A Cornell University graduate student in physics was killed when the bicycle he was riding was struck by a car on Route 13 in the town of Virgil, N.Y., on Saturday, April 20. Raphael Kapfer, 24, was riding north on Route 13 between Dryden and Cortland at 10:30 a.m. when he was struck by a car driven by Joseph Cinquanti, 82, of Dryden. Cinquanti was driving south and was making a left turn when he hit Kapfer, who was pronounced dead at the scene. Cinquanti was ticketed for failing to yield the right of way and operating a motor vehicle without proof of valid insurance, officials from the Cortland County Sheriff's Office said. (April 23, 2002)
Creating temperatures more fit for the fourth of July, the mid-April heat wave that crossed the Northeast from April 16 to 18 smashed 47 daily high marks on the thermometer and tied six previous records, according to data compiled by the Northeast Regional Climate Center.
Cornell University Police will have "zero tolerance" for people who don't wear their seatbelts during an enforcement campaign on campus April 22-26. Officers will conduct random road checks and issue tickets to drivers and passengers who are not "buckled up." This action follows an awareness campaign by Cornell Police for the past two weeks, during which they handed out warning brochures to motorists. (April 22, 2002)
Cooking tomatoes -- such as in spaghetti sauce -- makes the fruit heart-healthier and boosts its cancer-fighting ability. All this, despite a loss of vitamin C during the cooking process, say Cornell food scientists. The reason: cooking substantially raises the levels of beneficial compounds called phytochemicals. Writing in the latest issue of the Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry (April 17), Rui Hai Liu, M.D., Cornell assistant professor of food science, notes, "This research demonstrates that heat processing actually enhanced the nutritional value of tomatoes by increasing the lycopene content -- a phytochemical that makes tomatoes red -- that can be absorbed by the body, as well as the total antioxidant activity. The research dispels the popular notion that processed fruits and vegetables have lower nutritional value than fresh produce." (April 19, 2002)
A Ford Foundation grant of $195,000 to Cornell University's Africana Studies and Research Center will support the second phase of "Africa in Venice," a project under the direction of Professor Salah Hassan.
An appeal to Congress to raise fiscal 2003 funding for NASA's National Space Grant College and Fellowship Program was made Tuesday (April 16, 2001) by Yervant Terzian, a Cornell astronomy professor and director of the program in New York state.
Cornell University has made substantial progress in its multi-year faculty improvement plan, with salaries for continuing faculty increasing 8.1 percent in 2001-02, compared with the university's overall goal of 8 percent, President Hunter Rawlings announced.
Georgia Harper, manager of the Intellectual Property Section of the Office of General Counsel for the University of Texas System, will speak on "Copyright Law and Cyberspace" at 1 p.m. Thursday, April 25, in 133 Warren Hall on the Cornell University campus.