Daffodils near Bldg. 50

Looks Like Spring Is
Springing Forth

Thanks to the efforts of the "Green Team" — who toiled in the dirt last fall, planting hundreds of bulbs — beautiful blooms are sprouting up all across the Lab's landscape. The Green Team is an Employee Activities Association group that seeks to improve the environment here and in the surrounding community. Visit the Green Team website to learn more about recycling, energy efficiency, and junk mail reduction, and for information on joining the club.

Culler

Imagine swarms of tiny sensors sitting in your office, seeing, listening and maybe even smelling everything that goes on around you. Such "smart dust'' sensors are under development by start-ups like Dust of Berkeley. Many smart dust researchers have joined to develop an "open-source'' version of the technology. Intel supports the open-source movement, according to David Culler, a scientist in the Lab's Computational Research Division. Full story.

Discrimination Policies
Have Been Revised

Effective immediately, the Laboratory/University of California discrimination policies have been revised to clarify that discrimination on the basis of gender identity and pregnancy is prohibited. The changes incorporate the addition of "gender identity" as a protected status under the California Fair Employment and Housing Act. Discrimination on the basis of pregnancy is included with the category of discrimination based on "sex." The term "pregnancy" is being added to clarify the Laboratory/University policy in this regard. The revised policy may be found here.

A search committee will be convened today by Deputy Director Sally Benson to begin the national recruitment for the Director of Berkeley Lab's Environmental Health and Safety Division. Under Chairman James Symons, the panel includes Mina Bissell (Life Sciences), David Shuh (Chemical Sciences), Wim Leemans (Accelerator and Fusion Research), Ben Feinberg (Advanced Light Source), George Reyes (Facilities), Howard Hatayama (UC Office of the President) and Mark Freiberg (UC Berkeley). The new Director will succeed David McGraw, who moved from EH&S to become the Lab's Director of Business Services. Nominations and applications are encouraged; contact Ed Sayson, Manager of Recruitment, at x7509. Go here and insert the number 016777 in the keyword search box to read the job description.

Shift in Issuing SPAM Report confirmations

Employees who frequently report SPAM by forwarding these unwanted messages to [email protected], you may notice that the frequency of the confirmation responses to those e-mails has decreased. Previously the response was sent to each user on the same day the user reported spam. As of last Friday the frequency of these messages has decreased to once a month. Go here for more information about reporting spam.