A Sampling of Clips for March 31, 2010

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

Atom Smasher Sets Collision Record
TIME, March 31 -- The world's largest atom smasher conducted its first experiments at conditions nearing those after the Big Bang, breaking its own record for high-energy collisions with proton beams crashing into each other Tuesday at three times more force than ever before. (Quotes Bivek Sharma, a professor at UC San Diego) More

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Science Meets Politics Off California's Coast
Science, March 30 -- Just offshore from San Diego, California, the largest kelp forest on the West Coast shelters rockfish, sculpin, and many other species. Anglers and sea urchin divers have plied those waters for decades, but not for much longer. The Department of Fish and Game is drafting regulations that would put 18 square kilometers off-limits to any fishing or harvesting. As a result, fish, lobsters, and urchins should start getting larger and more abundant, says Edward Parnell, a marine ecologist with Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego. "They're going to fulfill their more historical ecological role," he predicts. More

What Quirk of the Brain Turns People Into Compulsive Hoarders?
Discover Magazine, March 30 -- What brain circuitry may be involved in the development of hoarding? Researchers at the University of Iowa compared  brain-damaged patients who began abnormally collecting things following their injuries to brain-damaged patients who did not collect. (Mentions research by Sanjaya Saxena, director of the Obsessive-Compulsive Disorders Program at UC San Diego) More

Scripps Sails Out to the Great Pacific Ocean Patch
Mother Nature Network, March 30 -- Scientists from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography traveled out to a spot of sea 1,000 miles from shore and were sad to find plastic everywhere. More

'Take a Nap!' Author's Study Says Sleepy Teens May Turn to Pot
The Sacramento Bee, March 31 -- Teenagers short of sleep are more likely to become marijuana users, according to a recent study led by a researcher from UC San Diego. The study, funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, National Institute on Aging and National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, mapped the social interactions of 8,349 adolescents in grades 7 through 12. More

Students Given Role in Census of Marine Life
San Diego Union-Tribune, March 30 -- It’s one thing to tally the nation’s population. Try taking a census of all sea life on the planet. Students in a La Jolla High School marine science class have joined an international effort led by top scientists, including researchers at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography, to inventory all organisms — from plankton to whales — living in and around the world’s oceans. More

Scripps Researchers Study Chile Quake Sea Floor
10News, March 30 -- It was an eight-day journey to study the rupture zone of the Chile quake and how tsunamis are formed. And now researchers from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography are analyzing the data they collected. More

UCSD Energy Dashboard Measures Campus Consumption
SDNN, March 30 -- A new energy dashboard available on an Internet portal provides real-time measurement and visualization of energy use on the UC San Diego campus, and the university is working with a San Diego area-based electronics company to make this technology available to consumers. More

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