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From the College of Natural Sciences
Boyer, Kaufmann and Moore awarded the 2005 ACM Software System Award for the Boyer-Moore Theorem Prover
AUSTIN, Texas—University of Texas at Austin professors Robert Boyer and J Stother Moore and Senior Research Scientist Matt Kaufmann were awarded the 2005 Software System Award by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) for their work on the Boyer-Moore Theorem Prover. Used by computer scientists to verify that computer systems are functionin...
Learning Machines
On a small practice field on the first floor of Taylor Hall, robot dogs playing soccer scuttle around the field like infants crawling across a playpen. They survey their field with Cyclops-like camera eyes and nudge balls around with silver chins. And like little humans, these robots learn to walk, recognize color, and hold a ball. They experiment ...
Poison dart frog mimics gain when birds learn to stay away
AUSTIN, Texas—When predators learn to avoid a highly toxic frog, they generalize, and this allows a harmless frog to mimic and be more abundant than a frog whose poison packs less punch, biologists at The University of Texas at Austin studying poison dart frogs in the Amazon have discovered. Catherine Darst and Molly Cummings report their findings...
Convergent evolution of molecules in electric fish
AUSTIN, Texas—Having a set of extra genes gave fish on separate continents the ability to evolve electric organs, report researchers from The University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Harold Zakon and colleagues, in a paper recently published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, show that African and South American groups of fish independe...
Student scientists create living bacterial photographs
AUSTIN, Texas—Using Petri dishes full of genetically engineered E. coli instead of photo paper, students at The University of Texas at Austin and UCSF successfully created the first-ever bacterial photographs. Their work is published in this week’s issue of Nature (Nov. 24, 2005), which is focused on the emerging field of synthetic biology. The s...
UT Department of Mathematics honored for graduating most Latinos in math in the nation
AUSTIN, Texas—The University of Texas at Austin Department of Mathematics has been named the 2005 Example of Excelencia for its efforts to boost Latino participation, graduation and pursuit of teaching in mathematics. The announcement was made in Washington, D.C. at the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials Educational Fund...
New laser technique measures Brownian motion of a single particle
AUSTIN, Texas—Using a new technique to trap and measure single particles with lasers, an international group of researchers from Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland, The University of Texas at Austin and the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg, Germany, have demonstrated that Brownian motion of a single pa...
University of Texas at Austin astronomers invite hurricane evacuees to view Moon, planets
AUSTIN, Texas—University of Texas at Austin astronomers will be hosting nightly “star parties” for the evacuees of Hurricane Katrina. Each night through Thursday, Sept. 22, they will set up two telescopes on the west side of the Austin Convention Center, at the intersection of Third and Red River streets, to share views of the Moon and planets. Wea...
Global warming's impact on U.S. plants, animals determined from review of dozens of studies
AUSTIN, Texas—Global warming has forced U.S. plants and animals to change their behavior in recent decades in ways that can be harmful, according to a new report prepared for the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. The Pew Center review of more than 40 studies is co-authored by Camille Parmesan, integrative biologist at The University of Texas at...Read It Now
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