UC Science Today

How do sea urchin embryos develop while defending against so many environmental stressors? To find out, PhD student Lauren Shipp of the University of California, San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography is using a confocal microscope to generate a 3-D recreation of embryos.

"Sea urchin embryos develop out in the open ocean where they are exposed to a whole variety of chemicals, some of which are naturally occurring and some of which are human generated. And so using this model system to study embryonic development, there is an evolved suite of protective proteins that occur in nature as a result of millions of years of these embryos developing in the face of chemicals. And now with our industrialized society, we are pouring more and more chemicals into the environment that these embryos aren’t used to encountering and so these evolved protective capacities are potentially being overwhelmed. And so this is a good system to study the interaction of those chemicals with the developmental processes of the embryo."

Have you ever wondered how scientists date evolutionary events such as when two populations diverged from a common ancestor? Computational biologist Rasmus Nielsen of the University of California, Berkeley says that one method is to use what’s called a molecular clock, which involves counting the mutations in DNA between ancient and living individuals.

"If we take some DNA from you and some DNA from me that DNA will not be identical to each other. It will differ a little bit because there will be mutations that have accumulated in time since we had our most recent common ancestor. Since in the past thousands of years ago, there was some individual that is the ancestor of both of us. By counting mutations, we can figure out something about how long ago since we had our most recent common ancestor. By doing that we can then put dates on these different events, as for example, when did Native Americans start to split up from each other?"

By counting mutations, Nielsen’s team estimated that the first Native Americans split into northern and southern populations around 13,000 years ago.

"And that helped us quite a lot, to distinguish between different hypotheses about how the American continents were peopled."

How do sea urchin embryos develop while defending against so many environmental stressors? To find out, PhD student Lauren Shipp of the University of California, San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography is using a confocal microscope to generate a 3-D recreation of embryos.

"Sea urchin embryos develop out in the open ocean where they are exposed to a whole variety of chemicals, some of which are naturally occurring and some of which are human generated. And so using this model system to study embryonic development, there is an evolved suite of protective proteins that occur in nature as a result of millions of years of these embryos developing in the face of chemicals. And now with our industrialized society, we are pouring more and more chemicals into the environment that these embryos aren’t used to encountering and so these evolved protective capacities are potentially being overwhelmed. And so this is a good system to study the interaction of those chemicals with the developmental processes of the embryo."

It’s no secret that getting enough sleep is important for our health. But now, a new study at the University of California, San Francisco has found that sleep affects how susceptible we are to viruses like the common cold. Study leader Aric Prather explains that volunteers were given the cold virus via nasal drops and were then monitored over one week.

"People who slept less were more likely to get the cold, but then when we broke it down by hours we actually saw what seemed like a threshold effect. So it turned out that people who sleep less than six hours are about four times the odds of getting the cold than people who sleep seven hours or more. So compared to people who sleep seven hours or more, people who sleep less than six are at four times the risk."

Prather says that the researchers measured subjects’ normal daily sleep habits to study the effects of chronic sleep loss.

"To do that we had to measure people’s fluctuation in their sleep, because we think it’s not just a night of missed sleep but this chronic experience of lack of sleep that might put people at risk."

It’s no secret that getting enough sleep is important for our health. But now, a new study at the University of California, San Francisco has found that sleep affects how susceptible we are to viruses like the common cold. Study leader Aric Prather explains that volunteers were given the cold virus via nasal drops and were then monitored over one week.

"People who slept less were more likely to get the cold, but then when we broke it down by hours we actually saw what seemed like a threshold effect. So it turned out that people who sleep less than six hours are about four times the odds of getting the cold than people who sleep seven hours or more. So compared to people who sleep seven hours or more, people who sleep less than six are at four times the risk."

Prather says that the researchers measured subjects’ normal daily sleep habits to study the effects of chronic sleep loss.

