KUCI: Get the Funk Out!

UC Irvine-led science team shows how to eat our way out of the climate crisis

Researchers explore the benefits of producing farm-free food

Irvine, Calif., Nov. 6, 2023 — Agriculture is one of the hardest human activities to decarbonize; people must eat, but the land-use practices associated with growing crops account for roughly a quarter of global greenhouse gas emissions. Researchers at the University of California, Irvine and other institutions evaluate a new solution to this problem, one that eliminates farms altogether.

In a study published today in Nature Sustainability, the UCI-led team of scientists assess the potential for widescale synthetic production of dietary fats through chemical and biological processes. The raw materials for this method are the same as those used by plants: hydrogen in water and carbon dioxide in the air.

“Large-scale synthesis of edible molecules through chemical and biological means without agricultural feedstocks is a very real possibility,” said lead author Steven Davis, UCI professor of Earth system science. “Such ‘food without the farm’ could avoid enormous quantities of climate-warming emissions while also safeguarding biodiverse lands that might otherwise be cleared for farms.”

Davis and his co-authors highlight other environmental and societal benefits of farm-free food in the paper, including a reduction in water use and watershed pollution, local control over food production, diminished risk of weather-related food shortages, and less need for low-paying and physically demanding agricultural labor. Another plus, according to Davis, would be the possibility of returning existing farmlands to a natural state, which could enhance biodiversity and build up natural carbon sinks.

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What do you do when you find out you have terminal brain cancer just before graduating from high school? Live life to the fullest, of course, which is what Nathan Lee does in this high-spirited Asian LGBTQ+ film.

This high-spirited LGBTQ+ drama LAST SUMMER NATHAN LEE, starring Harrison Xu, Natasha Tina Lia, Matthew Mitchell Espinosa, Dru Perez, and Aaron Guest, follows Nathan Lee (Harrison Xu), an Asian American teenager, who finds out that he has terminal brain cancer right before his 18th birthday, and vows to live the remains of his life with passion and laughter for one last summer with his friends and family...and refuses to die a virgin. Knowing that his gay best friend, Dash (Matthew Mitchell Espinosa), wants to become a filmmaker, Nathan offers himself as a documentary subject to Dash, who is also in love with Nathan.

LAST SUMMER OF NATHAN LEE

A coming-of-age story releasing in theaters October 20th and available on VOD November 22nd.

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BEAUX GRIS GRIS & THE APOCALYPSE

Beaux Gris Gris & The Apocalypse (pronounced \bo\ \gree-gree\ ) California-based blues rock americana soul band created by Louisiana-born-and-raised musician Greta Valenti (Well Hung Heart) and UK British Blues Hall of Fame Inductee, Robin Davey (The Hoax, DVL, Well Hung Heart). Joined by the talents of musical heavyweights: Tom Rasulo (Dave Matthews, Gerard Way) Drums/Production in the UK & USA OR Alex Thomas (Anna Calvi, Bat For Lashes, Squarepusher) (UK) on Drums; Emma Jonson (UK) & Sam Robertson (USA) or DANIEL KIRKPATRICK (USA) on Keys, plus Stephen Mildwater (UK) and Chris Cunningham (USA) on Bass in the UK/USA respectively. PLUS VARIOUS OTHER PLAYERS AND GUEST APPEARANCES AT VARIOUS SHOWS.

To fully understand Beaux Gris Gris & The Apocalypse is to experience the band live, a mix of soulful songs, intense energy, and world-class award-winning musicianship. RhythmBooze summed up the show finale as “A mind-boggling, blistering finish with everything thrown in including the kitchen sink...truly memorable”. When LouderSounds preaches “Let Beaux Gris Gris & The Apocalypse twist yer melons and remind you of the wonder of life” it might be because the band vibe is easier to pin down than their unique take on the roots genres. Rockshot Magazine elaborates “This extremely entertaining collective is a New Orleans-inspired, American blues-folk-soul band, who refuse to be pigeon-holed”.

Beaux Gris Gris and The Apocalypse debut album Love & Murder spurned Top 10 hits in genre charts across Europe. The albums wide-reaching appeal earned it a #13 placement in the “Top 50 Albums of the year” by Classic Rock Magazine, describing it as “A sensual, vibrant cocktail“

Guitarist Robin Davey was the youngest ever inductee into the British Blues Hall of Fame. He spent time as an artist on Atlantic and Interscope Records, and has recorded with a wide spectrum of artists from Mick Jagger to Katy Perry. Multi-award-winning vocalist and songwriter Greta Valenti is Louisiana-born-and-bred creative with generations of her family dating back before the Louisiana purchase. Her rock outfit Well Hung Heart (OCMA’s Best Live Band) toured the USA opening for the likes of Fitz & The Tantrums, Twenty One Pilots, Foreigner, and Offspring.

