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A)NE 11 UN)ar dE TWENTY ONE YEAbS OF Er2 ITO,2 IAL F EE
Ann Arbor, Michigan Friday, September 23, 2011 mciadiyo

michigandaily.com

CAMPUS VIGIL
Students
hold vigil in
memory of
Troy Davis

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P. .

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JED MOCH/Daily
A hot air balloon that the University brought to North Campus as part of the Go North! Initiative soars in the sky near the North Campus Diag
yesterday. More than 150 people waited in line to ride the hot air balloon that drifted about 100 feet in the air.
'U'hosts hot air balloon
rides o North Campus

i

'U' NAACP, Black
Student Union
organize vigil after
death of executed man
By GIACOMO BOLOGNA
Doily Stuff Reporter
More than 100 people gathered on
the Diag last night for a candlelight
vigil to commemorate the life of a
man who they believe was wrongly
executed for murder.
Troy Davis was executed Wednes-
day night, more than 20 years after
being arrested for the murder of an

off-duty white police officer in Geor-
gia. The case made headlines around
the world, as many believed that
Davis was wrongly convicted.
The vigil, organized by the Uni-
versity's chapter of the NAACP and
the Black Student Union, included
a moment of silence for Davis and
his family and speeches from people
opposed to the death penalty.
"It wasn't about that he was a black
man," Janee Brown, president of the
University's chapter of the NAACP,
said in an interview at the vigil.
"There was so much doubt in that
case."
Of the nine main witnesses origi-
nally in the trial, seven have recanted
See VIGIL, Page 5

Balloon festival part of
Go North! Initiative to
attract more students
to North Campus
By JENNIFER LEE
Daily StaffReporter
When students go to North Cam-
pus, they usually take the bus to go to
Engineering or Music, Theatre & Dance
classes. But yesterday, more than 150
people traveled on North Campus to

take a hot air balloon ride 100 feet into
the sky.
The hot air balloon festival was one
of the first events launched by the Go
North! Initiative, a new program devel-
oped by the Division of Student Affairs
that aims to bring more students, events
and excitement to North Campus. Yes-
terday's event featured one tethered hot
air balloon - provided by Renaissance
Balloons, Inc. in Howell, Mich. - in
which students and families from near-
by Northwood Community Apartments
could take a three-minute ride.
Elizabeth Zollweg, the project man-
ager of Go North!, said the initiative's

Watch the hot air balloon take off on
-m
mission is to attract more students to
events, lectures and recreational activi-
ties to an area of the University not
often frequented by the majority of the
student body.
"You don't have to go down to Central
or South (Campus) ... There are really
great, fun, new innovative things hap-
pening on North," Zollweg said.
The program was launched partly
in response to the larger population of
students living on North Campus than
See BALLOON, Page5

UNIVERSITY RESEARCH
Researchers replicating Mars
conditions to test for water, life

AOSS professor
examining if brine
can sustain life
By ZACH BERGSON
Daily StaffReporter
Three years after discovering evi-
dence of water on Mars, Nilton Renno,
a University professor of Atmospheric,
Oceanic and Space Sciences, is looking
for life on the planet.
Renno is leading a $1 million NASA-

funded project to determine if liquid
water can exist on Mars and whether
that water can sustain life.
In 2008, Renno was the co-investi-
gator of the Phoenix Mars Mission - a
NASA project led by a group of Univer-
sity researchers - that found evidence
of liquid brine on the surface of Mars by
analyzing soil and photos of the planet.
The discovery was the first of its kind
and raised questions about whether
Mars, which has extremely low air pres-
sure and drastic temperature swings,
could sustain life.
According to Renno, the first step

of his current project is replicating the
conditions on Mars - that the mission's
lander experienced inthe 2008 project -
to further explore whether the existence
of liquid water on the planet is possible.
However, according to Rackham student
Harvey Elliott, a Ph.D. candidate in the
AOSS department, the liquid water on
Mars is very different from water on
Earth.
"Pure water would either evaporate
or sublimate directly from ice to gas on
Mars," Elliot said.
A member of Renno's team, German
See MARS, Page5

CHRIS RYBA/Daily
A student protests the execution of Troy Davis on the Diag yesterday. Students also held a
vigil on the Diag last night to raise awareness about the death penalty.

STUDENT COMPETITION
Accelerate Michigan collecting students' business proposals

Competition aims to
improve state economy
through student ideas
By SABIRA KHAN
Daily StaffReporter
As the state continues to struggle eco-
nomically, one competition is encourag-
ing students to help stimulate growth in
Michigan through their innovation and
entrepreneurial skills.
The competition, the Accelerate
Michigan Innovation Competition, is

the world's largest business competition
and aims to engage the state's college
students and business community. The
competition is in its second year and
offers a $25,000 grand prize.
Lauren Bigelow, executive director
of the Accelerate Michigan Innovation
Competition, described the program
as "an idea competition" that gives stu-
dents the opportunity to consider what
they would do if they had their own
businesses.
"We're just looking for students to
come together (and) see what creative
ideas they've got out there," Bigelow said.
Four students from the Ross School

of Business - Hunt Briggs, Paul Davis,
Robert Levine and Nolan Orfield - won
last year's grand prize in student catego-
ry with their proposal to have grocery
stores convert their waste products into
energy that could be used to power their
facilities.
Beyond the cash prize, the competi-
tion is mainly designed to bringstudents
into contact with members of the busi-
ness community and "link students with
mentors and coaches and folks in their
immediate vicinity," Bigelow said.
"We really want to keep bright stu-
dents in Michigan, so a lot of this is about
how can we get the student population

engaged with the business community,
(and) how people can get in touch with
different corporations," she said.
The competition also connects stu-
dents with major local businesses and
corporations, Bigelow added. The 25
semifinalists will get the opportunity
to meet with representatives from Dow
Corning, DTE Energy and Ford Motor
Company.
Students who are interested in partic-
ipating in the competition are required
to be enrolled in at least two classes at a
university within the state of Michigan.
To apply, students must submit a one-
page description of their business pro-

posal by Sept.30.
Each proposal will be assessed on the
basis of its clarity of presentation, cre-
ative innovation, intended market and
ideas that will have a broad impact.
"(It's) really worth the opportunity
because (semifinalists) get a chance to
rub elbows with large investment firms
(and) large corporates in a setting that
would really set them apart and really
give them a leg up in terms of intern-
ships and career possibility," Bigelow
said. "And in today's job market, that's
just incredibly valuable."
The competition is part of the New
See PROPOSALS, Page5

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