BAFTA Shifts Corporate Sponsors for Film Awards

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – You can’t buy awards, but when it comes to the BAFTAs you can certainly sponsor them.

The British Academy of Film and Television is switching up its corporate partners for its annual film awards ceremony. That means it’s out with telecom company Orange, and in with broadband network EE.

The overhaul will require some rechristening of BAFTA‘s hardware. After 15 years with Orange in the title, the ceremony will now be known as the EE British Academy Film Awards. Moreover, its award for best newcomer will now be named the EE Rising Star Award.

The BAFTAs are the U.K. equivalent of the Oscars. EE is a sister company of Orange, so the shakeup is not seismic.

The EE British Academy Film Awards will be broadcast on the BBC on February 10, 2013 and will be hosted by satirist Stephen Fry.

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Alzheimer’s Tied to Mutation Harming Immune Response

Alzheimer’s researchers and drug companies have for years concentrated on one hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease: the production of toxic shards of a protein that accumulate in plaques on the brain.

But now, in a surprising coincidence, two groups of researchers working from entirely different starting points have converged on a mutated gene involved in another aspect of Alzheimer’s disease: the immune system’s role in protecting against the disease. The mutation is suspected of interfering with the brain’s ability to prevent the buildup of plaque.

The discovery, researchers say, provides clues to how and why the disease progresses. The gene, known as TREM2, is only the second found to increase Alzheimer’s risk substantially in older people.

“It points very specifically to a potential metabolic pathway that you could intervene in to change the course of Alzheimer’s disease,” said William Thies, chief medical and scientific officer of the Alzheimer’s Association.

Much work remains to be done before scientists understand precisely how the newly discovered gene mutation leads to Alzheimer’s, but already there are some indications from studies in mice. When the gene is not mutated, white blood cells in the brain spring into action, gobbling up and eliminating the plaque-forming toxic protein, beta amyloid. As a result, Alzheimer’s can be staved off or averted.

But when the gene is mutated, the brain’s white blood cells are hobbled, making them less effective in their attack on beta amyloid.

People with the mutated gene have a threefold to fivefold increase in the likelihood of developing Alzheimer’s disease in old age.

The intact gene, says John Hardy of University College London, “is a safety net.” And those with the mutation, he adds, “are living life without a safety net.” Dr. Hardy is lead author of one of the papers.

The discovery also suggests that a new type of drug could be developed to enhance the gene’s activity, perhaps allowing the brain’s white blood cells to do their work.

“The field is in desperate need of new therapeutic agents,” said Alison Goate, an Alzheimer’s researcher at Washington University in St. Louis who contributed data to Dr. Hardy’s study. “This will give us an alternative approach.”

The fact that two research groups converged on the same gene gives experts confidence in the findings. Both studies were published online Wednesday in The New England Journal of Medicine. “Together they make a good case that this really is an Alzheimer’s gene,” said Gerard Schellenberg, an Alzheimer’s researcher at the University of Pennsylvania who was not involved with the work.

The other gene found to raise the odds that a person will get Alzheimer’s, ApoE4, is much more common and confers about the same risk as the mutated version of TREM2. But it is still not clear why ApoE4, discovered in 1993, makes Alzheimer’s more likely.

Because the mutations in the newly discovered gene are rare, occurring in no more than 2 percent of Alzheimer’s patients, it makes no sense to start screening people for them, Dr. Thies said. Instead, the discovery provides new clues to the workings of Alzheimer’s disease.

To find the gene, a research group led by Dr. Kari Stefansson of deCODE Genetics of Iceland started with a simple question.

“We asked, ‘Can we find anything in the genome that separates those who are admitted to nursing homes before the age of 75 and those who are still living at home at 85?’ ” he said.

Scientists searched the genomes of 2,261 Icelanders and zeroed in on TREM2. Mutations in that gene were more common among people with Alzheimer’s, as well as those who did not have an Alzheimer’s diagnosis but who had memory problems and might be on their way to developing Alzheimer’s.

The researchers confirmed their results by looking for the gene in people with and without Alzheimer’s in populations studied at Emory University, as well as in Norway, the Netherlands and Germany.

