May 10, 2012
UBC botanists have placed seaweed in the underwater equivalent of a wind tunnel to get a better idea of how different types of algae withstand the onslaught of strong waves and currents.
The findings, published in the American Journal of Botany, show that bladed and branched seaweeds take very different approaches to surviving stormy waters--some reducing their surface area in the face of increased turbulence, others actually changing shape to cope.
May 8, 2012
UBC immunologists have found a potential way to develop universal flu vaccines and eliminate the need for seasonal flu vaccinations.
Each year, seasonal influenza causes serious illnesses in three to five million people and 200,000 to 500,000 deaths. The 2009 H1N1 pandemic killed more than 14,000 people worldwide. Meanwhile, public health and bioterrorism concerns are heightened by new mutations of the H5N1 “bird flu” virus, published last week by the journal Nature, that could facilitate infection among mammals and humans.
April 23, 2012
A UBC professor of Chemistry who studies how enzymes function, engineers them for use in industrial applications, and develops inhibitors as potential therapeutics has been elected to the Royal Society.
Stephen Withers, Director of UBC's Centre for High-Throughput Biology, was elected to the United Kingdom’s prestigious independent national academy on April 20.
April 18, 2012
Jellyfish are increasing in the majority of the world's coastal ecosystems, according to the first global study of jellyfish abundance by University of British Columbia researchers.
In a study published in this month's edition of the journal Hydrobiologia, UBC scientists examined data for numerous species of jellyfish for 45 of the world’s 66 Large Marine Ecosystems. They found increasing jellyfish populations in 62 per cent of the regions analyzed, including East Asia, the Black Sea, the Mediterranean, the Northeast U.S. Shelf, Hawaii, and Antarctica.
April 17, 2012
An eminent UBC evolutionary biologist whose early work focused on Charles Darwin's famous Galápagos Island finches has been named to one of the world's most prestigious honorary societies.
Dolph Schluter, professor and Canada Research Chair in Zoology, was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences today. He joins the ranks of some of the world's most accomplished leaders from academia, business, public affairs, the humanities, and the arts.
April 3, 2012
UBC Science is pleased to welcome three interdisciplinary research units to the Faculty: UBC's Fisheries Centre, Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability, and Institute for Applied Mathematics.
The change of administrative home is effective April 1, 2012.
The move is part of an effort to integrate and extend the support for interdisciplinary groups across UBC, and adds a strong cluster of sustainability- and policy-oriented research streams to the Faculty’s portfolio. All three units were previously housed in UBC's College for Interdisciplinary Studies.
April 2, 2012
Picky females play a critical role in the survival and diversity of species, according to a Nature study by researchers from the University of British Columbia and the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Austria.
March 30, 2012
Researchers at the University of British Columbia have identified a number of tiny but powerful 'genetic regulators' that are hijacked by avian and swine flu viruses during human infection.
The discovery, published this week in the Journal of Virology, could reveal new targets for broad-spectrum antivirals to combat current – and perhaps future – strains of influenza A viruses.
March 29, 2012
An international team that includes UBC physicists has used ultra-fast laser pulses to identify the microscopic interactions that drive high-temperature superconductivity.
In the experiment, to be outlined this Friday in the journal Science, electrons in a prototypical copper-oxide superconductor were excited by extremely short 100-femtosecond (0.0000000000001-second) laser pulses.
March 27, 2012
UBC's Mark MacLean has been awarded the 2012 Pacific Institute for the Mathematical Sciences Education Prize (PIMS) for his efforts in educational transformation, outreach and aboriginal engagement.
"Mark is an amazing teacher and a gifted educator," says Alejandro Adem, PIMS director. "UBC Mathematics and the PIMS community are fortunate to be able to count on his leadership and support across a wide variety of educational matters. He’s uniquely qualified for this award."
