Volume 124 · No. 7
Wednesday, July 19, 2017
EST. 1887
lsunow.com
@lsureveille
thedailyreveille
dailyreveille
dailyreveille
ROLL CALL
BASKETBALL
Tigers to compete in Maui for invitational
Student Government issues annual legislative report card Senate Grade Distribution
BY BRANDON ADAM @badam_TDR
Sen. Jim Fannin, R- Jonesboro 104 percent - A Rep. Julie Stokes, R- Kenner 87 percent - B Rep. Walt Leger, D- New Orleans 70 percent - C
House of Representatives Grade Distribution
Rep. Bob Hensgens, R- Abbeville 13 percent - F BY BRANDON ADAM
A
B
C
D
F
LSU Student Government released its annual Higher Education Report Card July 17. The report card grades state legislators on how they voted for or against bills involving higher education. The decision to publish an annual report card came in 2015, after the state had drastically cut funding for higher education on multiple occasions. The report card focused primarily on legislation involving TOPS and a bill proposing renovations to
@badam_TDR buildings on campus such as the Huey P. Long Fieldhouse, Patrick F. Taylor Hall and the iconic Memorial Tower. SG president Jason Badeaux said the process is an objective one, relying strictly on how a legislator voted or if they did not vote on a proposed bill centered around higher education. “All we are doing is evaluating whether you voted with higher education or you did not vote with higher education,” Badeaux said. “We counted [a]
see REPORT CARD, page 2
On Tuesday, LSU’s basketball team found out it would be playing Michigan in a first round matchup at the Maui Invitational Tournament this November. The tournament features seven other teams — including coach Will Wade’s former team VCU— and runs from Nov. 20-22. It will be the first time the Tigers have appeared in the tournament since 2007, when LSU went 1-2 with a win over Chaminade and close losses to Oklahoma State and Arizona State. This year in Hawaii, the Tigers open up with Michigan, who made it to the Sweet Sixteen last season. LSU will then play either Notre Dame or Chaminade. “It’s a great field,” Wade said in a teleconference on July 18. “I’m familiar with most of the teams. Michigan will be a big challenge for us, they are a perennial national program. They have had tremendous teams, tremendous success under Coach Beilein.” “It’ll be a tough game from a big time opponent from the Big Ten,” Wade added. “We need to play well to give ourselves an opportunity to get it done.” The opportunity to play elite basketball programs early is a chance for LSU and Wade to create an early season résumé that could help push the team into the NCAA Tournament.
see INVITATIONAL, page 2
RESEARCH
LSU researcher discovers new species of rat in Indonesia BY KATHERINE ROBERTS @krobe844 A new species has been discovered halfway across the world with the help of a University professor. Biological sciences assistant professor Jake Esselstyn and his research team discovered a new species of rat in Sulawesi Island, Indonesia, which made the International Institute for Species Exploration Top 10 New Species List. The slender root rat, or Gracilimus radix, is a small
mouse that looks like a mouse and shrew rat mix. Esselstyn, who is also the curator for the LSU Museum of Natural Science, and his team discovered the rat in Indonesia during their field work there within the past year. The team camps at fairly remote, wet places and lives out of a tent for several weeks, Esselstyn said. Since 2010, Esselstyn has traveled to Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines researching and discovering new animals. Discovering new species is a norm for Esselstyn. He and his
team find new mammals nearly every expedition they embark on in Southeast Asia. On Sulawesi Island, they discovered the three species Bunomys torajae in 2011, Paucidentomys vermidax in 2012 and Waiomys mamasae in 2016 from the same site, he said. To find all of these new species, they spend time trapping mammals using a variety of techniques. The root rat was trapped by a fall trap, which is a buried bucket in the ground surrounded by a fence pathway that lures the prey into
the trap. “We build a little fence that sort of funnels the animals towards the buckets and they run along the inside of the fence,” Esselstyn said. “They follow the fence until they fall in the bucket, if we’re lucky. The root rat is different from other species of rats because it is an omnivore, Esselstyn said, while most of its closest relatives are carnivores. The rat has a different anatomy compared to other wild rodents
see RESEARCH, page 2
courtesy of JAKE ESSELSTYN
Biological sciences assistant professor Jake Esselstyn and his research team in Sulawesi Island, Indonesia.