Nikon Instruments Inc. (www.nikoninstruments.com) and Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine announced the opening of a collaborative core microscopy imaging center, establishing a partnership that brings improved research capabilities to Northwestern, while providing critical feedback for Nikon product development. One of only three such centers in the U.S., the Northwestern Nikon Imaging Center will be equipped with the latest technology in light microscopy imaging systems and will be instrumental in ongoing biomedical research.

CHICAGO -- Ernest Moore, a research professor of molecular pharmacology and audiologist at Northwestern University, developed tinnitus -- a chronic ringing and whooshing sound in his ears -- twenty years ago after serving in the U.S. Army reserves medical corps. His hearing was damaged by the crack of too many M16 rifles and artillery explosions....Ever since his ears began ringing, Moore has been researching a cure. He's at the forefront of just a small band of such scientists in the country.

Northwestern University researchers have shown that a nano-engineered gel inhibits the formation of scar tissue at the injury site and enables the severed spinal cord fibers to regenerate and grow....The research is published...in the April 2 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience...lead author John Kessler, M.D., Davee Professor of Stem Cell Biology at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine.

...New research from Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine shows a single negative experience linked to an odor rapidly teaches us to identify that odor and discriminate it from similar ones...Wen Li, lead author of the study and a postdoctoral fellow at the Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer's Disease Center... The study will be published March 28 in the journal Science....Li's collaborators include Jay Gottfried, senior author and assistant professor of neurology, Todd Parrish, associate professor of radiology, and James Howard, technologist.

For the first time -- and in unambiguous findings -- researchers from Northwestern University and the University of Haifa show both that areas of the brain associated with language work harder in girls than in boys during language tasks, and that boys and girls rely on different parts of the brain when performing these tasks. ...(Douglas) Burman is primary author of “Sex Differences in Neural Processing of Language Among Children.” Co-authored by James R. Booth (Northwestern University) and Tali Bitan (University of Haifa), the article will be published in the March issue of the journal Neuropsychologia and now is available online at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2007.12.021.

New research from Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine reveals how hunger works in the brain and the way neurons pull your strings to lunge for the sweet fried dough.

Northwestern University experts on stem cell research and related ethical issues will take part in the Chicagoland Stem Cell Science Education Symposium, a forum for discussing innovative approaches to teaching stem cell research in middle and high school. More than 140 science teachers, educators, and leading scientists, most of them from the Chicago area, will attend the Feb. 22 program at the James Allen Center, Tribune Center, 2169 Campus Drive, Evanston campus. The symposium is sponsored by the Office of STEM Education Partnerships and Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University in partnership with The Biotechnology Institute, the National Academy of Sciences and members of the Illinois education and biotechnology communities. It will address the underlying scientific foundations and realistic promise of stem cell research, ethical and societal considerations, and approaches to teaching the science to Illinois students.

NUIN Associate Professor, Robert Vassar, PhD, Associate Professor in the Department of Cell and Molecular Biology at the Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, is one of three major recipients in 2008 of the prestigious Met Life Foundation Award for Medical Research in Alzheimer's Disease. Since 1986, MetLife Foundation has awarded $10.5 million in grants through the Awards for Medical Research program to support scientists who have made contributions to the understanding of Alzheimer’s disease and provide them with funds to pursue their research. Two past awardees have gone on to win Nobel Prizes.

“Subliminal Smells Can Guide Social Preferences” was published in the December issue of Psychological Science. Besides lead author Wen Li, the study's co-investigators include Isabel Moallem, Loyola University; Ken Paller, professor of psychology in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern; and Jay Gottfried, assistant professor of neurology at Feinberg and senior author of the paper.

NUIN member and Chair of Feinberg's Neurology Dept., Dr. Jack Kessler, shifted his diabetes research to stem cell research when his daughter was paralyzed from the waist down. MAPPING STEM CELL RESEARCH: Terra Incognita, the award winning documentary about Dr. Kessler by Maria Finitzo of Kartemquin Films is now screening in cities across the US before its broadcast premiere on PBS on January 15, 2007.