The TREM2 connection surprised Dr. Stefansson. Although researchers have long noticed that the brain is inflamed in Alzheimer’s patients, he had dismissed inflammation as a major factor in the disease.

“I was of the opinion that the immune system would play a fairly small role, if any, in Alzheimer’s disease,” Dr. Stefansson said. “This discovery cured me of that bias.”

Meanwhile, Dr. Hardy and Rita Guerreiro at University College London, along with Andrew Singleton at the National Institute on Aging, were intrigued by a strange, rare disease. Only a few patients had been identified, but their symptoms were striking. They had crumbling bones and an unusual dementia, sclerosing leukoencephalopathy.

“It’s a weird disease,” Dr. Hardy said.

He saw one patient in her 30s whose brain disease manifested in sexually inappropriate behavior. Also, her bones kept breaking. The disease was caused by mutations that disabled both the copy of TREM2 that she had inherited from her mother and the one from her father.

Eventually the researchers searched for people who had a mutation in just one copy of TREM2. To their surprise, it turned out that these people were likely to have Alzheimer’s disease.

They then asked researchers around the world who had genetic data from people with and without Alzheimer’s to look for TREM2 mutations.

“Sure enough, they had good evidence,” Dr. Hardy said. The mutations occurred in one-half of 1 percent of the general population but in 1 to 2 percent of patients with Alzheimer’s disease.

“That is a big effect,” Dr. Hardy said.

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FCC recommends cross-ownership waivers for Tribune Co.

The staff of the Federal Communications Commission has recommended that the agency grant Tribune Co. waivers of so-called media ownership rules, paving the way for the company to emerge from its long-running bankruptcy.

The waivers -- the last major hurdle in the four-year case -- would take effect Friday as long as none of the five commissioners raise serious objections, according to a person at the FCC who wasn't authorized to speak and therefore did not want to be identified.

No vote is required for the waivers to take effect.

The waivers would set the wheels in motion to emerge from bankruptcy, something that can happen as soon as new ownership, a group led by senior creditors Oaktree Capital Management, Angelo Gordon & Co and JPMorgan Chase & Co., can complete the necessary paperwork.

The FCC staff is recommending that the agency grant a permanent waiver to Tribune's ownership of the Chicago Tribune and WGN radio and television stations and that it give  one-year waivers for the Los Angeles Times ownership of KTLA-TV Channel 5 and for similar arrangements in three other markets.

The FCC also is circulating among commissioners a proposal for new media ownership rules that would ease restrictions on consolidations among newspapers and TV and ratio stations, according to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski. That proposal is expected to come up for an agency vote at the next regular meeting.

Once the new rules are in effect, Tribune's new owners could seek permanent waivers in the Los Angeles, New York, Hartford, Conn., and South Florida markets.

Tribune Vice President Shaun Sheehan declined to comment.

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Fla. socialite at center of scandal

If you were to diagram the increasingly tangled sex scandal involving former CIA Director David Petraeus, nearly all lines would lead back to one person: Jill Kelley, a 37-year-old Tampa socialite who hosted parties for the nation's top military brass.

Kelley's complaint about anonymous, threatening email triggered the FBI investigation that led to Petraeus' downfall. And now she is at the center of an investigation of the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan over alleged "inappropriate communications" between the two.

Kelley is a close friend of the Petraeus family, and photographs circulating in the media show the dark-haired woman at parties with Petraeus, his wife, and Kelley's husband, Scott, a cancer surgeon. She served as a sort of unofficial social ambassador for U.S. Central Command in Tampa, holding gatherings for the general when he was commander there from 2008 to 2010.

She also met Gen. John Allen while he was at Central Command, and now investigators are looking at 20,000-plus pages of documents and emails between Kelley and Allen, some of which have been described as "flirtatious." The general has denied any wrongdoing.

For her part, Kelley has taken a low profile since Petraeus' affair with his biographer, Paula Broadwell, became public. The Kelleys have retained high-powered Washington lawyer Abbe Lowell, who did not immediately return a call.