"To do that we had to measure people’s fluctuation in their sleep, because we think it’s not just a night of missed sleep but this chronic experience of lack of sleep that might put people at risk."

It’s no secret that getting enough sleep is important for our health. But now, a new study at the University of California, San Francisco has found that sleep affects how susceptible we are to viruses like the common cold. Study leader Aric Prather explains that volunteers were given the cold virus via nasal drops and were then monitored over one week.

"People who slept less were more likely to get the cold, but then when we broke it down by hours we actually saw what seemed like a threshold effect. So it turned out that people who sleep less than six hours are about four times the odds of getting the cold than people who sleep seven hours or more. So compared to people who sleep seven hours or more, people who sleep less than six are at four times the risk."

Prather says that the researchers measured subjects’ normal daily sleep habits to study the effects of chronic sleep loss.

"To do that we had to measure people’s fluctuation in their sleep, because we think it’s not just a night of missed sleep but this chronic experience of lack of sleep that might put people at risk."

It’s no secret that getting enough sleep is important for our health. But now, a new study at the University of California, San Francisco has found that sleep affects how susceptible we are to viruses like the common cold. Study leader Aric Prather explains that volunteers were given the cold virus via nasal drops and were then monitored over one week.

"People who slept less were more likely to get the cold, but then when we broke it down by hours we actually saw what seemed like a threshold effect. So it turned out that people who sleep less than six hours are about four times the odds of getting the cold than people who sleep seven hours or more. So compared to people who sleep seven hours or more, people who sleep less than six are at four times the risk."

Prather says that the researchers measured subjects’ normal daily sleep habits to study the effects of chronic sleep loss.

"To do that we had to measure people’s fluctuation in their sleep, because we think it’s not just a night of missed sleep but this chronic experience of lack of sleep that might put people at risk."

With all the new discoveries at the Large Hadron Collider, it’s hard to imagine that the particle accelerator once created quite a stir over its potential doomsday scenarios, including the creation of microscopic black holes. Particle physicist Marjorie Shapiro of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory says that the concern was significant enough to have a group of independent scientists review the scenarios.

"I would say most people thought it didn’t make much sense, but it's an important enough issue that you don't want to go by your gut. It’s easy to say, “Oh, come on,” but if you’re talking about the fate of the world, it’s not an appropriate way to respond. In fact, because there was so much concern in the general public, the Director General of CERN put together a blue ribbon panel of extremely well-known physicists, to really go through all the arguments and convince everybody that there was no chance that this would be the accelerator that ate the universe."

With all the new discoveries at the Large Hadron Collider, it’s hard to imagine that the particle accelerator once created quite a stir over its potential doomsday scenarios, including the creation of microscopic black holes. Particle physicist Marjorie Shapiro of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory says that the concern was significant enough to have a group of independent scientists review the scenarios.

"I would say most people thought it didn’t make much sense, but it's an important enough issue that you don't want to go by your gut. It’s easy to say, “Oh, come on,” but if you’re talking about the fate of the world, it’s not an appropriate way to respond. In fact, because there was so much concern in the general public, the Director General of CERN put together a blue ribbon panel of extremely well-known physicists, to really go through all the arguments and convince everybody that there was no chance that this would be the accelerator that ate the universe."

With all the new discoveries at the Large Hadron Collider, it’s hard to imagine that the particle accelerator once created quite a stir over its potential doomsday scenarios, including the creation of microscopic black holes. Particle physicist Marjorie Shapiro of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory says that the concern was significant enough to have a group of independent scientists review the scenarios.

"I would say most people thought it didn’t make much sense, but it's an important enough issue that you don't want to go by your gut. It’s easy to say, “Oh, come on,” but if you’re talking about the fate of the world, it’s not an appropriate way to respond. In fact, because there was so much concern in the general public, the Director General of CERN put together a blue ribbon panel of extremely well-known physicists, to really go through all the arguments and convince everybody that there was no chance that this would be the accelerator that ate the universe."