The links to the stories summarized on this page are time sensitive, so stories might no longer be online at that URL. We also include links to the original source publication itself.
Wednesday, 21 September 2011
1. American Hikers Freed in Iran, State Media Report
New York Times & International Herald Tribune (*requires registration)
September 21, 2011
London — Two Americans arrested while hiking along the Iran-Iraq frontier two years ago and sentenced to eight years for espionage were released Wednesday on $1 million bail and were leaving the country by plane, Iran’s official news agency, IRNA, reported.
The men, SHANE M. BAUER AND JOSHUA F. FATTAL, both 29, left Evin prison in a diplomatic convoy including Swiss and Omani officials and went directly to the airport, according to news reports.
...The men have denied the charges against them. Mr. Bauer, Mr. Fattal and a third American hiker, SARAH E. SHOURD, were arrested near northern Iraq’s border with Iran in July 2009 by Iranian border guards, who contended they had intentionally trespassed.
Ms. Shourd was released on $500,000 bail in September 2010 — also with help from Omani officials and just before the annual General Assembly meeting — and returned to the United States.
...The three friends are GRADUATES OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY....
[Stories on this topic appeared in more than 1000 sources worldwide, including the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Associated Press, and CBS—link to video] Full Story
2. Bay Area friends elated by news of UC Berkeley grads' release from Iranian prison
Oakland Tribune
September 21, 2011
The Wednesday morning release of SHANE BAUER AND JOSHUA FATTAL from an Iranian prison saw their colleagues, friends and mentors in the Bay Area overjoyed at the end of an exhausting wait.
The hikers' families endured numerous dashed hopes throughout the two-year imprisonment. Iranian authorities often hinted at progress, only to then announce further delays, or worse, fall completely silent on the issue....
KEN LIGHT, A PROFESSOR WHO TAUGHT BAUER AT UC BERKELEY'S GRADUATE SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM, said he envisioned his former student as surviving his prison experience as a "very people-oriented person, good at connecting," who would have had some skills to communicate with the people around him while imprisoned, despite not knowing the native language....
"But you can only imagine," Light said, "after a year you begin to lose faith, and you're not getting information. I imagine he'll need some time to recover from the experience."...
Bauer's fiance, SARAH SHOURD, is an Oakland resident who was detained with him and Fattal until late last year. She has been traveling the country since her release, fighting for her friends' freedom....
[This story also appeared in the San Jose Mercury News] Full Story
3. Biz Talk Blog: UC awards 13 grants to projects to bridge 'valley of death'
San Francisco Business Times Online (*requires registration)
September 19, 2011
The University of California has awarded 13 “proof of concept” grants to help researchers bridge the so-called “valley of death” to develop new technologies or treatments.
Among the winners of grants ranging from $100,000 to $250,000 were three Bay Area projects. Gao Liu of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory is working on a conductive polymer binder and silicon composite electrode, the UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY’S JAMES EVANS is developing completely printable batteries for energy storage and UC BERKELEY’S DMITRY BUDKER is working on a next generation of ultra-precise magnetic sensors.
“Our UC faculty and researchers are leaders in invention, and it’s central to the mission of our public university system to help ensure their innovations make a difference to society and the economy,” Steven Beckwith, UC vice president for research and graduate studies, said for the UC publication UC Health.... Full Story
4. California Touts the Economic Upsides of Clean-Tech Investment
Corporate Counsel
September 21, 2011
Since the solar energy company Solyndra LLC filed for bankruptcy earlier this month—taking with it $535 million in federally backed loans—the company's failure has generated all manner of questions about government investment in clean-energy technology, among them: Is it worth the risk to public dollars?
The U.S. Department of Energy is saying yes, pushing ahead with its support of $9.2 billion worth of government-guaranteed loans to 14 other clean-tech companies. So too are states like California, where renewable energy goals—which were passed into state law last spring—are driving conversations about financing and investment in local power projects.
