°µÍø½ûÇø

A cool, wet spring is keeping the wildfire hazard to a minimum in many parts of Colorado. But, according to a CU-Boulder wildfire expert, it would only take a few weeks of hot, dry weather to create a potentially dangerous fire season. "The really critical time period is June," said Tom Veblen, a professor of geography at CU-Boulder who studies the history of wildfires in the West. "It just takes a few weeks of really dry weather, high temperatures and, most importantly, wind."

The Center for Environmental Journalism at the University of Colorado at Boulder has selected five journalists as Ted Scripps Fellows in Environmental Journalism for 2003-04. The new fellows are Jeff Young, news bureau chief for West Virginia Public Broadcasting in Charleston, W. Va.; Vicki Monks, multi-media freelancer from Santa Fe, N.M.; Kim McGuire, environment reporter for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in Little Rock; Alex Markels, freelance journalist from Minturn, Colo.; and Eric Frankowski, assistant city editor for the Longmont (Colo.) Daily Times-Call.

Astronomers led by the University of Colorado and Carnegie Observatories have shown that a miniature galaxy less than one-hundredth the size of the Milky Way is ejecting large quantities of gas and energy into huge regions of intergalactic space.

The University of Colorado at Boulder received high marks from the U.S. Department of Labor, Denver District of the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs in a recent evaluation of the university's equal employment policies and practices.

Facilities operators at the University of Colorado at Boulder will conduct tests on steam boilers at the Williams Village housing complex June 9-13. The system is being tested to ensure provision of steam for the new student housing apartment complex, according to Derrick Watson, project coordinator. The building is scheduled to open for occupancy in August. The procedure is expected to produce a large steam cloud and noise that will be noticeable to the surrounding community. The steam vapor contains distilled water, which poses no environmental hazard.

While most University of Colorado students have completed the semester and moved on to summer jobs and internships, students participating in the Integrated Teaching and Learning Program's "Fellows in the Classroom" project are still hard at work teaching engineering to elementary students in local schools.

The computer is the most important invention in human history but most of us are not aware of that yet, according to a University of Colorado at Boulder professor. That's because its impact today is beyond comprehension, just as the full impact of the printing press could not be perceived by observers in the 15th century, said Douglas Robertson, an adjunct professor of geological sciences. The computer will produce even greater changes than the printing press, he contends.

CU-Boulder marketing Professor Dipankar Chakravarti has been elected president for 2003-04 of the Society for Consumer Psychology, a premier organization of consumer researchers from academia, government and industry.

Julio DeCastro, associate professor of organizational management at the CU-Boulder Leeds School of Business, has been elected to the board of governors of the Academy of Management. The Academy of Management, based at Pace University in New York, is the premier organization of management professors, bringing together 12,000 members from the United States and throughout the world. The board of governors both manages and sets policy for the organization.

University of Colorado at Boulder researchers have discovered four new kingdoms of life in the high alpine environment of Colorado, findings that have potential applications in the fields of agriculture and global change. Doctoral student Allen Meyer and Professor Steven Schmidt of the environmental, population and organismic biology department discovered the new microbe kingdoms in barren, boulder-filled tundra slopes west of Boulder.