UC Science Today

As the planet heats up, economies around the world may be cooling down. A new study at the University of California, Berkeley has found that, if left unmitigated, climate change could reduce average income by as much as 23 percent by the end of the century. The results are based on the finding that economies perform optimally at a temperature of 13 degrees Celsius, or 55 degrees Fahrenheit. Lead author Solomon Hsiang explains that rising temperatures could even widen global inequality.

"Most of the countries that are harmed the most are the countries that are already hot. And the countries that are already hot in the present world are the countries that tend to be poorer, on average, than cooler countries. And you have a lot of countries in the north, particularly in northern Europe, places like Germany and Norway, which are already quite cold and they in fact benefit a small amount from warming. And so what you have is an image of the world going forward where the global economy has been completely reshaped by climate change in a way that makes it relatively poorer and more unequal."

As the planet heats up, economies around the world may be cooling down. A new study at the University of California, Berkeley has found that, if left unmitigated, climate change could reduce average income by as much as 23 percent by the end of the century. The results are based on the finding that economies perform optimally at a temperature of 13 degrees Celsius, or 55 degrees Fahrenheit. Lead author Solomon Hsiang explains that rising temperatures could even widen global inequality.

"Most of the countries that are harmed the most are the countries that are already hot. And the countries that are already hot in the present world are the countries that tend to be poorer, on average, than cooler countries. And you have a lot of countries in the north, particularly in northern Europe, places like Germany and Norway, which are already quite cold and they in fact benefit a small amount from warming. And so what you have is an image of the world going forward where the global economy has been completely reshaped by climate change in a way that makes it relatively poorer and more unequal."

It’s not easy landing a 1-ton robot on Mars. The Curiosity rover’s landing, famously nicknamed “Seven Minutes of Terror,” involved using large parachutes and jet propulsion technology to guide the delicate payload onto the Martian surface. Now, a team led by NASA and the University of California, Berkeley is working on a new prototype of robots made of rods and elastomers that would allow them to be dropped safely from a spacecraft and walk away. Mechanical engineering professor Alice Agogino explains.

"The idea is it could be dropped from a spacecraft or possibly from a satellite, deployed. And that it absorbs energy through these elastomers. It's a particular structure. And would protect the payload in the center. So not only can it be dropped and not be damaged, it can also contain, in the middle of it, a payload that would not be damaged."

Agogino says that the design makes the robots much more robust for space exploration.

"It could be under harsher conditions, harsher terrains, much, much lighter and orders of magnitude less expensive."

Healthy infants come in a range of sizes, but since growth tends to follow a fairly predictable path, physicians and new parents often refer to a growth chart to determine what’s normal. Now, researchers at the University of California, San Diego are looking to do something similar with the brain. Graduate student Chun Chieh Fan says they can use 3D imaging techniques to determine brain anatomy based on genetic heritage.

"We can have a normal trajectory, given your ancestral background and we can really look at when we should feel concerned when you deviate away from this norm. So the beauty of our current result is that it can go both ways. If you give us your brain imaging, we can calculate how similar your brain to a given proportion of your ancestral background, or you can give your ancestral information and then we can predict what is the expected brain shape, given your ancestral background."

It’s not easy landing a 1-ton robot on Mars. The Curiosity rover’s landing, famously nicknamed “Seven Minutes of Terror,” involved using large parachutes and jet propulsion technology to guide the delicate payload onto the Martian surface. Now, a team led by NASA and the University of California, Berkeley is working on a new prototype of robots made of rods and elastomers that would allow them to be dropped safely from a spacecraft and walk away. Mechanical engineering professor Alice Agogino explains.

"The idea is it could be dropped from a spacecraft or possibly from a satellite, deployed. And that it absorbs energy through these elastomers. It's a particular structure. And would protect the payload in the center. So not only can it be dropped and not be damaged, it can also contain, in the middle of it, a payload that would not be damaged."

Agogino says that the design makes the robots much more robust for space exploration.

