(Radio Iowa) – A University of Iowa researcher is eager to see what NASA’s newest telescope is able to find at the edges of the universe. The James Webb Space Telescope is scheduled for launch tomorrow (Saturday) morning. The U-I’s Keri Hoadley says astronomers are finding more planets orbiting distant starts and the Webb telescope will allow scientists to study those planets more closely.  Hoadley says, “I think it’s going to be our best shot at trying to identify signatures of life around these other planets.”

The Webb telescope is designed to see infrared light just now reaching Earth from the first galaxies created after the Big Bang. Hoadley studies how stars form out of clouds of gas. She says with the Webb telescope, scientists will be able to essentially look back in time to see how the process worked in the beginning.  “The Big Bang created the universe, but then how did we get from there to today where we see galaxies all over the place, and we see those galaxies full of stars and we have planets around all these stars,” she says.

The Webb telescope is more than double the size of the Hubble telescope. Hoadley says the data captured by the Webb telescope will all be archived and will eventually be made public for researchers around the world.

(by Grant Gerlock, Iowa Public Radio)

(Radio Iowa) – Along with Thanksgiving, today (Friday) and tomorrow are the top three days of the year for cooking fires in Iowa and nationwide. Andrea Vaspis, public education director for the National Fire Protection Association, says December 24th and 25th will mean families and friends are gathering for a big meal — and they’ll usually congregate in the kitchen. “There’s a lot more of the cooking going on, there’s a lot more people to distract you,” Vaspis says. “There is usually more alcohol use going on as well. That’s a recipe for a home fire when somebody thinks someone else is paying attention to something that’s on the stove.”

As guests arrive, there’s frequently chaos as people set down food they’ve brought to share, perhaps a little too close to the open flames. Watch for plastic containers that might melt or towels that could burst into flame. “The person who’s by the stove needs to stay by the stove. Stand by your pan, watch what you fry,” Vaspis says. “Keep a heavy lid nearby when you’re cooking on the stove. In case there is a flare-up, you can slide that lid right over the pan, turn off the ignition and avert a fire.”

While a big part of the joy of the holidays is seeing kids and grandkids, she reminds safety should be your first priority while the cooking is underway.”Keep kids and pets three feet away from where you’re cooking as it’s much too easy for someone to bump into something, spill something, knock something over, get burned,” Vaspis says. “You want to cook on those back burners while you can and turn your pan handles in.”

Cooking is the leading cause of home fires year-round, accounting for 49-percent all home fires reported to fire departments.

(Radio Iowa) – The latest state rest area to get an upgraded building is now open along I-80 near Victor between Grinnell and Iowa City. D-O-T director Scott Marler told the Transportation Commission at their recent meeting that it continues the plan of having a theme. “The theme of this one is ‘The Land Between Two Rivers.’ That’s actually what Iowa means, the land between two rivers, and that was selected for this rest area,” Marler says. The new rest area buildings are larger than the ones they replace and Marler says this one has a new feature known as an adult changing station. “This is the first of its kind in Iowa — and I will even say one of the first in the nation,” Marler says.

He the table is in the family bathroom that is now included in the new buildings. “These adult changing stations provide an adjustable table to help family and friends address the needs of loved ones who require assistance attending to their personal care in a restroom,” he says. The tables are a larger version of the child-changing tables that are used for kids. Marler says the Iowa Legislature has proposed some legislation in recent years regarding adult changing tables — but they aren’t waiting for that. “We decided in Iowa we are just going to go ahead and install these regardless of whether the legislation is in place or not,” Marler says. “The response to these has been overwhelming as you can imagine.”

The D-O-T’s Rest Area Administrator, Steve McMenamin, says they plan to add more adult changing tables into existing rest areas. He says it takes some time and money because in existing buildings they have to move around some things to fit them in. “What we’re going to do initially is kind of scatter them across I-80 and I-35, every other one in the already newer buildings that have room for that — they have a family room already,” McMenamin says. “We’d just be expanding that and changing the layout in that family room to make room for that table to go in there.” He says it is not cheap to retrofit the buildings for the adult changing tables.

“It’s 44-thousand dollars per building for four buildings each year until we get all the newer style converted,” he says. “I think that may be a little conservative. We about have to do a modification and see. Another thing is just getting someone to do the work. It’s a difficult time for construction.” McMenamin says the new style buildings have been well received, especially the various themes and information they provide.

(Radio Iowa) – While the holidays are a time for family gatherings, some Iowans might notice changes in a loved ones’ cognitive abilities that warrant further investigation. Lauren Livingston, spokeswoman for the Iowa Chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association, says there are often clear signs a person may be developing one of the most common forms of dementia.  “The main one is memory loss that disrupts their daily life,” Livingston says. “Forgetting things they have known their whole life, like how to use the microwave or how to get home from the grocery store, things like that that would be very unusual for someone to forget.”

The association estimates 66-thousand Iowans are now living with Alzheimer’s and Livingston says many will show similar symptoms of a failing memory. “Challenges in solving problems like simple math, figuring out the tip on a bill, things like that,” Livingston says, “or difficulty just completing daily tasks like they would do normally, like getting dressed or taking a shower, having confusion with things they are normally familiar with.” They also many not recognize people with whom they’re ordinarily familiar. So how does one tell if a loved one’s memory loss is just typical forgetfulness or if it’s the harbinger of a real problem.

“One thing that’s kind of a key indicator would be seeing these signs over and over and over or every time you talk to a loved one on the phone and they’re forgetting the same thing that you shared multiple times,” Livingston says. “Seeing that pattern of forgetting things and things that they have done their whole lives or they’ve known their whole lives and they’re forgetting.”

The Alzheimer’s Association Helpline is a vital resource for concerns about cognitive changes affecting a loved one. The number, 800-272-3900, is staffed around the clock every day, even holidays. (More info. online at www.alz.org/iowa)

(Radio Iowa) – A lot of people are hitting the highways to see relatives this weekend and into next week for Christmas and New Year’s. Iowa State Patrol Trooper Kari Yaneff says there will be extra state and local officers on the roadways. Yaneff says there continues to be excessive speeding — and that combined with holiday drinking and possible winter weather — could lead to a deadly situation. Yaneff says we haven’t had much snow here yet, but it is a possibility. She says a trooper just recently stopped a driver going more than 90 miles an hour while also driving impaired. “Having that speed and the person being impaired at 2:30 in the afternoon is pretty scary,” Yaneff says.

She says if you take anything that is going to impact your driving — let someone else take the wheel. “I think everyone just needs to remind themselves if they are going to have a great time with family and friends, just making sure that they are responsible. If you are going to be drinking too much — please be sure you have a designated driver. If you are participating in some illegal controlled substances, making sure that we are also being responsible and not getting behind the wheel too,” she says.  Trooper Yaneff says driving too fast remains a key factor in accidents whether you are impaired or not. She says about 90 percent of crashes are caused by speeding, with distracted driving also contributing.

Yaneff says their goal was to get under 300 traffic death this year. “Unfortunately, we’ve already exceeded that, so I am praying that nobody else will get into any fatality crashes,” Yaneff says. She says you can avoid being a statistic by buckling up, putting down the phone, and refrain from driving and texting, slowing down, and driving defensively.