"The California renewables mandate is at least as ambitious as any in the country—and probably more so," says STEVEN WEISSMAN, DIRECTOR OF THE ENERGY PROGRAM AT THE CENTER FOR LAW, ENERGY & THE ENVIRONMENT (CLEE) AT UC BERKELEY SCHOOL OF LAW. California is one of 31 states in the U.S. that maintains either the Renewable Portfolio Standards or Alternative Energy Portfolio Standards, each a set of requirements that say a certain percentage of a state's energy needs will hail from wind, solar, and other forms of non-fossil-based sources.
With regards to the singular, if high-profile, failing of Solyndra, Weissman says: "It's a vast oversimplification to point to [the failure] of one company and draw any meaningful conclusions." The purpose of the federal loan-guarantee program is to shift risk in uncharted waters from the private sector to the taxpayer, and "whenever there's risk, that means some things are going to succeed and some things are going to fail," he adds....
Berkeley's CLEE is currently assessing the policy barriers and possible solutions that arose from conference, says Weissman. Considerations include: how to streamline the local permitting process; how to improve interconnection between sources of energy and distribution grids; and how to create financial incentives that would, for example, "improve end-users' perception of the cost-benefits of installing solar," says Weissman.
Weismann expects CLEE to release its assessment later in the fall, and says the findings will be incorporated into a final report to be released by the California Energy Commission (CEC). Last month, CEC published a draft staff report, "Renewable Power in California: Status and Issues," aimed at outlining the challenges that the state and other stakeholders will need to address in order to promote investments in renewable energy. Full Story
5. Can Obama beat 'class warfare' rap?
Politico
September 20, 2011
When President Barack Obama laid out his deficit plan Monday, he wasn’t just trying to sell a policy. When he pressed for tax hikes on the rich and announced, “This is not class warfare,” he was trying to exorcise a demon that has bedeviled the Democratic Party for decades and, in the process, deprive the Republicans of one of their trustiest weapons.
The reaction from the right was swift and sure: “Class warfare!”...
“What [the GOP is] really accusing the Democrats about is saying that there are classes in America — that classes exist,” said GEOFFREY NUNBERG, A LINGUIST AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA-BERKELEY’S SCHOOL OF INFORMATION.
Use of the phrase “class warfare,” has roots in the socialist theorists of the 19th century, and entered the American political lexicon in the 1950s and ’60s, when fears of spreading communism were at their height, according to Nunberg, who has studied how the term has been used in politics.
His chart of the phrase’s use shows it rising steadily starting in the late 1980s, and emerging, in 1989, as a Republican Party talking point.
“The Democratic leadership subscribes to the rancid rhetoric of class warfare,” House GOP leader Robert Michel said that year.
The phrase has long been a favorite of Michel’s successor, Newt Gingrich, and its frequency jumped again in 1994 with the introduction of the Republicans’ Contract With America. It then gradually declined until 2000, when it peaked sharply during the 2000 presidential campaign between Al Gore and George W. Bush. Another sharp peak took it to new heights in the fight over Bush’s tax proposals in 2003.
Now, the deficit debate stands to put one of the GOP’s most cherished — and effective — talking points to the test once again.... Full Story
6. Universities now urging freshmen to consider studying the forgotten humanities
San Jose Mercury News (*requires registration)
September 21, 2011
On 21st century U.S. campuses, is there room for Shakespeare, Sartre and Sondheim?
A declining number of students think so — a trend that worries leaders at many top universities, where engineers often outnumber humanists....
In the humanities' heyday of the mid-1960s, more than one in three Stanford students majored in languages, literature, the arts, history, cultural studies, philosophy and religion. By 1995, only about one in 10 did — a figure that hasn't budged much since. Meanwhile, interest in engineering, math and computer science has climbed....
This nationwide trend is echoed in five decades of data from UC BERKELEY, UCLA and even from such tweedy Ivy League universities as Harvard, Princeton, Brown and Yale....
[This story also appeared in the Contra Costa Times and Oakland Tribune] Full Story
7. New doubts about 'poster child' of exoplanets
New Scientist
September 21, 2011
When it comes to alien worlds, even poster children are fickle. Fomalhaut b — one of the first and only exoplanets to be photographed directlyMovie Camera — may not be what it seems.
