The two Town Hall meetings, regarding proposed changes to the hiring and promotion policies for Scientists/ Engineers, hosted by Deputy Director Graham Fleming and Senior Physicist Natalie Roe, Chair of the Scientific Advancement Committee, have now occurred. If you missed these meetings, you can watch videos of both the March 7 and March 22 meetings here. Go here to view a PDF of the meetings’ presentation. The employee comment period for these policy changes continues through April 1. If you wish to make comments on the proposed policy changes, read the revised text. Comments can be sent to the Human Resources Policy Analyst at [email protected].

Optional Holiday —
Cesar Chavez Day

White dwarf explosion simulation

Scientists Compute Death Throes of Dwarf Star

Chu in Washington
For Hearing on China

Berkeley Lab Director Steve Chu will be in Washington to give invited testimony tomorrow about China and energy issues at a hearing of the U.S. Senate Finance Committee. Under Chairman Sen. Max Baucus, D-Montana, the committee will be exploring “Opportunities and Challenges in the U.S.-China Economic Relationship.”

Chronicle Tribute:
'A Noble Nobel'

(A San Francisco Chronicle Editorial) Berkeley has been home to many controversial trends over the decades: free speech movements, organic eating, public nudity. But there's at least one trend emerging from that city that everyone can support: Nobel Prize winners donating their prize money to charity. George Smoot, a Berkeley Lab astrophyisicist and professor of physics at UC Berkeley, just became the most recent winner to dedicate the majority of his 2006 prize to the Oakland-based East Bay Community Foundation. We applaud professor Smoot, who is already on to his next big project at the Laboratory -- "solving energy crises," he said. Full story.