On Tuesday, Kelley could be seen through the large windows of her South Tampa home, a stately, two-story brick house with a half-dozen white columns. In the driveway was a silver Mercedes with a license plate marked "Honorary Counsel." Kelley's identical twin sister, Natalie Khawam, also lives there.

In the afternoon, Kelley, wearing dark sunglasses, left through the front door and ignored reporters' questions as she drove off in the Mercedes.

South Tampa is a conservative Southern community of big houses, big bank accounts, garden clubs and wives who pride themselves on volunteer work. A lot of the brass from MacDill Air Force Base, where Central Command is headquartered, lives or socializes in South Tampa, and helping members of the military is a major volunteer activity.

Former Mayor Pam Iorio said that she went to several parties to benefit the military at the Kelleys' home, and they drew MacDill's top brass, including Petraeus. But they were by far not the only parties held around the city for MacDill's officers.

"Our community's relationship with MacDill is just multi-faceted," said Iorio, who later invited the Petraeuses over to her own home for dinner. "It's something that is generational. People sincerely care about the military."

Petraeus aides said Kelley took it to another level, winning the title of "honorary ambassador" for her extensive entertaining. Petraeus even honored Kelley and her husband with an award in a special ceremony at the Pentagon.

The Kelleys invited then-Florida Gov. Charlie Crist to their home, but he never accepted. Instead, he had dinner with the Kelleys at a steakhouse in Tampa with Petraeus.

"Lovely people. I remember I had a nice dinner with she and her husband and the general and his wife," Crist said.

Ken Walters, a neighbor, said he went to a party the couple had to celebrate their first son's baptism. The Kelleys have two other children.

"Natalie and her sister, they're certainly not shrinking violets," Walters said. He recalled that when the sisters first entered the South Tampa social scene, they "rubbed people the wrong way. I think they probably stepped on a couple of toes."

Petraeus' affair with Broadwell was discovered after Kelley told an FBI agent friend that she had received email warning her to stay away from Petraeus. The email turned out to be from Broadwell, who apparently regarded Kelley as a rival for Petraeus' affections. Kelley's family and Petraeus aides have said Petraeus and Kelley were just friends.

In another strange footnote to the scandal, long before the case involving Petraeus got under way, the FBI agent sent Kelley shirtless photos of himself, according to a federal law enforcement official.

Kelley's brother, David Khawam, told WPVI-TV in Philadelphia on Monday night that the allegations have spilled out quickly.

"It's a shock. We're trying to figure out where the pieces are falling right now," he said in an interview at his law office in Westmont, N.J.

He said that his family left Lebanon for suburban Philadelphia's Huntingdon Valley in the 1970s to escape the turmoil in their homeland. His parents opened a Middle Eastern restaurant in Voorhees, N.J., called Sahara.

"My family is very patriotic; we came from Lebanon at a young age," he said.

Kelley later married and moved to Florida with her husband, who works at a cancer clinic.

Jill and Scott Kelley have been involved in at least nine legal actions since arriving in Tampa, according to court records. Most involve real estate transactions, including one foreclosure and an $11,000 judgment against the couple in a Pennsylvania case.

In another twist in the scandal, court records indicate that Petraeus and Allen intervened two months ago in a messy custody dispute on behalf of Jill Kelley's sister. Both four-star generals wrote letters supporting Natalie Khawam.

The judge in the case awarded Khawam's ex-husband custody last year of their son. He also called Khawam dishonest and lacking in integrity.

Khawam is a lawyer who works on health care fraud and whistleblower cases, according to her LinkedIn profile, which has been removed from the professional networking site. The sisters also competed in a cook-off filmed for a Food Network show called "Food Fight" in 2003.

___

Associated Press writers Kimberly Dozier and Pauline Jelinek in Washington, and Brendan Farrington in Tallahassee, Fla., contributed to this report.

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Petraeus enlisted for cameo in ‘Call of Duty’ game

LOS ANGELES (AP) — David Petraeus has landed on his feet with a new gig in “Call of Duty: Black Ops II.”

The retired Army general who stepped down as CIA director last week amid a scandal surrounding his extramarital affair pops up in the highly anticipated Activision Blizzard Inc. first-person shooter game released Tuesday.

