Health Field Experience are making other plans in the wake of the UW–Madison decision to suspend all student travel to the country.
Making a better flip-flop to overcome illiteracy and disease
In many parts of the world, a good share of the population wears flip-flops. In America, the candy-colored sandals are a ubiquitous herald of summer. In rural Uganda, kids wear them, adult men and moms wear them whether they're bopping around the compound, working in the fields or getting water.
Water systems research fills in the details for Africa’s largest dam
When the government of Ethiopia finishes building the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) in 2017 or 2018, it will not only have built the largest hydroelectric power-generation plant in Africa, but also stirred up tensions among African nations, and indelibly altered a river that itself has guided millennia of human history in the region.
Moroccan pioneer in women’s rights to speak on aftermath of Arab Spring
Fatima Sadiqi, who founded a women's organization working on family law reforms and women's rights in her native Morocco, will speak on "North African Women's Rights in the Aftermath of the Arab Spring" as this year's J. Jobe Soffa and Marguerite Jacqmin Soffa Distinguished International Visitor at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.