NewsFlash is a monthly email of press items featuring our College's researchers. For a more complete and regularly updated list of COE media coverage, see In the Media.
Click on a headline to read that article on the web. Some links may require a subscription or no longer be active.
NewsFlash is a service of the UW College of Engineering and the UW Office of News and Information. If you have a newsworthy result about one month from publication, presentation or demonstration, please contact Michelle Ma at mcma@uw.edu@uw.edu or (206) 543-2580.
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NewsFlash, December 2012
Dec. 07, 2012 | The Los Angeles Times
A promising technology to prevent HIV and unwanted pregnancy
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It has been decades since the last major breakthrough of a popular, easy-to-use and effective form of birth control. But innovative research is underway in Kim Woodrow’s UW bioengineering lab. Woodrow and graduate students Cameron Ball and Emily Krogstad describe a promising multipurpose prevention strategy in a new study published in the open-access journal PLoS One. |
Electrically spun fabric offers dual defense against pregnancy, HIV
Dec. 07, 2012 | Deutsche Welle (Germany)
Nanofabric could revolutionize contraception
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Researchers at the University of Washington in Seattle have created a stretchy fabric that is so fine-pored that it can block sperm. The contraceptive can also protect against HIV infection. |
Electrically spun fabric offers dual defense against pregnancy, HIV
Dec. 04, 2012 | PopSci.com
Better than a condom? Discrete nanofabric protects against pregnancy and HIV
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Bioengineer Kim Woodrow has developed a new contraceptive that for the first time offers women a discreet way to protect against both sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancy. The goal: to empower women to make their own reproductive choices safely and cheaply. |
Electrically spun fabric offers dual defense against pregnancy, HIV
Dec. 13, 2012 | Discovery News
Excellent idea of the day: Dissolvable birth control
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A bioengineering lab at the UW has developed electrically spun, super-thin cloth that can dissolve and release drugs. With funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the researchers are hopeful that the product will be cheap and plentiful enough to put a dent in the transmission of AIDS and unwanted pregnancies. |
Electrically spun fabric offers dual defense against pregnancy, HIV
Dec. 24, 2012 | Crosscut
Best of 2012: Seattle's global health powerhouses turn their attention to south King County
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Computer science and Human Centered Design and Engineering undergraduates enrolled in the spring 2011 course "Designing Technology for Resource-Constrained Environments," co-taught by computer scientist Gaetano Borriello, designed a text-messaging service that helps south King County residents find cheap, affordable interpreters. |
Dec. 03, 2012 | The New York Times
Pushing science’s limits in sign language lexicon
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Words like “organism” and “photosynthesis” — to say nothing of more obscure and harder-to-spell terms — have no single widely accepted equivalent in sign language. Now, crowdsourcing projects, including one by computer scientist Richard Ladner, enable people who are deaf to develop a new terminology. |
Crowdsourcing site compiles new sign language for math and science
Dec. 07, 2012 | DVICE.com
New approaches add scientific lexicon to sign language
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Gallaudet University in Washington DC, the world's leading deaf and hard-of-hearing school, is collaborating with the University of Washington on the ASL-STEM Forum. This forum is a federally sponsored program that allows users to submit and vote on new signs for scientific terms in a community-driven, wiki-style approach. |
Crowdsourcing site compiles new sign language for math and science
Dec. 10, 2012 | United Press International
Site helps deaf with signing science terms
| Computer scientist Richard Ladner developed an online forum to help develop sign-language versions of specialized terms used in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. |
Crowdsourcing site compiles new sign language for math and science
Dec. 05, 2012 | Nature News
Heart cells coaxed to divide and conquer
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The heart does have a limited ability to heal itself — and a genetic 'trick' can harness this. Bioengineer Chuck Murry is quoted. |
A strategy to fix a broken heart
Nov. 20, 2012 | The (UW) Daily
Preparing for takeoff
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Aeronautics & Astronautics students are preparing to enter the eighth annual Intercollegiate Rocket Engineering Competition. Their rocket will be made of carbon fiber so that it will be stronger and lighter than last year's model. |