A character with Petraeus’ name and likeness voiced by Jim Meskimen briefly appears as the Secretary of Defense in the year 2025.

The cameo was first reported by the gaming site Kotaku.com.

“Call of Duty” games have often employed virtual renditions of political figures.

“Black Ops II” also features an encounter with Manuel Noriega, a female president resembling current Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, an aircraft carrier named the USS Barack Obama and an appearance by retired Lt. Col. Oliver North.

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Kidney Donors Given Mandatory Safeguards

ST. LOUIS — Addressing long-held concerns about whether organ donors have adequate protections, the country’s transplant regulators acted late Monday to require that hospitals thoroughly inform living kidney donors of the risks they face, fully evaluate their medical and psychological suitability, and then track their health for two years after donation.

Enactment of the policies by the United Network for Organ Sharing, which manages the transplant system under a federal contract, followed six years of halting development and debate.

Meeting at a St. Louis hotel, the group’s board voted to establish uniform minimum standards for a field long regarded as a medical and ethical Wild West. The organ network, whose initial purpose was to oversee donation from people who had just died, has struggled at times to keep pace with rapid developments in donations from the living.

“There is no question that this is a major development in living donor protection,” said Dr. Christie P. Thomas, a nephrologist at the University of Iowa and the chairman of the network’s living donor committee.

Yet some donor advocates complained that the measures did not go far enough, and argued that the organ network, in its mission to encourage transplants, has a conflict of interest when it comes to safeguarding donors.

Three years ago, the network issued some of the same policies as voluntary guidelines, only to have the Department of Health and Human Services insist they be made mandatory.

Although long-term data on the subject is scarce, few living kidney donors are thought to suffer lasting physical or psychological effects. Kidney donations, known as nephrectomies, are typically done laparoscopically these days through a series of small incisions. The typical patient may spend only a few nights in a hospital and feel largely recovered after several months.

Kidneys are by far the most transplanted organs, and there have been nearly as many living donors as deceased ones over the last decade. What data is available suggests that those with one kidney typically live as long as those with two, and that the risk of a donor dying during the procedure is roughly 3 in 10,000.

But kidney transplants, like all surgery, can sometimes end in catastrophe.

In May at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, a 41-year-old mother of three died when her aorta was accidentally cut during surgery to donate a kidney to her brother. In other recent isolated cases, patients have received donor kidneys infected with undetected H.I.V. or hepatitis C.

Less clear are any longer-term effects on donors. Research conducted by the United Network for Organ Sharing shows that of roughly 70,000 people who donated kidneys between late 1999 and early 2011, 27 died within two years of medical causes that may — or may not — have been related to donation. For a small number of donors, their remaining kidney failed, and they required dialysis or a transplant.

The number of living donors — 5,770 in 2011 — has dropped 10 percent over the last two years, possibly because the struggling economy has made it difficult for prospective donors to take time off from work to recuperate. With the national kidney waiting list now stretching past 94,000 people, and thousands on the list dying each year, transplant officials have said they must improve confidence in the system so more people will donate.

The average age of donors has been rising, posing additional medical risks. And new ethical questions have been raised by the emergence of paired kidney exchanges and transplant chains started by good Samaritans who give an organ to a stranger.

Brad Kornfeld, who donated a kidney to his father in 2004, told the board that it had been impossible to find good information about what to expect, leaving him to search for answers on unreliable Internet chat rooms. He said he had almost backed out.

“If information is power,” said Mr. Kornfeld, a Coloradan who serves on the living donor committee, “the lack of information is crippling.”

Under the policies approved this week, the organ network will require hospitals to collect medical data, including laboratory test results, on most living donors to study lasting effects. Results must be reported at six months, one year and two years.

Similar regulations have been in place since 2000, but they did not require blood and urine testing, and hospitals were allowed to report donors who could not be found as simply lost.

That happened often. In recent years, hospitals have submitted basic clinical information — like whether donors were alive or dead — for only 65 percent of donors and lab data for fewer than 40 percent, according to the organ network. Although the network holds the authority, no hospital has ever been seriously sanctioned for noncompliance.

