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DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY
Professor to speak on Mexican Revolution UH Historian and Professor John Hart will speak about the Mexican Revolution at 2:30 p.m. on Oct. 5 in the Honors Commons at the M.D. Anderson Memorial Library. Hart has been at UH since 1973 and is one of the leading scholars in the nation on Mexican history. He has written more than five books and published more than 40 articles. Hart also sits as the department chair for the UH College of History, where he teaches undergraduate classes, graduate classes and a research seminar in Modern Mexican History. — Sara Nichols/The Daily Cougar
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Pharmacy professor attempts to create a drug to treat addicts By Naheeda Sayeeduddin
THE DAILY COUGAR College of Pharmacy professor Joydip Das is working on a new research study to determine the root of alcohol addiction in the brain. Das, with his team of post-doctoral fellows, are exploring the mechanisms in hopes to one day develop a drug to treat alcoholism. The National Institutes of Health is funding their research with a three-year,
$450,000 grant. The efforts of the research have led Das and his team to discover precisely where the alcohol binds in the brain. “We think we have found the target, and the name of the target is Protein Kinase C,” Das said. “We found that alcohol binds to that protein and inhibits its action. We think that based on this binding site in this protein, we will be able to develop some drugs.” The development of a drug may take years. Das said the research is in its pre-clinical phase. After a drug is developed, the team has to complete animal lab testing. Once sufficient data is collected, it will be sent to the Food and Drug Administration to be
Today is the deadline to register for the mock interview day. Keep up with Newsline as we cover Coog Career Week, and go http://www.career.uh.edu/careerweek for a detailed schedule and further information.
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approved for human testing, also known as the clinical phase. Das said it may take a while before the teams gets to this point. According to the NIH, Alcoholism is defined by four main characteristics – craving, loss of control, physical dependence, and tolerance. The NIH also states that there are roughly 17.6 million people in the U.S. with alcohol addiction. Das said that the government spends $184 billion a year on alcohol abuse and alcoholism — of which $1 billion is spent on alcoholism prevention. “It (alcohol addiction) has a lot of social impact,” Das said. “It’s a big problem.”
By Katie Rowald
— Sara Nichols/The Daily Cougar
AROUND TOWN
October 1, 2010
Engineering grant permits soil research
UH University Career Services is hosting Coog Career Week in an attempt to better prepare college students for a successful job search once they graduate. The week will feature interviewing tips, an internship fair and a mock interview day, among other activities.
Tony Rock Chris Rock’s younger brother Tony Rock will be sharing a few laughs at the Houston Improv tonight at 8 p.m. He has been featured on many different shows including ones on Comedy Central. Tony will be in Houston until Oct. 3, so grab some tickets and see him when you can!
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Team examines alcohol
Monday kicks off the start of the first-ever Coog Career Week, which spans from Oct. 4 to Oct. 8.
IT Training on Web Development A free class for students and faculty introducing Adobe Flash CS5 will be held in the Social Work Building in room 110-L. You must register at www.uh.edu/ittraining beforehand. The class will be held from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m.
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Coog Career Week takes off Monday
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Issue 029, Volume 76
Graffiti gets gawks, gazes
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tudents have been talking about the anonymously placed graffiti on walls and bulletin boards throughout campus (shown outside the UC-Satellite and inside on the community board) with inspirational quotes and a distinct egg character that is being called ‘Aplha Delta Eggy.’ Fliers have been distributed linking the graffiti to fraternity and sorority ‘rush week.’ | Kendra Berglund/The Daily Cougar
A UH engineering graduate student was awarded a $10,000 fellowship award to further his research on the behavior of soil and structures. Taraka Ravi Shankar Mullapudi, a doctoral candidate in the Cullen College of Engineering’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, was given the 2010 Trent R. Dames and William W. Moore Fellowship by the American Society of Civil Engineers for his work towards a better understanding of the interaction between tensionless soil and a load. “Soil can resist loads proportional to its normal displacement at a particular point, which is what most structures rely on,” Mullapudi said in a College of Engineering news release. “But it can also resist bending because of the cohesive nature of the soil, and J Taraka Mulusually this bending resistance is neglected. We are investigating and lapudi numerically simulating that interaction.” Once his research is complete, Mullapudi said he hopes his findings will be incorporated into computer software that will allow architects to create structures that will more effectively distribute their weight. The Fellowship is open to graduate students, professors and practicing engineers. Mullapudi was nominated by associate professor Ashraf Ayoub. Mullapudi, who received his bachelor’s and master’s of technology in civil engineering in India, received the ASCE’s 2009 O.H. Ammann Research Fellowship in Structural Engineering for his work on the seismic analysis of reinforced concrete structures subjected to combined axial, bending, shear and torsional loads. Mullapudi is currently the president of the UH chapter of Chi Epsilon Civil Engineering Honor Society and the vice-president of the University’s Golden Key International Honor Society. news@thedailycougar.com