uncnews.unc.edu

Here is a sampling of links and notes about Carolina people and programs cited recently in the media:

National Coverage

UNC hires Bubba Cunningham as AD
The Associated Press
North Carolina has hired Tulsa athletic director Bubba Cunningham as the school's next AD. University trustees approved the hiring in a meeting Friday morning. Cunningham's start date is Nov. 14 and his contract runs through June 2017. ... "I'm not smart enough to have enough adjectives about the emotions I feel right now," Cunningham said during the news conference to announce his hiring. "It's a special, special place, and it's such an honor to be a part of it."

Obama to attend hoops game -- on aircraft carrier
USA Today
Two of the best college basketball teams in the land -- North Carolina and Michigan State -- will honor the armed forces next month by playing a game on an aircraft carrier. The commander in chief will be there to watch. President Obama will attend the Veterans Day game in the USS Carl Vinson, communication director Dan Pfeiffer said today.
Related Links: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/early-lead/post/obama-will-attend-college-basketball-game-on-aircraft-carrier/2011/10/13/gIQAWqzphL_blog.html
http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/sns-rt-bkc-newss134e15fa1-20111013,0,1577337.story

Fundamental Change Is Never Voluntary
The Huffington Post (Blog)
For the last year or so Holden Thorp and I have been talking about change. In our book, Engines of Innovation, we suggest virtually all of our major institutions are in crisis and that innovation and entrepreneurship offer a path forward. (We just posted the introduction to the book at where we set forth this argument in some detail.) The book has given us the opportunity to talk with policy-makers, academics, students, parents and trustees from all over this country about the uncertain future of the world's great research universities.

Regional Coverage

Surviving a hospital stay: 'People's Pharmacy' authors tell how to avoid deadly medical mistakes
The Sacramento Bee
... Dr. Nortin Hadler, a University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill rheumatologist and an oft-quoted critic of the U.S. health care system, wrote a blurb for the cover of the Graedons' book, but his praise is qualified. "If you're inclined toward doctor-bashing, this book will give you some fodder," he said in an interview. "They do know something about drug adverse events and drug-drug interactions ... (But) there's a real problem with assuming that an understanding of the literature translates perfectly to the bedside. ... There is more nuance to informed medical decisions than just the pharmacology of drugs."

State and Local Coverage

Board approves Cunningham as new UNC AD
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
UNC's Board of Trustees this morning approved the hiring Lawrence "Bubba" Cunningham as its new athletics director. Cunningham comes to Chapel Hill from Tulsa, where he has served as AD since 2005. A news conference has been scheduled for 11 a.m.
Related Links: http://www.wralsportsfan.com/unc/story/10250852/
http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=news/sports&id=8391176
http://www.heraldsun.com/view/full_story/16048367/article-UNC-approves-Cunningham-as-new-AD?instance=homefirstleft
http://triangle.news14.com/content/top_stories/648116/unc-board-to-announce-hiring-of-new-athletic-director

Nutrition institute lands $8.9 million federal grant
The Charlotte Business Journal
The UNC Chapel Hill Nutrition Research Institute has received a nearly $8.9 million grant — its largest to date — to study fetal-alcohol disorders. The Kannapolis-based nutrition center will examine the prevalence and characteristics of fetal-alcohol disorders in the general U.S. population, says Philip May, a nutrition research professor.

Obama to be at UNC game on carrier
The Triangle Business Journal
President Obama will be aboard the USS Vinson on Nov. 11, Veterans Day, when UNC and Michigan State square off in the "Carrier Classic," the first NCAA game ever played on the deck of an aircraft carrier. The game is being staged as a way to honor American troops. The Vinson, by the way, was the carrier that delivered Osama bin Laden to his watery burial on May 2.

UNC-Chapel Hill officials dispute claims about new chairman
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
UNC-Chapel Hill officials issued statements this week disputing comments a sports writer wrote in a blog about the new board chairman's professional connection to media organizations and his involvement in discussions about the NCAA's probe into the football program. Wade Hargrove, a Raleigh lawyer, became chairman of the board this summer, the day Tar Heel football coach Butch Davis was fired.

A radical departure
The Carrboro Citizen
Check out the 1966 Yackety Yack and see if you can identify the progressives. Sure, the occasional beard is a dead giveaway: Gary Waller, vice chair of the UNC chapter of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), has one. ... Yesterday, in a ceremony presided over by UNC Chancellor Holden Thorp, a memorial marker was placed on the stone wall that separates McCorkle Place on campus from Franklin Street, where the ban was openly challenged in March ’66.

State wants NCAA information on UNC probe
The News & Observer (Raleigh)
N.C. Secretary of State Elaine Marshall's office is seeking an order from a Wake County judge to force the NCAA to turn over information about its probe of UNC-Chapel Hill athletics. According to the Wake Superior Court filing, the NCAA has refused to provide documents that the Secretary of State's Office wants to review as part of its ongoing investigation into agent-related conduct affecting the UNC-CH football program.
Related Links: http://www.heraldsun.com/view/full_story/16040108/article-Marshall-taking-NCAA-to-court-to-get-records-from-UNC-probe?instance=homesecondleft
http://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/morning_call/2011/10/nc-wants-unc-probe-records-from-ncaa.html
http://www.wralsportsfan.com/unc/story/10255234/

Issues and Trends

Epizyme grabs $4M from partner GlaxoSmithKline
The Boston Business Journal
Epizyme Inc., a privately-held biotechnology company focused on personalized cancer treatments, has received $4 million in payments from UK-based drug maker GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE: GSK) for meeting early-stage drug candidate milestones. ... Epizyme was founded in 2007 by Robert Horvitz, a Nobel Prize-winning biology professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Yi Zhang, a professor at The University of North Carolina Chapel Hill.