Dec. 11, 2012 | The Seattle Times: Brier Dudley's blog
Microsoft, Amazon, UW researchers named ACM Fellows
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Computer scientist Anna Karlin is among three new Seattle-area fellows of the Association for Computing Machinery. |
News Digest: Honor: Anna Karlin
Dec. 04, 2012 | Xconomy
Under Seattle’s cloud, a big data cluster grows
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It’s a good time to be doing big data in Seattle. So says computer scientist Ed Lazowska, who played host and tour guide to the region’s big-data lineup. |
New hires catapult UW's expertise in machine learning and 'big data'
Dec. 17, 2012 | KUOW: The Conversation
Seattle: Welcome to the Internet fast lane
| Seattle is launching a pilot project to bring ultra high-speed broadband service the city. The city is working with the UW and tech company Gigabit Squared to launch the service. Computer scientist Ed Lazowska talks about the project, and what Seattleites might do with ultra high-speed broadband. |
Dec. 11, 2012 | Puget Sound Business Journal: TechFlash blog
SNUPI Technologies, latest company to spin out of UW, gets $1.5M in funding
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A Seattle startup co-founded by computer scientist and electrical engineer Shwetak Patel has received $1.5 million in funding from venture capital firms. The product is a wireless sensor that can go decades before it needs a battery change. |
Home's electrical wiring acts as antenna to receive low-power sensor data
Dec. 11, 2012 | Xconomy
UW spinout funded by Madrona to build cheap home sensor networks
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A team including a “genius” University of Washington professor and one of Seattle’s top serial entrepreneurs just landed $1.5 million from Madrona Venture Group and others to build a small, inexpensive, long-lasting wireless sensor network that could revolutionize home hazards detection. |
Home's electrical wiring acts as antenna to receive low-power sensor data
Dec. 11, 2012 | The Seattle Times: Brier Dudley's blog
UW sensor spinoff SNUPI takes flight
| Called SNUPI - for sensor network utilizing powerline infrastructure - the new company co-founded by computer scientist and electrical engineer Shwetak Patel and electrical engineering PhD student Gabe Cohen will be led by longtime Seattle tech entrepreneur and UW alum Jeremy Jaech. |
Home's electrical wiring acts as antenna to receive low-power sensor data
Dec. 11, 2012 | GeekWire
Jeremy Jaech’s new home sensor startup SNUPI lands $1.5M from Madrona, others
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It may be several months before we get to see the new home sensor technology that Shwetak Patel and his colleagues are working on. But Seattle entrepreneur Jeremy Jaech has already lined up some key support. |
Home's electrical wiring acts as antenna to receive low-power sensor data
Dec. 23, 2012 | Fox Business
Analysis: Amazon, Google on collision course in 2013
| The Google-Amazon rivalry will escalate in 2013 as the two companies' areas of rivalry grow, spanning online advertising and retail to mobile gadgets and cloud computing. Oren Etzioni, professor of computer science and engineering, is quoted. |
Dec. 19, 2012 | American Public Media: Marketplace
The brave new world of dynamic pricing
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In today’s lackluster economy, dynamic pricing often works for the consumer, says the CEO of Seattle startup Decide.com. The pricing website was co-founded last year by computer scientist Oren Etzioni and former UW computer science students. |
Dec. 27, 2012 | The Seattle Times
Editorial: Retain degree-tuition flexibility for state’s colleges, universities
| The Seattle Times editorial board argues that Washington state's higher education institutions need the flexibility to raise tuition for degrees, including engineering, that cost more to deliver. |
Dec. 05, 2012 | The Seattle Times
Value of public-private scholarships to increase to $5,000 from $1,000
| Next school year, nearly 1,900 Washington students will get $5,000 scholarships to pursue degrees in science, technology, engineering, math and health care. |
Dec. 13, 2012 | GeekWire
‘Tis the season: Google’s unique Seattle-born G-Give charity program raising thousands this week
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CSE alums Krista Davis and Jessan Hutchison-Quillian now work in Google's Seattle office. This year they created an easy way for Googlers to donate money to charity - including to a scholarship fund at their alma mater. |
Dec. 14, 2012 | The Seattle Times: Today File blog
Google employees raise more than $120,000 for UW scholarship fund
| Two Google employees who graduated from the UW have come up with a simplified way for their fellow workers to give money to social causes — an idea that this week raised about $120,000 for an endowed scholarship at the UW. |
If you have a newsworthy result about one month from publication, presentation or demonstration, please contact Hannah Hickey, hickeyh@uw.edu. Notice of student and faculty awards and grants is also welcome.