A Sampling of Clips for October 8^th, 2009

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

The World's Top 100 Universities Listed
Guardian UK, Oct. 8 – Oxford University has slipped in the ­ international league table of the world's top universities - in a study which shows the advance of academia in Asia that will soon pose a challenge to the Ivy League and Oxbridge. The study, from Times Higher Education and QS Top Universities shows that overall the UK still punches above its weight, second only to the US. The UK has four out of the top 10 slots and 18 in the top 100. But there has been a significant fall in the number of North American universities in the top 100, from 42 in 2008 to 36 in 2009. (Mentions UCSD) More

Indian-origin Scientist, Two Others Win Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Times of India, Oct. 7 – Americans Venkatraman Ramakrishnan and Thomas Steitz and Israeli Ada Yonath won the 2009 Nobel Prize in chemistry on Wednesday for mapping ribosomes, the protein-producing factories within cells, at the atomic level. India-born Venkatraman Ramakrishnan is a senior scientist at the MRC Laborartory of Molecular Biology at Cambridge. Born in 1952 in Chidambaram, Tamil Nadu, Ramakrishnan shares the Nobel prize with Thomas E Steitz (US) and Ada E Yonath (Israel) for their "studies of the structure and function of the ribosome". Ramakrishnan earned his B.Sc. in Physics (1971) from Baroda University and his Ph.D. in Physics (1976) from Ohio University.  He moved into biology at UCSD, where he took a year of classes, then conducted research with Dr Mauricio Montal, a membrane biochemist. More 

A 'Green Revolution' Buds Slowly in Algae
The New York Times, Oct. 7 -- Amid the charts on James Levin's bulletin board with titles like "Photosynthetic Carbon Fixation" there is a diagram that looks just like the others -- until Levin starts to explain it. Levin is a biologist who researches algae for Kent Bioenergy. After seven years in the pharmaceutical industry, he came to Kent to study viruses that kill bacteria. His office in San Diego has gray-blue carpet, and the lab around the corner contains petri dishes and test tubes. (Quotes Susan Golden, professor of biology at UCSD) More

Course Correction: My term at Afghanistan’s Graduate School of War
The New Republic, Oct. 8 – Camp Julien is surrounded by reminders of Afghanistan’s past. The coalition military base--which sits in the hills south of Kabul, just high enough to rise above the thick cloud of smog that perpetually blankets the city--is flanked by two European-style palaces built in the 1920s by the modernizing King Amanullah.(Refers to the counterinsurgency research of Eli Berman, professor of economics at UCSD) More

Backstage: Tresnjak Looks Beyond Old Globe
North County Times, Oct. 7 -- Last week, UCSD theatre professsor Darko Tresnjak's six-year leadership position at the Old Globe came to an end. Since 2003, Tresnjak has served as founder and artistic director of the Globe's Summer Shakespeare Festival, has directed numerous productions, and served for a time as co-artistic director with Jerry Patch (until his departure early last year for the Manhattan Theatre Club in New York). (Also mentions Kyle Donnelly, professor in UCSD’s Department of Theatre and Dance) More

Loving and Loathing
Forward.com, Oct. 7 -- A longtime secret treasure of American film criticism, UCSD Professor Emeritus of Visual Arts Manny Farber is finally in the limelight, a year after his death of bone cancer at age 91. Farber is being honored with the publication of “Farber On Film: The Complete Film Writings of Manny Farber,” an 824-page tome from the Library of America, collecting many long-overlooked reviews originally written for The Nation, The New Leader, Artforum and others. (Also mentions UCSD professor in Department of Visual Arts, Jean-Pierre Gorin) More

Teddy Cruz to Address Friends of San Diego Architecture
San Diego Daily Transcript, Oct. 7 -- Teddy Cruz will present on the politics of architectural styles at an upcoming Friends of San Diego Architecture meeting. A professor of public culture at UCSD and owner of Estudio Teddy Cruz, his presentation is titled, “Radicalizing the Local: Beyond the Politics of Style!” Cruz’s designs for mixed-use developments have attracted national attention. More