"It could be under harsher conditions, harsher terrains, much, much lighter and orders of magnitude less expensive."

Healthy infants come in a range of sizes, but since growth tends to follow a fairly predictable path, physicians and new parents often refer to a growth chart to determine what’s normal. Now, researchers at the University of California, San Diego are looking to do something similar with the brain. Graduate student Chun Chieh Fan says they can use 3D imaging techniques to determine brain anatomy based on genetic heritage.

"We can have a normal trajectory, given your ancestral background and we can really look at when we should feel concerned when you deviate away from this norm. So the beauty of our current result is that it can go both ways. If you give us your brain imaging, we can calculate how similar your brain to a given proportion of your ancestral background, or you can give your ancestral information and then we can predict what is the expected brain shape, given your ancestral background."

It’s not easy landing a 1-ton robot on Mars. The Curiosity rover’s landing, famously nicknamed “Seven Minutes of Terror,” involved using large parachutes and jet propulsion technology to guide the delicate payload onto the Martian surface. Now, a team led by NASA and the University of California, Berkeley is working on a new prototype of robots made of rods and elastomers that would allow them to be dropped safely from a spacecraft and walk away. Mechanical engineering professor Alice Agogino explains.

"The idea is it could be dropped from a spacecraft or possibly from a satellite, deployed. And that it absorbs energy through these elastomers. It's a particular structure. And would protect the payload in the center. So not only can it be dropped and not be damaged, it can also contain, in the middle of it, a payload that would not be damaged."

Agogino says that the design makes the robots much more robust for space exploration.

"It could be under harsher conditions, harsher terrains, much, much lighter and orders of magnitude less expensive."

Healthy infants come in a range of sizes, but since growth tends to follow a fairly predictable path, physicians and new parents often refer to a growth chart to determine what’s normal. Now, researchers at the University of California, San Diego are looking to do something similar with the brain. Graduate student Chun Chieh Fan says they can use 3D imaging techniques to determine brain anatomy based on genetic heritage.

"We can have a normal trajectory, given your ancestral background and we can really look at when we should feel concerned when you deviate away from this norm. So the beauty of our current result is that it can go both ways. If you give us your brain imaging, we can calculate how similar your brain to a given proportion of your ancestral background, or you can give your ancestral information and then we can predict what is the expected brain shape, given your ancestral background."

Healthy infants come in a range of sizes, but since growth tends to follow a fairly predictable path, physicians and new parents often refer to a growth chart to determine what’s normal. Now, researchers at the University of California, San Diego are looking to do something similar with the brain. Graduate student Chun Chieh Fan says they can use 3D imaging techniques to determine brain anatomy based on genetic heritage.

"We can have a normal trajectory, given your ancestral background and we can really look at when we should feel concerned when you deviate away from this norm. So the beauty of our current result is that it can go both ways. If you give us your brain imaging, we can calculate how similar your brain to a given proportion of your ancestral background, or you can give your ancestral information and then we can predict what is the expected brain shape, given your ancestral background."

In the last 15 years, DNA sequencing has literally gotten a million times cheaper. This, according to the University of California, San Diego’s Rob Knight, who is a world leader in the study of the microbiome, which is the collection of microorganisms and their genetic material in or on the human body or in another environment.

"Part of the reason that we’re finding so much out about the microbiome at the moment, is the cost of DNA sequencing dropped by about a fraction of a million in the last 15 years. And you probably wouldn’t pay $100 million to find out what was in your own gut, or the gut of your dog, or your cat – but you might well pay $100."

Knight says this has led to a large number of studies, including one he cofounded called The American Gut Project, which is a crowdsourced, crowdfunded initiative in which anyone can contribute mouth, skin or gut samples from themselves, family members or even their dogs.

"What’s going to be really exciting is when it gets to the point where every middleschooler, instead of doing a project where they just look at the mold growing in their fridge, they can sequence the DNA of that mold and find out what it really is."