In his column, Bill McGraw reviews the history of the Packard Motor Car Co.'s now abandoned Detroit plant and its historical significance. Professor Charles Hyde commented in the column saying that the plant's design was revolutionary.

Megabus.com, which offers fast, inexpensive bus fares for trips to and from Chicago , has found a strong market in Detroit . Megabus has two pickup and drop-off spots in Detroit , one at Grand Circus Park and the other is on the campus of Wayne State University . Services to Chicago began April 10 with one-way fares ranging from $1 to $27.

Jean D. Perduzzi, associate professor at Wayne State 's School of Medicine , was quoted in this article about a Delaware man who received an experimental stem cell procedure in Lisbon , Portugal . The man suffered two crushed discs in the cervical region of his spinal cord in a car crash. He was left a tetraplegic. The procedure, an olfactory mucosa autograft, extracted cell tissue from his nasal cavity and transplanted it into his spinal cord. "It seems like these cells have the same potential in terms of forming a variety of cell types, just like embryonic cells," Peduzzi said. She also co-authored a study involving seven paralyzed patients who received stem cell procedures. A year later, much like the Delaware man, none could walk, but all had seen improvement in the use of their motor skills. "We don't know the strength of the placebo effect," Perduzzi said. "We can't get rid of that. But we waited a year until the patients had the surgery to see if they improved."

In this article about the Detroit Action Network For Reproductive Rights (DANFORR) support rally on June 30, Marisol Ybarra, a leader of the Wayne State chapter of the Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance, was mentioned for urging young people and students to continue standing in favor of choice.

Gov. Jennifer Granholm and Republican legislative leaders said on Friday they have reached a tentative budget agreement that includes funding increases for schools, colleges and universities. Under the deal, Wayne State University would receive a 2.5 percent increase. The University of Michigan and Michigan State University would receive a 3 percent increase while Oakland University receives a 3.4 percent increase and Eastern Michigan University receives a 2.7 percent increase. Lawmakers are expected to vote on the budget in late July.

Detroit Medical Center CEO Mike Duggan says he can steer the Detroit Medical Center (DMC) toward sustained profitability without investing more in the suburbs or its Wayne State University Physicians Group affiliation. After lengthy negotiations, the DMC and WSU physicians agreed in late March to extend their current contract through the end of this year. While Wayne State physicians comprise more than 700 of the DMC's 2,500 doctors, more than 1,000 Wayne State residents and graduate students also staff DMC hospitals. In June, Wayne State announced a new, separate partnership with Oakwood Healthcare Inc., and Robert Mentzer, dean of Wayne State's School of Medicine, has said the school is actively courting more partnerships. "This is not a ditching of the DMC," he said. "Affiliation with different systems would give WSU physicians and students more practical exposure to different patient populations and make the school a better candidate for increased funding."

Robin Boyle, Wayne State urban planning professor, comments in an Associated Press story about Mayor Kilpatrick's Administration's intention to sell $30 million in land this fiscal year as part of an effort to close a serious budget deficit. Prominent among the land proposals was a tentative deal to sell the Detroit-owned Rackham Golf Course in the northern suburb of Huntington Woods to developers for up to $11 million. The City Council rejected Kilpatrick's initial proposal on the golf course Friday. "Those holdings represent the heyday of the city," Boyle told the Detroit News, "We are in a new world. It makes accounting sense."

In a business brief under "Partnerships," Wayne State University's and Oakwood Healthcare Inc's. affiliation agreement is noted as creating an academic and clinical care partnership.

Peter Henning, Wayne State law professor, is quoted in this article about the potentially shifting global status of the auto industry now that GM is in talks to partner with Renault and Nissan. Henning asks, "Can Ford survive in the global marketplace? That'll be the next question, if GM goes in that direction."

This Q&A ran as a companion piece to a broader article on globalization by the Detroit Free Press reporter Sarah Webster. Peter Henning is quoted in both pieces. General Motors Corp.'s largest individual shareholder, Kirk Kerkorian, is pushing GM to consider having France's Renault and Japan's Nissan Motor Co. buy a significant stake in the company to form a three-way global alliance. Professor Peter Henning commented about the consequences of this potential alliance. He said with shares of large companies fractured, it usually takes consolidated control of only about a third of a company's shares to have power over the direction of the company.

M.L. Liebler, poet and Wayne State English professor, is profiled in this feature article discussing his teaching career and international notoriety in the field. Liebler is the first poet laureate for the City of St. Clair Shores and a mover in the local and national poetry community, but chances are he is better known in Macau or Munich, where he has drawn crowds of 400 to 500 to hear his poetry. "It was bizarre, I'd never seen anything like it," he said of the large audiences in Berlin and Munich, where he has spoken at universities and performed his poetry set to music in nightclubs. He has been published in hundreds of anthologies, written about a dozen books, produced CD's with his Magic Poetry Band and won awards such as the Paterson Poetry Prize in 1995.