“It’s time we put some teeth into our policy,” said Jill McMaster, a board member from Tennessee.

By 2015, transplant programs will have to report thorough clinical information on at least 80 percent of donors and lab results on at least 70 percent. The requirements phase in at lower levels for the next two years.

Dr. Stuart M. Flechner of the Cleveland Clinic, the chairman of a coalition of medical societies that made recommendations to the organ network, said 9 of 10 hospitals would currently not meet the new requirement.

Donna Luebke, a kidney donor from Ohio who once served on the organ network’s board, said the new standards would matter only if enforcement were more rigorous. She noted that the organization was dominated by transplant doctors: “UNOS is nothing but the foxes watching the henhouse,” she said.

Another of the new regulations prescribes in detail the medical and psychological screenings that hospitals must conduct for potential donors. It requires automatic exclusion if the potential donor has diabetes, uncontrolled hypertension or H.I.V., among other conditions.

The new policies also require that hospitals appoint an independent advocate to counsel and represent donors, and that donors receive detailed information in advance about medical, psychological and financial risks.

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Miscrosoft executive exits at a shaky time

Turns out Microsoft Corp.'s radical overhaul of its Windows operating system last month wasn't the only big change in store for the company.

The abrupt departure of Steven Sinofsky, president of Windows and Windows Live, is being called poor timing for the tech behemoth. It's also seen as a sign that longtime Chief Executive Steve Ballmer has no plans to step down anytime soon.

Sinofsky's exit, just weeks after the company rolled out the Windows 8 operating system, "doesn't necessarily reflect well on the company," said Kirk Materne, managing director at Evercore Partners.

"I think if you're Steve, having this happen right after creates a level of distraction that you don't want in the first place," he said. "It's never great when you've had this much turnover at the senior level of a company that is really trying to gain its footing in markets like tablet and mobile."

Shares of Microsoft slid 90 cents, or 3.2%, to $27.09 on Tuesday. Its stock has languished in the last decade — virtually unchanged — while shares of rival Apple Inc. have climbed more than 6,700%.

Microsoft is under pressure to impress consumers and investors with its latest offerings, which include Windows 8 and its new Surface device, a hybrid tablet-laptop that launched last month.

But both products have been met with lackluster interest. Windows 8 debuted to low investor expectations, and reviews for the revamped operating system have been mixed, with some users saying it's at times confusing to use.

The Surface, meanwhile, was buzz-worthy when it was first unveiled, but analysts seem unconvinced that it will make a dent in a market currently dominated by Apple's iPad. Although the hardware is sleek, the Surface lacks applications compared with the iPad, and its highly touted snap-on keyboard that doubles as a cover is difficult to accurately type on, reviewers have said.

The Windows 8 launch was said to be the biggest revamp of the operating system in nearly two decades. The latest update includes a new interface called the Start screen that was designed for tablets and touch-screen computers and features moving tiles similar to those on Windows Phone devices. Microsoft wants the new Start screen interface to be the future of Windows.

"The general conclusion of Win 8 is on the surface, it's a solid first start," Materne said. "It's not mind-blowing, it's not going to immediately recapture market share, but it gets them back in the ballgame to a certain degree."

Sinofsky, a 23-year Microsoft veteran, was in charge of the Windows 8 and Surface efforts at the Redmond, Wash., company. He was a polarizing figure in the office with a tough management style and was rumored to be in line to succeed Ballmer, who has been chief executive since 2000.

In an employee memo Monday, the day Microsoft announced his departure, Sinofsky said he had decided to leave to seek "new opportunities."

"With the general availability of Windows 8/RT and Surface, I have decided it is time for me to take a step back from my responsibilities at Microsoft," he said. "I've always advocated using the break between product cycles as an opportunity to reflect and to look ahead, and that applies to me too."

Now that Sinofsky has left, analysts — some of whom speculated there had been a rift between Sinofsky and Ballmer — say they expect a new direction for the Windows division.