Duo to Discuss Works of Film Critic Farber
Del Mar Times, Oct. 7 -- Robert Polito and Patricia Patterson will discuss "Farber on Film: The Complete Film Writings of Manny Farber," edited by Polito, at 7 p.m. Oct. 9 at D.G.Wills Books, 7461 Girard Ave. Patterson was Farber's wife and collaborator. Emanuel "Manny" Farber (1917-2008) was at his home in Leucadia when he passed away at age 91. He began his career in the 1940s writing art and film criticism for The New Republic and The Nation. Also an artist, his first group exhibition was in 1945, followed by his first solo exhibition in 1957. While pursuing art full time, Farber continued as a film critic until the late 1970s for Time, The New Leader, Cavalier and Artforum. He also contributed to Commentary, Film Comment, City Magazine and Film Culture. Farber taught film at UCSD from 1970 to 1987. Vanity Fair added him into its Hall of Fame in June 1998. More

UCSD Borrows $40 Million from Itself
XETV, Oct. 7 -- Officials at UCSD are planning to take out a $40 million internal loan to help cope with $84.2 million in state budget cuts. The La Jolla-based university won't pay interest on the loan but will give up money it would have earned in an interest-bearing account in order to pay back the funds. Earlier this year, UCSD introduced higher fees for students and unpaid furlough days for staff members after the university lost nearly 28 percent of its $2.5 billion a year budget. More

Rowe Partners with Scripps to Integrate Marine Life Studies
Del Mar Times, Oct. 7 -- The Rancho Santa Fe School District doesn't devote one week to marine studies anymore. Instead, a new partnership with UCSD’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the Birch Aquarium at Scripps is helping marine science be a part of the curriculum year-round at R. Roger Rowe. "There's a long history of ocean science being taught here," said Roberta Dean, the Scripps ocean partnership coordinator. "The kids and the teachers both know a lot about ocean science as it builds every year. By the time they get to middle school they can understand something like climate change because they have a pretty extensive background." More

Playhouse to Present 'Laramie' Sequel that Gives Voice to Shepard's Killer
North County Times, Oct. 7 -- A decade after "The Laramie Project" became a theatrical phenomenon, its creators are back with an epilogue highlighted by a riveting prison interview with the killer of gay college student Matthew Shepard ---- depicting him as candid but not remorseful over the murder. The new production, which opens nationwide on Monday at more than 130 theaters ---- including a celebrity-packed reading at La Jolla Playhouse ---- features a segment based on more than 10 hours of face-to-face interviews with convicted killer Aaron McKinney, conducted by Greg Pierotti, a gay actor/writer who helped create the original docudrama. (Mentions UCSD professor of Theatre and Dance, Darko Tresnjak, director of the only scheduled 'Laramie' sequel performance in San Diego County) More

Get Sensible
San Diego Union-Tribune, Oct. 7 -- With San Diego already facing financial calamity, the California Coastal Commission could act today to force a backbreaking $1.5 billion burden on the city for a project that is utterly unnecessary and scientifically unjustified. The commission, meeting in Oceanside, will reconsider its unexpected and completely senseless 8-1 vote in August denying San Diego's request for a third five-year waiver from federal Clean Water Act requirements that publicly owned sewage treatment plants provide at least “secondary” treatment of wastewater discharged into bodies of water. (Mentions UCSD’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography) More

'The Show is Alive Again'
San Diego Union-Tribune, Oct. 8 -- A lot has happened to Valerie Vigoda and Brendan Milburn since they hit the Old Globe Theatre six years ago with their band and a brand-new musical, “Striking 12.” But — long story short — theater is now at the center of these married pop-rockers' lives. And their latest theater piece, “Long Story Short,” is now front and center at San Diego Rep, which opens its 2009-10 season this week with the local premiere of the musical love story. (Quotes UCSD alumna Melody Butiu) More

Theater Review: Sly 'Savannah' Hides as Subtle Message in Between...
North County Times, Oct. 7 -- The laughs that pepper "Savannah Disputation" come with the regularity of a sitcom laugh track. Yet at its core, Evan Smith's recent comedy, now in a sly, entertaining production at the Old Globe, wrestles with the polarizing religiosity that pollutes the national dialogue. And just as there's a stealth theme about tolerance and intellectual humility lurking beneath the laughs, the Globe production, buoyantly directed by Kim Rubinstein, also has a secret weapon ---- actor Nancy Robinette. Her performance is a vivid tour de force as Mary, the self-styled "born mean" sister who wants to "crush" a perky evangelical stalking her Roman Catholic household like an unwanted cat. (Mentions UCSD professor in Department of Theatre and Dance Judith Dolan) More

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