Lari Warren-Jeanpiere, research associate in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurosciences at Wayne State's School of Medicine, and Dr. Sophie Womack, chief of Neonanatology at Sinai-Grace Hospital and assistant professor of pediatrics at the medical school, are quoted in a story about the health disparities among the country's ethnically diverse population. Warren-Jeanpiere commented about the importance of mother-daughter communication. She said communication between mothers and their daughters can produce a wealth of health improvements. "If the mother-daughter communication is open and free-flowing, then the woman will feel comfortable speaking with her physician about these same types of intimate issues which will allow in turn the physician to give that woman more comprehensive care." Dr. Womack addressed the issue of high infant mortality rates, especially from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), among African-American babies who are two times more likely to die of SIDS than white babies. According to Womack, six infants per 1,000 births will die in the first year of birth. She pointed out that another contributor to the deaths of African-American babies are the high numbers of premature and low birth weight babies being born to teen mothers who have multiple children. "This has an important impact on why our young children die. They are born too close together and are premature."

\"Leaders on Leadership\", co-produced by Wayne State's School of Business Administration and Detroit Public Television, featured Patricia Mooradian, president of The Henry Ford, the parent organization for Henry Ford Museum, Greenfield Village, an IMAX theater, a charter high school, and the Ford Rouge tours. Mooradian said her goal is for the Henry Ford to become, within 10 years, the benchmark history destination by which all others in the U.S. are judge.

Universities and community colleges will receive an average 3 percent boost, partly restoring some of the cuts they suffered in recent years under a budget deal announced by Gov. Jennifer Granholm and legislative leaders. Increases will range from 2.5 percent at Wayne State University to a high of 6 percent at Grand Valley State University. "It's good to be funded," said Harvey Hollins, vice president of government and community affairs at Wayne State. But Hollins said a funding formula used to dole out higher education money for the second year is still disheartening. "When you have increases from 6 percent all the way down to 2.5 percent, it says a lot about the intent of the Legislature in respect to Wayne State," Hollins said. "And that's a perception we still have to work on."

Peter Henning comments in another story about General Motors Inc. shareholder Kirk Kerkorian's attempt to form a worldwide alliance between GM, Renault and Nissan. "If he (Kerkorian) could save an American icon, then, sure, that would cement his legacy," Henning said. "Or at least it would take him from being a modestly well-known investor to someone who did something quite dramatic."

Peter Henning was quoted extensively in another story about GM's proposed partnership with Nissan and Renault, and how a similar maneuver was initiated in 1998 by Chrysler and Daimler-Benz AG - which was later ruled to be a merger in federal court. Henning said as people learned during the contested and controversial DaimlerChrysler union, you can't always trust the labels that companies put on their potential deals. "You can't mislead shareholders, but you can obscure things," he said.

A prominent feature story profiles Dr. Ingida Asfaw, clinical professor of surgery at Wayne State University, who founded the Ethiopian North American Health Professionals Association six years ago to help bring medical care to the country. Asfaw says part of his mission is to set up a system that the younger generation can take over. He describes a plan for a world-class medical institution with cardiovascular care at its core and every discipline of medicine around it. "I am in the process of designing such a facility, "he says. Asfaw considers his home to be the Detroit area where he first ventured in 1967 seeking his general surgery residency at Wayne State. "I am part and parcel of Wayne State University and the Detroit Medical Center." Photos of Asfaw are included.

Wayne State University Law Professor Robert Sedler wrote an opinion piece about the U.S. Supreme Court's 5-3 ruling yesterday insisting that Congress has the exclusive power to created laws governing U.S. military conflicts. Sedler maintained that the decision "handed the Bush administration a stinging defeat in its assertion of presidential power in the 'war on terrorism.'

Michael H. Belzer, a Wayne State industrial relations professor, commented about the Teamsters' 27th convention in Las Vegas and the long-running struggle between reform-minded Teamsters and the union's current leadership. At about 1.4 million members, the Teamsters are one of the largest unions in North America, and its leadership has always tried to play down cleavages during conventions, Belzer said. "When it comes to conventions, most of the issues have already been decided, and there\'s a desire to present a united front to the outside world - regardless of the circumstances. It is still relatively unusual to see any sort of a showdown at union conventions."

Standard & Poor's bond rating service Thursday revised its financial outlook for the Detroit Medical Center (DMC) to "stable" from "positive." Analysts at one of the nation's largest rating agencies lowered the DMC's status because of concerns that patient volumes are dropping, despite the eight-hospital system's vigorous efforts to draw more business. Admissions dropped by about 850, to 79,734, from 2004 to 2005. Patient volumes also dropped in the second half of 2005 and early 2006. On the positive side, Standard & Poor's said the DMC's large patient base, relatively low debt load and a proven ability to contain costs remain strengths.