9:36 a.m., Jan. 9, 2009----UD in the News is a roundup of recent news items about the University of Delaware, its faculty, students, staff and alumni.

Todd Moitz, a University of Delaware graduate, was featured in the Jan. 8 issue of the San Diego Union Tribune, Jan. 9 issues of the Asbury Park (N.J.) Press and the News Journal and multiple news broadcasts in the San Diego area, after winning $32 million in the California Lottery. Moitz recently moved to Pacific Beach.

Marianne Carter, director of the Delaware Center for Health Promotion, which is sponsored jointly by the University of Delaware and the state of Delaware, is working with the News Journal on a health campaign to get Delawareans to lose 20,000 excess pounds. The "Be Healthy Delaware: Ten Ton Challenge" will run for 10 weeks in the News Journal's Tuesday Health section, providing readers with tips for sensible weight loss. For information, see the Web site. Also, WPVI-TV of Philadelphia shot footage for a HealthCheck story on the program.

Cole Galloway, associate professor of physical therapy, was featured in the Jan. 7 Cape Gazette after discussing research on babies and robots during a meeting of the Rehoboth Beach Sunrise Rotary Club.

William Poole, former president of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis and Distinguished Scholar in Residence in the Lerner College of Business and Economics, wrote an opinion piece on Federal Reserve policy in the Jan. 4 News Journal.

Mark Miller, Emma Smith Morris Professor of Political Science and International Relations, was quoted in a Jan. 4 News Journal story about Israel and Gaza. "We know what the parameters of a truce would be," Miller said. "That Hamas would not attack Israelis and Israelis would not attack Palestinians. But we've seen that before, and they have not proven to be durable truces. That's why we're in this situation."

Ed Freel, policy scientist with the Institute for Public Administration, was featured as a Friday Forum panelist on a Jan. 2 WHYY-TV Delaware Tonight broadcast. He joined former Delaware Gov. Pete du Pont and U.S. Rep. Michael N. Castle to discuss the challenges faced by Gov.-elect Jack Markell.

Emmanuel Savary, a 10-year-old figure skating champion who trains at the University of Delaware Ice Skating Science Development Center, was featured Jan. 2 on WPVI-TV's news broadcast.

Elena DelleDonne, freshman on the Fightin' Blue Hens volleyball team, was featured in an ESPN Outside the Lines feature that ran frequently on the sports network through the holiday season. DelleDonne was one of the premier women's basketball players in the nation and left the University of Connecticut to enroll at Delaware and join the volleyball team, which went on to win its second consecutive Colonial Athletic Association championship.

Charles Elson, Edgar S. Woolard Jr. Chair and director of the John L. Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance, was quoted in a Dec. 31 Atlanta Journal Constitution story about Gulfstream, corporate jets and the economy, and in a Dec. 29 Bloomberg story about Citigroup leadership.

April Veness, associate professor of geography, was quoted in a Dec. 30 News Journal story about a book by Blake Gumprecht, The American College Town, which looks at town-gown tensions.

Melinda Kremer, co-founder of the American DanceWheels Foundation, was interviewed Dec. 30 on the Woman of the Week program on radio station WBEN-FM in Philadelphia and mentioned that the University of Delaware is the first institution of higher education to offer wheelchair ballroom dance classes.

Muqtedar Khan, associate professor of political science and international relations, wrote an opinion piece in the Dec. 30 News Journal concerning democracy, war and the Middle East.

Carrie Murphy and Anna Stoops, extension agents with University of Delaware Cooperative Extension, were quoted in a Native Delaware story in the Dec. 28 News Journal concerning homegrown vegetables.

Douglas W. Tallamy, chairperson of the Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology, was featured in a story in the Dec. 27 Indianapolis Star concerning his book, Bringing Nature Home: How Native Plants Sustain Wildlife in Our Gardens.

Matt Jaskot, a University of Delaware graduate, was quoted in a Dec.26 McClatchy Newspapers story about renewable energy companies in North Carolina. He works for Sencera, which manufactures materials for solar panels. "I was interested in alternative energy because I felt like it was going to be a field that was going to open up a lot of new jobs, and I felt like there were a lot of interesting problems that needed to be solved," Jaskot said. "It's the kind of thing that if we do it well, it could really take off."

Scott Caplan, associate professor of communication, was quoted in a Dec. 23 BBC story about research on gender differences among gamers playing EverQuest II. "In many cases, stereotypes reflect what I would call a 'cultural time lag'," Caplan told the BBC. "What we think about men and women and videogames may have been true 10 or 15 years ago, when there were mainly console video games or single-player games. But what we're seeing now is that games become social, and as these online games become communities then the attraction for that kind of behavior might increase for women. I think a lot of our stereotypes are based on the way computer games have been, rather than where they're going."