Science News

Dan Charles, National Public Radio A huge collaboration of bee researchers, from more than a dozen countries, looked at how pollination happens in dozens of different crops, including strawberries, coffee, buckwheat, cherries and watermelons. As they report in the journal... Ann Guy

UC Berkeley and University of Hawaii scientists have shown that complex molecules can form on icy rocks in space, suggesting that comets may have seeded early Earth with the building blocks of life. The team zapped icy snowballs of carbon dioxide and hydrocarbons, producing complex molecules, such as dipeptides, that are capable of catalyzing the formation of more complex structures.

Donald Glaser, a Nobel-prize winning physicist who reinvented himself as a biotech pioneer and later dove into the field of neurobiology, died in his sleep Thursday morning, Feb. 28, at his home in Berkeley. Glaser, a professor emeritus of physics and of molecular and cell biology, was 86.

It is with regret that we announce that Professor Emeritus Donald Glaser, a Nobel-prize winning physicist and neurobiologist, passed away in his sleep at his home in Berkeley on February 27, 2013. He was 86.

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UC Berkeley sleep researcher Matthew Walker's City Arts & Lectures talk on "The Brilliance of Sleep" airs on KQED radio tonight (Tuesday, March 5) at 8 p.m. and on Wednesday and Sunday.

The human genome is contained within a vast jumble of DNA. Each of its 20,000 or so genes must be turned on at the right time and in the right cells. Now, Berkeley molecular biologist Eva Nogales and her research team have glimpsed the cellular machinery that accomplishes that feat. They describe their findings in the journal Nature.

How do you design a mobile robot that keeps its balance? Berkeley scientist Shai Revzen and his colleagues have been studying the steady-footed cockroach for keys to this vexing problem. Their theory: it's not in a better algorithm, but better leg design. Discovery News reports.

Professor of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Structural Biology Tom Alber is the recipient of the 2013 Christian B. Anfinsen Award for "his foundational studies yielding an understanding of the structure/function relationship of proteins." Professor of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Structural Biology Jennifer Doudna is the recipient of the 2013 Hans Neurath Award for her "study of three dimensional structures of non coding RNA to investigate how ribonucleoprotein complexes regulate protein production." Both awards are given by the Protein Society.

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Physicist Hitoshi Murayama has been chosen deputy director of the newly established Linear Collider Collaboration, an international consortium that will coordinate development of the next big atom smasher. The collaboration, announced Feb. 21, will coordinate R&D on detectors and accelerators for an electron-positron collider to complement the proton collider at CERN in Switzerland.

Chemist Jay Groves and colleagues at Berkeley Lab have used cutting-edge tools to reveal the workings of the epidermal growth factor receptor, which is screwed up in numerous cancers. Their picture of how the receptor changes structure when activated could help scientists understand other cancer triggers.

Assistant Professor of Cell and Developmental Biology Diana Bautista and Assistant Professor (Affiliated) of Cell and Developmental Biology Arash Komeili are the subject of Research News Briefs at the UC Berkeley NewsCenter.

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For a front-row view of a biological spectacle, newt love, there’s no better spectator stand than the banks of the UC Botanical Garden’s Japanese Pool, and no better time than now. Docents are on hand at specified times to explain the life-cycle and mating rituals of these lively and fascinating amphibians.

Ancient languages hold a treasure trove of information about the culture, politics and commerce of millennia past. Yet, reconstructing them to reveal clues into human history can require decades of painstaking work. Now, UC Berkeley scientists have created an automated “time machine,” of sorts, that will greatly accelerate and improve the process of reconstructing hundreds of ancestral languages.

New book by Andrew Guzman, Overheated: The Human Cost of Climate Change, predicts a grim future for billions of people in this century.

After looking for intelligent radio signals from 86 stars with known planets, UC Berkeley scientists have, for the first time, calculated the odds of finding intelligent civilizations in the Milky Way Galaxy. Fewer than one in a million stars probably are advanced enough for us to detect, though that means there are still potentially millions of such civilizations in the galaxy.

A team of scientists from the Berkeley Geochronology Center and UC Berkeley have determined the most precise dates yet for the dinosaur extinction 66 million years ago and for the well-known impact that occurred around the same time, and concluded that they were simultaneous. While the impact probably was not the sole reason for the dino die-off, it was likely the last straw.

KQED Quest producer Sheraz Sadiq profiles Kathy Ann Miller, a curator and seaweed expert in UC Berkeley's University Herbarium, in the video "Preserving the Forest of the Sea." Sadiq says he was struck by Miller's "enthusiasm and warmth, especially when describing her herbarium 'home' and its red, green and brown-hued precious occupants whom she has cherished for over 30 years."

By Stephanie M. Lee, San Francisco Chronicle Mothers who breathe the kind of pollution emitted by vehicles, coal power plants and factories are significantly likelier to give birth to underweight children than mothers living in less polluted areas, according to... Ann Guy

By Robert Sanders, UC Berkeley Media Relations Some bacteria make their own tiny magnets to navigate the oceans. But these tiny compasses also show up beautifully in 3-D magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans, inspiring UC Berkeley scientists to use them... Ann Guy

Associate Professor of Cell and Developmental Biology Michael Rape has been awarded the Vilcek Prizes for Creative Promise in Biomedical Science. The Creative Promise Prizes are awarded annually in biomedical science to encourage and support younger immigrants who have already demonstrated exceptional achievements, and who often face significant challenges early in their careers.

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