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  Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2007 spacer image
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Today

10 a.m.
EHS 260
Basic Electrical Hazards & Mitigations

Bldg. 70A-3377

11 a.m.
Chemistry Department
Coenzyme A and Natural Product Biosynthesis
Michael Burkart, UC San Diego
120 Latimer Hall (campus)

2 p.m.
EHS 339
Asbestos Awareness

Bldg. 70A-3377

4 p.m.
Chemistry Department
Nanocrystal Derived Solar Cells
Paul Alivisatos
120 Latimer Hall (campus)

5:30 p.m.
Water Resources Center Archives
Confluence, Confusion, or Catastrophe: Prospects for Ending the Delta Stalemate
John Cain, Natural Heritage Institute
112 Wurster Hall


Tomorrow

8 a.m.
EHS 206
Crane/Hoist Operator-Over Two Tons

Bldg. 70A-3377

Noon
Dance Club
Fox Trot Lesson

Bldg. 51 Lobby

Noon
CITRIS
Minimal Manufacturing Through Ink-Jet Technology

Kazuhiro Murata, AIST
290 Hearst Mining Bldg. (campus)

Events Calendar button
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spacer imageCAFETERIA
 

Breakfast: Pineapple Pancakes with Canadian Bacon
Tomorrow's Breakfast: Chorizo Scramble with Flour Tortilla
Pizza: Marinated Spinach with Feta Cheese and Red Onions
Grill: Buffalo Chicken Sandwich
Cultural Cuisines: Taco Salad
Deli: Ham, Brie and Apple on Baguette
Carvery: Roast Loin of Pork with Roasted Potatoes

B'fast: 6:30 a.m. - 9:30 a.m.
Lunch: 11 a.m. - 1:30 p.m.
Full menu
 

Hewlett Foundation
Gift Largest Ever for Cal

UC Berkeley yesterday received the largest private gift in its history, $113 million from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. The Hewlett gift provides the campus with a major new source of endowed funds to attract and support world-class faculty and graduate students. Through a challenge grant, it will create 100 endowed chairs, permanent funds designed to keep UC Berkeley professors' salaries competitive with those at the best private schools and to recruit top graduate students. "If we lose faculty, we may still have a public university, but it won't be the same," said Paul Alivisatos, Berkeley professor and Berkeley Lab associate director. "We'll have hurt young people who have so much to gain and so much to offer." Full story. Go here for more information on the challenge grant.

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RESEARCH UPDATE

TEAM Instrument Sets
New Microscopy Record


Tests performed on the TEAM (Transmission Electron Aberration- corrected Microscope project) 0.5 microscope have demonstrated 0.5-Angstrom resolution — a new record in electron microscopy that paves the way for new kinds of experiments and exploration of atomic structure in nanomaterials. After completion of the acceptance tests later this year, the instrument will be installed at the National Center for Electron Microscopy (NCEM). TEAM 0.5 will become a user facility at NCEM in the fall of 2008. Read more here. Access the project website here.

IN THE NEWS


Explaining Sick Feeling
After Airline Flights

That sick feeling you may experience after a long airplane flight is not all in your head. But your head may be contributing to it. Environmental health experts — including Berkeley Lab environmental energy technologist William Nazaroff — recently exposed 16 research subjects to mock flights, complete with elevated ozone levels. They found that the interaction of high ozone concentrations with oils on passengers' skin, hair and clothing produces a compound suspected of irritating nasal passages, drying out eyes and lips, and causing headaches. The offending byproducts of this interaction belong to the aldehyde family of compounds, which appear to be the culprits in workplaces stricken with "sick building syndrome." Full story.

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Science and the Simpsons;
Is the Universe a Doughnut?

This article is an excerpt from Paul Halpern's book: What's Science Ever Done for Us? What the Simpsons Can Teach Us About Physics, Robots, Life and the Universe

In an episode of The Simpsons, guest star Stephen Hawking tells Homer over a beer “Your theory of a doughnut-shaped universe is intriguing…I may have to steal it." In reality, the most reliable data on the shape of space stem from measurements of the cosmic microwave background (CMB), the cooled-down relic radiation from the Big Bang. The CMB was first discovered in the mid-1960s, but a far more detailed examination of the CMB came in the early 1990s, thanks to the Nobel Prize-winning work of John Mather and Berkeley Lab physicist George Smoot. Full excerpt.

ANNOUNCEMENT




Open Source Software Topic of CITRIS Talk

Bruce Perens, creator of the Open Source Definition and vice president of Sourcelabs, will present a talk on “Innovation Goes Public” on Monday, Sept. 17, at 4 p.m. in 306 Soda Hall on campus. The talk is sponsored by UC Berkeley’s CITRIS (Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society) program. Perens will show how Open Source is often the most effective strategy for creating and utilizing new innovation, and explain the economics of Open Source and how it works for profit-generating companies.

 
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