"Sinofsky was a highly talented operator who hit product release dates, got delivery in Windows to be more reliable, and was pivotal to successful Office and Win 7 releases," Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Holt said in a note to investors. "While he is a loss for Microsoft, Windows has entered a different phase where cultivation of developers, collaboration between product groups, integration with the mobile operating system and a focus on applications become more important."

Sinofsky will be replaced by Julie Larson-Green, who has been with the company since 1993 and oversaw program management, user interface design and research for Windows 7 and 8. She will lead all Windows software and hardware engineering.

Tami Reller, Windows chief financial officer and chief marketing officer, also will assume responsibility for the business of Windows.

There could be a bit of a learning curve in the meantime, said equity analyst Angelo Zino of S&P Capital IQ.

"We are surprised by the announcement, given Sinofsky's recent success as well as a belief by many that he could eventually have been the successor to CEO Steve Ballmer," he said. "While we are confident in the abilities of both individuals, we see the change increasing product development risk to future Windows releases."

andrea.chang@latimes.com

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Abt, Coyote Logistics, iD Commerce top Chicago workplaces

The Chicago Tribune released its annual Top Workplaces survey Monday, with a broad cross section of companies -- and dozens of new names -- earning recognition as the best places to work in Chicago. 

Abt Electronics and Coyote Logistics repeated as the top large and midsize employers, respectively, with iD Commerce + Logistics making the list for the first time as the top-ranked small company.  

This is the third year the Tribune has partnered with Workplace Dynamics to rank the top 100 companies as judged by their own employees, using criteria ranging from clued-in managers to flexible work schedules. More than 1,600 companies were invited to participate, with a record 254 completing the survey.

Pennsylvania-based Workplace Dynamics partnered with 32 newspapers and surveyed 1.5 million employees nationwide last year as part of its research efforts into what environments are best for employees. 

"We all spend an awful lot of time at work," said Doug Claffey, CEO of Workplace Dynamics. "Creating a really great workplace for employees is something that I think businesses have an obligation to do.  In addition to making money, you need create an environment where your people want to be."

Beyond Glenview electronics retailer Abt,  the top five large companies were Hyatt Hotels, Baird & Warner, ATI Physical Therapy and FedEx -- all new to this category this year.

Chicago-based Coyote Logistics was followed by kCura, Slalom Consulting, Edward Jones and Mercy Home for Boys & Girls among companies with 250 to 999 employees.  

Wood Dale-based id Commerce topped Webster Dental, 2011 winner Red Frog Events, Assurance Agency and LeasePlan USA among small companies.

Full survey results and a variety of top workplace profiles will be published in a magazine insert included in Tuesday's Chicago Tribune.

rchannick@tribune.com | Twitter @RobertChannick

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U2′s Bono to urge U.S. politicians not to cut aid programs

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Irish rocker and anti-poverty campaigner Bono will appeal to Democrats and Republicans during a visit to Washington this week to spare U.S. development assistance programs from cuts as Congress tries to avert the looming “fiscal cliff” of tax hikes and spending reductions early next year.

The U2 lead singer’s visit comes as the Obama administration and congressional leaders try to forge a deal in coming weeks to avoid the economy hitting the “fiscal cliff” – tax increases and spending cuts worth $ 600 billion starting in January if Congress does not act.

Analysts say the absence of a deal could shock the United States, the world’s biggest economy, back into recession.

Kathy McKiernan, spokeswoman for the ONE Campaign, said Bono will hold talks with congressional lawmakers and senior Obama administration officials during the November 12-14 visit.

During meetings he will stress the effectiveness of U.S. foreign assistance programs and the need to preserve them to avoid putting at risk progress made in fighting HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, she said.

Bono, a long-time advocate for the poor, will argue that U.S. government-funded schemes that support life-saving treatments for HIV/AIDS sufferers, nutrition programs for malnourished children, and emergency food aid make up just 1 percent of the U.S. government budget but are helping to save tens of millions of lives in impoverished nations.

The One Campaign would not elaborate which lawmakers and senior Obama administration officials Bono will meet.

On Monday, Bono will discuss the power of social movements with students at Georgetown University. He will also meet new World Bank President Jim Yong Kim for a web cast discussion on Wednesday on the challenges of eradicating poverty.