Astronomers expected to find a planet orbiting the young, nearby star Fomalhaut since 2005, when Hubble Space Telescope images showed that the star's spectacular dust disc lies a bit off-centre.
Sure enough, in 2008, PAUL KALAS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY, AND COLLEAGUES spotted a wandering speck of light in two separate images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope's Advanced Camera for Surveys in 2004 and 2006....
The trouble is, in the three years since the 2008 discovery, no other telescope had detected the planet.
The Hubble instrument used to take the first images broke in 2007, and will not be repaired. So Kalas and colleagues used an older Hubble camera to take another peek in 2010. As they reported on 12 September, at the Extreme Solar Systems II conference in Moran, Wyoming, this revealed the bright speck again.
This time, however, it was in an unexpected place. "That's a problem," says Steinn Sigurdsson of Pennsylvania State University in University Park, who helped organise the conference. To make sense of it, the planet would need an elliptical orbit that takes it across the dust disc, yet its brightness suggests that it is too big to do so without disrupting the disc....
Kalas is not giving up. ...
"It will all be solved with observations, probably within the next year," says Kalas. His team is scheduled to observe the Fomalhaut system with Hubble again in 2012.... Full Story
8. Military surveillance data: Shared intelligence
The military has a vast array of scientifically valuable data — some more accessible than you think.
Nature
September 21, 2011
No one monitors our planet more closely than the military. Thirty-six thousand kilometres above Earth, US Air Force satellites watch for the heat plume of a ballistic missile. An array of other surveillance satellites patrol lower altitudes. Some can see a rifle from space; others penetrate cloud cover with radar, seeking military hardware or installations. Still closer in, aircraft and drones fly over conflict zones collecting intelligence, and seismometers listen for shudders from an underground nuclear test. Even the deepest oceans are prowled by military submarines, watching their foreign adversaries.
Through most of their history, the data collected by this vast blanket of military sensors have been highly classified. But on occasions when scientists are lucky enough to see the data, their view is considerably different from that of the generals. Satellites designed to track missiles can also spot the flaming trails of meteors; aerial photographs of Iraq have allowed archaeologists to trace ancient canals. Even the military's most banal weather satellites collect data on ocean precipitation that are valuable for understanding Earth's energy cycles....
In the United States, the start of the Manhattan Project in 1942 set the tone for collaboration between the modern military and civilian scientists. The greatest physicists of the era, conscripted to build the atomic bomb, spent years working closely with the US Army. The Pentagon has used outside scientists to help shape its capabilities ever since. It maintains a handful of quasi-academic labs near university campuses, and a truculent panel of independent scientists — known as the JASONs — advises it on technical topics such as submarine detection and nuclear weapons (see page 397).
At the same time, opportunistic collaborations have sprung up between civilian scientists and the defence establishment. With the advent of nuclear submarine warfare in the 1950s, the US Navy devoted enormous resources to mapping and understanding the sea floor — including mid-ocean ridges, where Navy mapping yielded clues to the theory of plate tectonics, according to RAYMOND JEANLOZ, AN EARTH SCIENTIST AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY, and a long-time member of the JASONs. Seismic networks used to monitor nuclear tests have also mapped earthquakes. Jeffrey Richelson, a historian at the National Security Archive in Washington DC, says that since the 1970s, the US defence department has occasionally shared satellite imagery with civilian agencies in response to natural disasters such as flooding and forest fires.... Full Story
9. Observations Blog: Annual Nobel Predictions Announced, but Forecasting Prizes Remains a Tricky Business
Scientific American Online
September 21, 2011
Information and media firm Thomson Reuters released its annual Nobel Prize predictions today, highlighting 24 researchers whose influential work could make them contenders for a Nobel in physics, chemistry, economics, or physiology or medicine. (The Thomson Reuters methodology, which tracks citations of research articles, does not work for forecasting the Nobels for literature or peace.)
