NYU’s Daily Student Newspaper
WASHINGTON SQUARE NEWS Vol. 43, No. 21
THURSDAY, MARCH 5, 2015
nyunews.com WORLD POLITICS
SPORTS
Violets beat Rutgers-Camden in close match By BOBBY WAGNER Sports Editor
Ross Udine may be just a freshman, but in NYU men’s basketball’s 68-65 win over RutgersCamden on Wednesday, he played with the confidence of a seasoned veteran. With just under 15 ticks left on the clock and the Violets down two, Udine pulled up for a three off a screen from junior teammate Evan Kup-
ferberg and nailed it, effectively keeping NYU’s season alive. “I just saw the defender go under the screen, and as a shooter when you see that you have to shoot it,” Udine said. “No matter how many you miss, in your head you always think the next one is going in.” The Violets went on to win the game by three after two free throws from junior forward Patrick Burns sealed the deal. They
will now move on to the second round of the Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference tournament. “I can’t believe Ross took that shot at the end of the game,” Burns said. “It took a lot of confidence to take that shot, coming off a screen to shoot a fadeaway three. I can’t believe a freshman took that shot, I was so proud of him.” However, Udine struggled for the majority of the game.
He had a string of turnovers in the first half that planted him on the bench. But where Udine struggled, Burns picked up the slack. The junior finished with a game-high 21 points on just 13 attempts, and battled down low all night through contact that went uncalled by the referees. With a 10-point cushion, the
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STAFF PHOTO BY RACHEL KAPLAN
Patrick Burns takes a shot from in deep against Rutgers-Camden on Wednesday. The junior forward from Lexington, Massachusetts, led the Violets last night with 21 points. FEATURES
NYU researcher connects astronomy, biology By DHRITI TANDON Staff Writer
NYU biology professor Michael Rampino established conclusive correlations between the earth’s movement in the galaxy and biological phenomena, namely mass extinctions.
In his paper published in “Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society,” Rampino discussed how periodic mass extinctions are strongly related to the earth’s position in relation to the galaxy. Rampino noted that this
correlation can be attributed to the fact that the Earth and the solar system’s movements around the galactic disc are circular in a large path but are wavy on a smaller level, which is what Rampino says creates the periodic mass extinction.
Rampino’s research commenced in the 1980s after he found data sets that showed a 30 million periodicity between the mass extinctions and impact craters. “An astronomer colleague of mine and I realized that there was a 30 million year
cycle wherein the sun goes up and down in the galaxy,” Rampino said. “So we concluded that the passing through the plane of the galaxy shakes up the orb cloud, comets fall in, hit the earth and this happens every 30
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Professor discusses Turkish civil rights By JUSTINE MORRIS Contributing Writer
At first it may seem like there are many differences between Turkish and American students, but CAS professor Kevyne Baar disputed this during a talk Wednesday in the Silver Center. Baar discussed the similarities between the American civil rights movement and the ongoing civil rights movements in Turkey. Baar spent a year in Turkey teaching African American literature, focusing on all aspects of civil rights movements throughout history. She displayed a picture of her class in Turkey standing in front of a timeline that had three parallel lines. “It became something very important to me, that nothing happens in a vacuum,” Baar said. “I developed a timeline which basically has three movements: the African American civil rights movement, the women’s movement, and the gay rights movement.” The class itself was not taught in a vacuum. In Turkey, major civil rights protests had happened mere months before her class. “I’m teaching this class four months after the riots in Gezi Park,” Baar said. “I’m going to be teaching American civil rights, which they have emulated a lot of.” The demonstrations in Gezi Park began in May 2013, when the government wanted to add a shopping mall to the historic district of Istanbul. Soon, the demonstrations spread to 90 other sites in Turkey. “Basically, people didn’t want this historical area torn down,” Baar said. “It was very much emulating Occupy Wall Street, initially. They put tents up and they literally went into the park. And then once the tanks and the water cannon came in and everything, and everyone went,
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