(Editing by W Simon)

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‘Dream Team’ of Behavioral Scientists Advised Obama Campaign

Late last year Matthew Barzun, an official with the Obama campaign, called Craig Fox, a psychologist in Los Angeles, and invited him to a political planning meeting in Chicago, according to two people who attended the session.

“He said, ‘Bring the whole group; let’s hear what you have to say,’ ” recalled Dr. Fox, a behavioral economist at the University of California, Los Angeles.

So began an effort by a team of social scientists to help their favored candidate in the 2012 presidential election. Some members of the team had consulted with the Obama campaign in the 2008 cycle, but the meeting in January signaled a different direction.

“The culture of the campaign had changed,” Dr. Fox said. “Before then I felt like we had to sell ourselves; this time there was a real hunger for our ideas.”

This election season the Obama campaign won a reputation for drawing on the tools of social science. The book “Victory Lab,” by Sasha Issenberg, and news reports have portrayed an operation that ran its own experiment and, among other efforts, consulted with the Analyst Institute, a Washington voter research group established in 2007 by union officials and their allies to help Democratic candidates.

Less well known is that the Obama campaign also had a panel of unpaid academic advisers. The group — which calls itself the “consortium of behavioral scientists,” or COBS — provided ideas on how to counter false rumors, like one that President Obama is a Muslim. It suggested how to characterize the Republican opponent, Mitt Romney, in advertisements. It also delivered research-based advice on how to mobilize voters.

“In the way it used research, this was a campaign like no other,” said Todd Rogers, a psychologist at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and a former director of the Analyst Institute. “It’s a big change for a culture that historically has relied on consultants, experts and gurulike intuition.”

When asked about the outside psychologists, the Obama campaign would neither confirm nor deny a relationship with them. “This campaign was built on the energy, enthusiasm and ingenuity of thousands of grass-roots supporters and our staff in the states and in Chicago,” said Adam Fetcher, a campaign spokesman. “Throughout the campaign we saw an outpouring of individuals across the country who lent a wide variety of ideas and input to our efforts to get the president re-elected.”

For their part, consortium members said they did nothing more than pass on research-based ideas, in e-mails and conference calls. They said they could talk only in general terms about the research, because they had signed nondisclosure agreements with the campaign.

In addition to Dr. Fox, the consortium included Susan T. Fiske of Princeton University; Samuel L. Popkin of the University of California, San Diego; Robert Cialdini, a professor emeritus at Arizona State University; Richard H. Thaler, a professor of behavioral science and economics at the University of Chicago’s business school; and Michael Morris, a psychologist at Columbia.

“A kind of dream team, in my opinion,” Dr. Fox said.

He said that the ideas the team proposed were “little things that can make a difference” in people’s behavior.

For example, Dr. Fiske’s research has shown that when deciding on a candidate, people generally focus on two elements: competence and warmth. “A candidate wants to make sure to score high on both dimensions,” Dr. Fiske said in an interview. “You can’t just run on the idea that everyone wants to have a beer with you; some people care a whole lot about competence.”

Mr. Romney was recognized as a competent businessman, polling found. But he was often portrayed in opposition ads as distant, unable to relate to the problems of ordinary people.

When it comes to countering rumors, psychologists have found that the best strategy is not to deny the charge (“I am not a flip-flopper”) but to affirm a competing notion. “The denial works in the short term; but in the long term people remember only the association, like ‘Obama and Muslim,’ ” said Dr. Fox, of the persistent false rumor.

The president’s team affirmed that he is a Christian.

At least some of the consortium’s proposals seemed to have found their way into daily operations. Campaign volunteers who knocked on doors last week in swing states like Pennsylvania, Ohio and Nevada did not merely remind people to vote and arrange for rides to the polls. Rather, they worked from a script, using subtle motivational techniques that research has shown can prompt people to take action.

“We used the scripts more as a guide,” said Sarah Weinstein, 18, a Columbia freshman who traveled with a group to Cleveland the weekend before the election. “The actual language we used was invested in the individual person.”

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