The picks for the Nobels, which will be rolled out over the course of a week starting October 3, appear below, but the honorees shouldn’t adjust their sleep schedules to get on Swedish time just yet. For although the predictions have met with some success in the past, the Nobels are full of surprises, and the overall success rate of the individual picks has been low....
Last year, when Thomson Reuters had 99 eligible picks, only two hit among the nine awardees in physics, chemistry, economics, and physiology or medicine....
But enough caveats. Without further ado, here are the 24 researchers predicted to be in the running for a Nobel, along with the Thomson Reuters summary of their work:
Chemistry:
...JEAN M. J. FRÉCHET OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY, and King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia....
Physics:
...Sajeev John of the University of Toronto and ELI YABLONOVITCH OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY, for “their invention and development of photonic band gap materials.”... Full Story
10. Is 'genius' a dirty word?
BBC News Magazine
September 21, 2011
The annual awarding of MacArthur Foundation grants means that another 22 people are going to find themselves called "genius". But is the title a blessing or a curse?
According to the MacArthur Foundation, annual fellowships are awarded to outstanding individuals who show talent, originality, and dedication in all fields. They must also be citizens of, or resident in, the United States.
But due to a popular nickname, the fellows are known by a much grander moniker —genius....
The disdain some winners have for the title "genius" is both a mix of humility and a sense that the true geniuses are far ahead of their time.
"When people are doing something that's really innovative, it's not recognised for a long time," says former fellow RICHARD A MULLER, a senior scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley laboratory and PROFESSOR OF PHYSICS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY. "Most people think you're just wasting your time."... Full Story
11. New JavaScript hacking tool can intercept PayPal, other secure sessions
Ars Technica
September 21, 2011
On Friday, a pair of security researchers will present a hacking tool which they claim decrypts secure Web requests to sites using the Transport Layer Security 1.0 protocol and SSL 3.0, allowing a person or program to hijack sessions with financial websites and other services. Juliano Rizzo and Thai Duong are unveiling their Browser Exploit Against SSL/TLS tool, dubbed BEAST, at the Ekoparty security conference in Buenos Aires....
The attack, according to Duong, is capable of intercepting sessions with PayPal and other services that still use TLS 1.0—which would be most secure sites, since follow-on versions of TLS aren't yet supported in most browsers or Web server implementations.
While Rizzo and Duong believe BEAST is the first attack against SSL 3.0 that decrypts HTTPS requests, the vulnerability that BEAST exploits is well-known; BT chief security technology officer Bruce Schneier and UC BERKELEY'S DAVID WAGNER pointed out in a 1999 analysis of SSL 3.0 that "SSL will provide a lot of known plain-text to the eavesdropper, but there seems to be no better alternative." And TLS's vulnerability to man-in-the middle attacks was made public in 2009. The IETF's TLS Working Group published a fix for the problem, but the fix is unsupported by SSL. Full Story
12. Upscale culture and gang violence share a small space
In San Francisco's Mission District, gang violence is layered atop the flourishing restaurant and club scene that has grown up in recent years.
Los Angeles Times
September 21, 2011
Reporting from San Francisco — The first in a spate of casualties in this city's hipster haven was a quiet 22-year-old who held two jobs and sent money home to his mother in Mexico's Yucatan region. Gaspar Puch-tzek was grabbing a cigarette outside the swank Mission District restaurant where he worked on Aug. 30 when he was mistaken for a gang member and shot in the face....
San Francisco's compact neighborhoods have for decades been a laboratory for change, undergoing identity-shifting transformations. But nowhere have the economic contrasts been as pronounced as in the Mission....
LYDIA CHAVEZ, A JOURNALISM PROFESSOR AT UC BERKELEY who along with students and professional staff runs a bilingual news website called Mission Loc@l, said it was the coexistence of disparate worlds that sets the Mission apart.
The contrasts inspired a student to piece together a website map, dubbed "gangs and cupcakes," that overlaid the Mission's rival territories with its bakeries. The purpose, Chavez said, was to give people "a different way to look at the neighborhood."
