Ke Xu of the Biosciences Area has received a 2018 NIH Director’s New Innovator Award. These $1.5 million grants aim to catalyze “exceptionally innovative” biomedical research from early career investigators. An assistant professor of chemistry at UC Berkeley, Xu develops new physical and chemical tools to explore biological, chemical, and materials systems at the nanoscale with high resolution and sensitivity. More>
Biosciences’ Ke Xu Receives New Innovator Award
October 17, 2018
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Lab Connections to 2018 Nobel Prize Winners
October 5, 2018
The scientific background report accompanying the 2018 Nobel Prize in physics — won by Arthur Ashkin, Gérard Mourou, and Donna Strickland — discussed R&D led by Wim Leemans at the Lab’s BELLA Center on laser-driven plasma accelerators. Also, Frances Arnold of Caltech, one of the winners of this year’s Nobel Prize in chemistry, has connections to the Molecular Foundry, Advanced Light Source, JBEI, and the Biosciences Area. More>
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Markita Landry wins DARPA Young Faculty Award
October 4, 2018
Markita Landry, a faculty scientist in the Molecular Biophysics and Integrated Bioimaging (MBIB) Division, has received a prestigious two-year Department of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Young Faculty Award for her work developing optical probes for neuromodulators such as dopamine. More>
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Mary Maxon Tells Leaders Carbon Could Be California’s Next Gold Rush
October 3, 2018
Biosciences ALD Mary Maxon recently spoke at an event hosted by the East Bay Economic Development Alliance about the East Bay’s unique biotech innovation ecosystem. During the panel discussion, Maxon noted that carbon waste could be California’s next gold rush, driving the bioeconomy. The discussion was recorded by Contra Costa TV and will be rebroadcast through October. Go here to see the schedule.
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Normal Is Good: Breast Cells Produced in Novel Media Resemble Those In Vivo
October 2, 2018
Lab scientists have published a new PLOS ONE study describing a comprehensive analysis of three kinds of media used to grow human breast epithelial cells. The M87A medium – newly developed by the Biosciences Area’s Martha Stampfer and James Garbe – produces cell cultures that grow well and best resemble normal breast cells found in the body. More>
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Lab Researchers Featured in New Yorker Article on What Termites Can Teach Us
September 19, 2018
A New Yorker article on “What Termites Can Teach Us” features the work of Héctor García Martín of the Biosciences Area, JBEI’s Jay Keasling, and Jill Banfield of the Earth & Environmental Sciences Area to crack the mysteries of termite digestion to turn biomass into fuels. More>
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In Memoriam: Biosciences Researcher Jim O’Neil
September 14, 2018
Jim O’Neil of the Molecular Biophysics and Integrated Bioimaging Division died on Aug. 7 at the age of 55 from complications related to heart failure. O’Neil was a radiochemist who made many important contributions to the field of nuclear medicine and to the Positron Emission Tomography (PET) imaging program at the Lab. A memorial service will be held at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley on Oct. 20 at 2 p.m. More>
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KBase: A New Data Platform for the Biological Sciences
August 30, 2018
With the initial goal of developing a type of public research “Dropbox,” the KBase team, comprised of researchers from DOE’s Argonne, Berkeley, Oak Ridge, and Brookhaven national labs, as well as the Cold Spring Harbor Lab, have produced a multifaceted system that will change how science is recorded and shared. More>
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Joint JGI-NERSC-KBase Call for Biological Data Science Proposals; Sept. 24 Deadline
August 27, 2018
The Joint Genome Institute, NERSC, and KBase have issued a joint call for proposals in biological data science as part of the Facilities Integrating Capabilities for User Science (FICUS) initiative. The call aims to help users perform large-scale computational analyses of genomics and related omics data to solve problems relevant to the DOE missions in bioenergy and the environment. Proposals are due Sept. 24. More>
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Infrared Beams Show Cell Types in a Different Light
August 24, 2018
By shining highly focused infrared light on living cells, scientists at Berkeley Lab hope to unmask individual cell identities, and to diagnose whether the cells are diseased or healthy. They will use their technique to produce detailed, color-based maps of individual cells and collections of cells – in microscopic and eventually nanoscale detail – that will be analyzed using machine-learning techniques to automatically sort out cell characteristics. More>
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