A Sampling of Clips for April 23, 2010

* UCSD faculty and staff may obtain a copy of an article by e-mailing the University Communications Office

The Importance of Friendship
Elle, April 23 -- When Harvard University social scientist Nicholas Christakis and UC San Diego professor James Fowler published their groundbreaking study about the contagion of obesity in 2007, the duo was particularly amused by the difference between how American and European headline writers framed the findings. More

Girl Wakes from Coma, Speaks German
MSNBC, April 23 -- After 24 hours in a coma, a Croatian girl woke up speaking only German, according to reports that spread across the Internet last week. (Quotes Matt Leonard, a doctoral student in cognitive science at UC San Diego. Along with neuroscientist Eric Halgren and colleagues, his group is using new, magnetic field-based technology to zero in — in more detail than ever — on which parts of the brain process language and in what order.) More

Geoengineering: A Necessary Evil?
ABC National Radio, Australia, April 23 -- The science of geoengineering involves the deliberate manipulation of the planet's environment on a massive scale in order to combat the negatives of climate change. There are huge risks involved, but is it a necessary evil? (Quotes Tony Haymet, director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography) More

Technology Behind the Green Fuel of the Future
Popular Science, April 23 -- A research award to Mark Hildebrand of Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) aims to unlock the bioenergy secrets of algae known as diatoms and find ways to maximise their production of fatty oils, or “lipids”, that can be developed to power everything from automobiles to jets. More

Life and Love in the Uncanny Valley
Discover Magazine, April 22 -- David Hanson’s robots are by now somewhat familiar faces, including his Einstein  robot currently being used as a research tool at Javier Movellan’s Machine Perception Lab at UC San Diego, and the punk rock conversationalist Joey Chaos. More

Cambridge Fair Shows How to Celebrate Science
Boston Globe, April 23 -- When the Cambridge Science Festival kicks off tomorrow with a laser light show and science carnival, local residents will not be the only ones showing up for nine days of events that range from lunching with Nobel laureates to a geology-based treasure hunt. (Quotes Loren Thompson, community outreach director for the San Diego Science Festival and assistant vice chancellor at UC San Diego, which held its first festival last year) More

Mitochondrial DNA Points to Multiple Killer Whale Species
GenomeWeb, April 23 – Killer whale "ecotypes," which vary in their choice of prey, behavior, and appearance, represent distinct species, according to a paper appearing online yesterday in Genome Research. The lead author is Phillip Morin, a geneticist affiliated with the National Marine Fisheries Service's Southwest Fisheries Science Center and UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography. More

Challenges of Caring for the Tiniest Babies
The Baltimore Sun, April 23 --Life in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit can be fraught with uncertainties, challenges and fear for new parents and caregivers alike. A new series on Discovery Health and filmed at Baltimore's Mercy Medical Center aims to capture the journey that providers, families and their babies face. The series, called NICU DIARIES, airs in July. It features stories from Mercy as well as UC San Diego Medical Center in San Diego, Calif. More

UCSD Looks at Football and Division I Upgrade
San Diego Union-Tribune, April 23— The biggest challenges of switching to Division I and creating a football team at UC San Diego would be cost, federal gender-equity regulations, scheduling and finding football facilities. More

Connect Inducts Software Pioneer
Peter Preuss to Entrepreneurial Hall of Fame
San Diego Union-Tribune, April 23 -- Connect, San Diego’s non-profit group for technology innovation, officially inducted software industry pioneer Peter Preuss into its Entrepreneurial Hall of Fame during a luncheon yesterday that recounted his life story—from a nerd growing up in postwar Berlin to a successful technology entrepreneur and prominent patron of both education and cancer research. He also served for 15 years on the University of California Board of Regents, developing an interest in education that resulted in the formation of The Preuss School, a UC San Diego-owned high school that prepares San Diego’s underprivileged youth for college. More

3 Face Sentencing in Killing of UCSD Professor
San Diego Union-Tribune, April 23— Three men who pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter in the 1995 shooting death of a UC San Diego professor during a robbery were scheduled to be sentenced today in San Diego. More

Gatsby Grant Aiding Research Team
Del Mar Times, April 22 --It's perhaps not surprising that Anirvan Ghosh, always fascinated by how things work and inspired by some of the great scientists of the past century, found his calling in the exploration of that most unique, complex and still relatively unexplored of human organs - the brain. Ghosh, 46, is a research neuroscientist and professor of neurobiology at UC San Diego. He is also a key player in a new consortium of four research teams from UCSD and the Salk Institute for Biological Studies selected to receive a $4 million grant over five years to expand our understanding of the brain's complex circuitry. More

Triathlete Helps UCSD Students
Del Mar Times, April 22 -- A former professional triathlete who went on to become a mother of two and a physician when she was 34, Dr. Regina Fleming Magit is busy these days running UC San Diego 's Student Health Service and providing health services to the university's 29,110 students. More

Closing America’s Job Gap
SDNN, April 22 -- Henry DeVries, assistant dean at UC San Diego Extension and the Jobs & Careers editor for San Diego News Network, will speak on “Closing America’s Job Gap: Innovation and Job Creation” at 8 am Thursday, May 6 at the Hong Kong Association of Southern California and the International Trade Advisory Board and quarterly joint breakfast meeting at National University, Spectrum Business Park Campus. More

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