The Hugh Hodgson School of Music puts great emphasis on its large ensembles - the Symphony Orchestra, Wind Ensemble, the UGA Hodgson Singers - and for good reason. Our students are highly accomplished musicians who gain valuable pre-professional performance experience in these large ensembles, and you should catch them whenever you can.
Students and faculty from one of UGA's longest-running Study Abroad programs are featured in an exhibition of work from 2011. The exhibition runs through Jan. 21 on the third floor of the Lamar Dodd School of Art:
The exhibition focuses on work produced by program participants during the three semesters of 2011; and there will be a reunion for its students from throughout the year. The work covers the studio areas of painting, drawing, watercolor, printmaking, photography, sculpture, ceramics, jewelry/metals, paper and book arts, graphic design, interior design and landscape architecture.
I was thinking about the upcoming Martin Luther King Holiday on my walk in this morning, how the Civil Rights Era in the U.S. can sometimes seem distant, abstract and merely iconic. But it is so much more than that. The principles for which people fought, marched and died continue to impact us in very real ways.
My colleague Sam Fahmy brings us this story today, from UGA researchers harnessing bacterial immune systems to fight infection and disease:
“Scientists study bacteria and other microorganisms to understand essential life processes as well as to improve their use in the safe production of foods, biofuels and pharmaceuticals, and to fight those that cause disease,” said Michael Terns, a professor in the departments of biochemistry and molecular biology, and genetics in the UGA Franklin College of Arts and Sciences. “And now we have a new way to engineer bacteria to decrease or even eliminate the expression of the genes of our choosing.”
I watched this NOVA presentation over the holidays, and while you might think that nothing could move as slow as a glacier, they are unfortunately not shifting all that slowly. The scientists on the program were able to measure movement that, while imperceptible to the naked eye, equaled about 130 feet per day. That is amazing. And alarming.
Here's a great little post about Apple and Steve Jobs to start the New Year:
In June 1976, Steve Jobs went looking for someone to print the manual for the Apple I computer, the first product from the company he had started with Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne a few months earlier. Jobs's friend Regis McKenna, the head of Silicon Valley's premier advertising and public relations firm, suggested he contact Mike Rose, who ran a small advertising agency in Los Altos, California.
