John Gibb

Key negotiations involving two major Chinese exhibitions with close links with the Otago Museum will take place in Shanghai, Dunedin's Chinese sister city, this week.

Toitu Otago Settlers Museum has won the Museums Aotearoa Project Achievement Award - Significant Project for its recently-completed $37.5 million redevelopment.

The Otago Museum can play a major role by helping inspire visitors to learn more about the world around them, newly appointed director Dr Ian Griffin says.

University of Otago research that shows a northern hemisphere dwarf whale escaped extinction longer than previously thought also supports a theory that a still-surviving southern pygmy whale belongs to the same family.

The University of Otago has confirmed its place among the country's most research-intensive universities, despite its ranking dipping from first to third in the latest Performance Based Research Fund quality evaluation.

The 50th anniversary of University of Otago pharmacy degree education marks an ''important milestone'' for the university and the Otago School of Pharmacy, school dean Prof Stephen Duffull says.

Changing the law elsewhere in the world to allow for voluntary euthanasia had not produced a huge avalanche of ''assisted dying'' cases, voluntary euthanasia advocate Pat Hubbard said in Dunedin yesterday.

Dr Margot Skinner, deputy dean of the University of Otago School of Physiotherapy, has been granted a rare honour by Physiotherapy New Zealand.

Professor Elizabeth Dean, a leading physical therapist from the University of British Columbia, is urging physiotherapists to help patients counter lifestyle diseases, including those linked with obesity.

Improved food labelling is needed to counter the adverse effect of ''hidden sugar'' on tooth decay, an oral science researcher says.