But Alfaro said the map offended some in the community by appearing to minimize life-and-death issues while stressing the divisions he and others work so hard to erase.... Full Story
13. Brooks Review: Granholm's Fairy Tales
Detroit News
September 20, 2011
Having read Governor [and UC BERKELEY PROFESSOR JENNIFER] GRANHOLM's book, "A Governor's Story: The Fight for Jobs and America's Economic Future," there is no doubt in my mind that she sees herself as a cross between Wonder Woman, Captain Marvel, Margaret Thatcher, Angela Merkel — and a little bit of Mother Theresa and Charlie's Angels thrown in.
Right from the git-go the ex-governor lets you know just how bright she — and the team she assembled — is. She refers to herself as a "gifted student" who managed to get all A's at the UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT BERKELEY (well, there was that one A- she got while studying in France). Not only is she the smartest one in the room, but she's able to attract the best and brightest to government. She describes her team as "whip smart," "nonstop brains," "steely-eyed professionals," and "brilliant."
Clearly, Granholm assembled the best minds in Michigan for her administration. But having read about the expertise of her extraordinary team, I was left with nagging questions: If they were so damn brilliant, why did Michigan suffer so terribly at her hand? And why is her legacy so scarred?
Her book tracks several themes which are repeated ad nauseam. For example, the ex-guv states her zealous determination to convert Michigan into a green economy....
Incredibly, Granholm states unequivocally: "By 2030, 70 percent of the cars on the road will be electric, all of them with these advanced lithium-ion batteries." She'll be forgotten in the bowels of Berkeley when that prediction runs out of juice.... Full Story
14. Berkeley Art Museum tightens belt, gets better fit
San Francisco Chronicle
September 21, 2011
In a perfect architectural world, Toto Ito's white-steel egg crate would be rising today in downtown Berkeley. Three tall floors of museum galleries would stand at the edge of the UC BERKELEY CAMPUS, a grid-like abstraction of thin walls and glass.
Instead, a less pricey concept by new architects was unveiled last week by the BERKELEY ART MUSEUM AND PACIFIC FILM ARCHIVE, a paired institution that hopes to (finally) make its move in 2015. For now, look on the two schemes as a crash course in the limitations of real life — and the limitations of viewing architecture primarily as art....
The new firm on the job is New York's Diller Scofidio + Renfro. And except for the site at Center and Oxford streets, everything else has changed as well....
Yes, our grim age of lessened expectations has left its mark on the urban field of dreams. But if architects and builders keep an eye on what counts — craft and compelling spaces — the result can still be rewarding and fresh. Full Story
15. Beyond the castle: Julia Morgan at Asilomar
San Francisco Chronicle
September 21, 2011
Despite a lack of affinity for planes, matrices and coefficients that prevented me from ever being an architect, JULIA MORGAN has been one of my heroes ever since I first beheld Hearst Castle as a tyke. Not only was she the FIRST WOMAN TO GET A CIVIL ENGINEERING DEGREE AT U.C. BERKELEY and to become a licensed architect in California, she was a social activist in her own quiet way. She put as much of her creative energy into state park structures and YMCAs and other buildings dedicated for use by women as she did creating luxurious private homes (or castles) and public buildings.
Morgan's work — nearly 700 commissions during her 49-year career — was eclectic, taking its greatest inspiration from her affection for the California landscape. The site determined her choice of style, and at Asilomar Conference Grounds in Pacific Grove, that style was the woodsy, light-infused comfort of the Arts & Crafts movement.
Hearst Castle is Morgan's most famous creation, but it is probably the least representative of her personal vision. At Asilomar, where she had carte blanche, you find Morgan in her element. This is the largest single collection of Morgan's work, and 13 of her original 16 buildings are still standing. Best of all, you don't have to stay at Asilomar to see them. Just call the local state park office at (831) 646-6443 to schedule a tour, or if rangers aren't available at the time you'd like, download a self-guided trail brochure and strike out on your own.... Full Story