Having headlined festivals across Europe, including Upton Festival (UK), The Great British R&B Festival (UK), Moulin (Netherlands) and Blues Alive (Czech Republic), the band were nominated for Band of the Year at the European Blues Awards. THIS YEAR, THE BAND WILL BE WORKING ON THEIR THIRD ALBUM AND TOURING EXTENSIVELY ACROSS UK, EUROPE, and the US.

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G.B. Smith and his stunning photobook “Pathways” (G Editions, Nov. 7, 2023). The book features several of Smith’s recent multi-award winning images, and the curation reflects the simplicity and uncluttered form of his distinctive black and white style. Informed by his experience with color blindness, Smith’s work encourages the viewer to examine a world that exists beyond color.

Among Smith’s many accolades are three consecutive Gold Medals in the architecture, fine art and nature categories at the Prix de la Photographie awards in Paris.

Believing that art should make a positive impact, Smith will be donating proceeds from the sales of “Pathways” to the Breast Cancer Alliance.

“I have long admired G.B. Smith’s singular ability to focus and to strip away distractions to help others see the most important elements….he studies his subjects with care and thinks deeply about all that he wants us to see.”

–Lawton W. Fitt, former head of The Royal Academy of Arts

About G.B. Smith

Born in the industrial heartland of England, G.B. Smith began his photographic journey almost fifty years ago as a teenager in apprenticeship of traditional film techniques both in the darkroom and with large plate cameras. The simplicity and deliberateness of his images today reflect the mindfulness of this traditional approach, manifested in modern digital technology. Having grown up with extreme color blindness, Smith strips away visual distractions to focus on the structures and patterns as he sees them. His images bring solace to a psyche constantly overwhelmed by the overstimulation of color, and encourage us to look beyond color. Given his industrial heritage, many of his studies gravitate toward decaying man-made structures and their interaction with the regenerative power of nature. A truly global citizen, having lived on multiple continents and worked extensively in six, Smith now resides in Maryland. To learn more, visit: www.gbsmith.com and follow him on Instagram @g.b.smith.photography

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It’s one of the greatest runs in television. During his more than four-decade run on Days of Our Lives, Thaao Penghlis has kept the plots twisting and the passions burning by playing two look-a-like villains, Count Tony DiMera and his impersonator Andre DiMera.

But the Australian-born star is much more than a guy who knows how to deliver a nasty line and take a woman’s slap. A world traveler and celebrated host of Hollywood dinner parties, Penghlis has authored the memoir Places: The Journey of My Days, My Lives, and the cookbook Seducing Celebrities One Meal at a Time.

And now this child of Greek immigrants is pouring his own passions for all things Greece into a new podcast, The Lost Treasures, a thrilling detective story-style exploration of Greece’s greatest contribution to the world’s literature, the poet Homer.

In a rollicking Mediterranean-hopping adventure, The Lost Treasurers explores the Iliad and the Odyssey through the amazing life of German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann, who changed history when he discovered the real-life locations and treasures in the epic poems.

Written and narrated Penghlis, the podcast draws on his exclusive access to 60,000 pages of long-hidden documents and diaries. “Against all odds, Heinrich Schliemann proved that the myths of Troy and the myths of Mycenae really happened,” says Penghlis. “For more than 20 years, my interest in this subject never waned. Two visits to Troy, five to Greece, I completed the journey. And I’m still wanting more.”

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STATE OF THE UNITY

Directed by Nathaniel Paul Hoff & Jillian Speece

Releasing Friday September 8th @ Laemmle Monica Film Center,

September 11th @ TCL Chinese Theatre,

and On Digital and On Demand October 6th

In 2016, Brooklyn-based band, The Bergamot embarked on a timely journey to perform in all 50 States while inviting people to sign their message of unity on their station wagon (known as The Unity Car). What ensued is a heartwarming tale of human perseverance, empathy and understanding during one of the most polarizing times in American history.

Directed by:

NATHANIEL PAUL HOFF

JILLIAN SPEECE

Produced by

NATHANIEL PAUL HOFF

JILLIAN SPEECE

Running Time:

88 minutes

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Well-being improves across young adulthood and into midlife, according to a new study by Susan Charles, professor of psychological science at the University of California, Irvine.

“Contrary to negative stereotypes of aging, late life is a time of relatively stable and high levels of well-being,” says Charles. “With older age, people focus more on the present and less on planning for the future, and this mindset is one possible explanation for high levels of well-being later in life. Older adults generally report greater satisfaction with their close friends and family members, which may also explain why people who are older have relatively stable levels of well-being over time.”

Charles and her research team followed 1,000 people, ages 22 to 95, over two decades for the study, which was published earlier this year in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. They asked participants about the positive and negative emotions they were feeling that day, in the past week and in the past month.

You can read more details here. Professor Charles is enthused to discuss her team’s findings.

Susan Charles, Ph.D

University of California, Irvine

Website: https://faculty.sites.uci.edu/scharles

research: Emotion Research Lab (uci.edu)

ABOUT SUSAN CHARLES

Susan Charles is Professor of Psychological Science and Professor of Nursing Science, and Associate Dean of Academic Programs in the School of Social Ecology at the University of California-Irvine. Her research examines social and emotional processes across the adult life span. She is interested in how affective experience varies across the life course, and how they are related to cognitive physical and mental health. Her work has been funded by the National Institutes of Health for over 20 years. She is a fellow of the Gerontological Society of America and the Association for Psychological Science.

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ERASING THE FINISH LINE: The New Blueprint for Success Beyond Grades and College Admissions, author, academic advisor, and educator, Ana Homayoun addresses issues that are critical and timely for parents, teens, educators, and anyone who cares about our kids today.

With mental health issues on the rise, college pressure, new technology like ChatGPT, social media, and the fear of what's to come in the future, Ana re-envisions what skills young people really need to thrive in school, and more importantly, in life.

In ERASING THE FINISH LINE: The New Blueprint for Success Beyond Grades and College Admissions (Hachette Go; 8/29/23; $29; ISBN: 9780306830693), renowned teen and early career development expert, author and educator Ana Homayoun offers a groundbreaking new way of thinking about education for parents, teachers, administrators and policymakers deeply invested in the emotional development and well-being of children today.

For decades, we have been collectively brainwashed into believing that getting into a “good” college is an all-encompassing key to a successful life. Year after year, this frenzy causes students and their families to be overtaken by the rollercoaster ride of the college admissions process which leaves students feeling anxious, demoralized and unprepared.

What if we’ve overlooked the critical skills young adults need to navigate an ever-changing world? What fundamental skills help young people adapt, persevere, and thrive?

Focusing on foundational executive functioning skills that empower kids to develop their own blueprints for success, ERASING THE FINISH LINE flips the way we think about education altogether. In her accessible and solutions-oriented guide, Homayoun shares stories of her former and current students to shift our perspective beyond pre-prescribed paths and expand our vision to help each young person thrive in school and life.

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In the mid 1980s, Canada's worst public health disaster was unfolding. Catastrophic mismanagement of the country's blood supply allowed contaminated blood to be knowingly distributed nationwide, infecting close to two thousand Canadians with HIV. Among them was Melanie Brooks's surgeon father who, after receiving a blood transfusion during open-heart surgery in 1985, learned he was HIV positive.

At a time when HIV/AIDS was widely misunderstood and public perception was shaped by fear, prejudice, and homophobia, victims of the disease faced ostracism and persecution. Afraid of this stigma and wanting to protect his family, Melanie's father decided his illness would be a secret. A secret they'd all have to keep. They did not know that her father would live past that first year, but he did. And for ten years before his death in 1995, from the time she was thirteen until she was twenty-three, Melanie's family lived in the shadow of AIDS. She carried the weight of the uncertain trajectory of her father’s health and the heartbreaking anticipation of impending loss silently and alone. It became a way of life.

A Hard Silence is an intimate glimpse into Melanie's memories of coping with the tragedy of her father's illness and enduring the loneliness and isolation of not being able to speak. With candor and vulnerability, Melanie opens her grief wounds and brings her reader inside her journey, twenty years after her father died, to finally understand the consequences of her family's silence, to interrogate the roots of stigma and discrimination responsible for the ongoing secret-keeping, and to show how she's learned to be authentic now.

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“Bryan Robinson is the seminal voice in work addiction recovery. I have greatly benefited from his guidance, experience, knowledge and wisdom on the topic of healing from what I consider to be the quietest and most insidious (and often praised) addiction in today’s times.”

—Alanis Morissette, singer/songwriter

A step-by-step guide to reestablishing work-life balance

Americans love a hard worker. The employee who toils eighteen-hour days and eats meals on the run between appointments is usually viewed with a combination of respect and awe. But for many, this lifestyle leads to family problems, a decline in work productivity, and, ultimately, physical and mental burnout. Intended for anyone touched by what Robinson calls “the best-dressed problem of the twenty-first century,” Chained to the Desk in a Hybrid World provides an inside look at the impact of work stress on those who live and work with workaholics—partners, spouses, children, and colleagues—as well as the appropriate techniques for clinicians who treat them.

This groundbreaking book builds on the research included in three previous editions of Chained to the Desk from the best-selling author and widely respected family therapist Bryan E. Robinson. In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and the rise of working from home, Robinson finds that the agonies of work stress have only become more challenging. Recent years have seen an unprecedented shift to remote work, which has made it significantly harder to maintain the already delicate work-life balance, weakened as it is by smartphones and other technology. The result is that many workaholics are more stressed and burnt out than ever before in their work, despite being constantly in the presence of family. Chained to the Desk in a Hybrid World both counsels and consoles. It provides a step-by-step guide to help readers spot, understand, and ultimately recover from workaholism.

Bryan E. Robinson, Ph.D.

Psychotherapist in Private Practice

Contributor: Forbes / Psychology Today / Thrive Global

Writing and Books: bryanrobinsonbooks.com

Journalism: Muck Rack

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