New Position As President Of Entire UC System Author: NEERAJA SANKARAN Psychologist Richard C. Atkinson, former chancellor of the University of California, San Diego, and director of the National Science Foundation, assumed his new duties as president of the University of California (UC) system on October 1, at UC headquarters in Oakland. Atkinson, 66, succeeds Jack W. Peltason, who held the post for the past three years. Atkinson is the 17th president in the university's 127-year history. I

J.-F. Zhang, A.D. Randall, P.T. Ellinor, W.A. Horne, W.A. Sather, T. Tanabe, T.L. Schwarz, R.W. Tsien, "Distinctive pharmacology and kinetics of cloned neuronal Ca2+ channels and their possible counterparts in mammalian CNS neurons," Neuropharmacology, 32:1075-88, 1993. (Cited in more than 80 publications through August 1995) Comments by Richard W. Tsien, Ji-Fang Zhang, and Patrick T. Ellinor, Stanford University Medical Center According to Richard Tsien, a professor of molecular and cellular

A. Noda, Y. Ning, S.F. Venable, O.M. Pereira-Smith, J.R. Smith, "Cloning of senescent cell-derived inhibitors of DNA synthesis using an expression screen," Experimental Cell Research, 211:90-8, 1994. (Cited in nearly 150 publications through August 1995) Comments by James R. Smith, Baylor College of Medicine The major finding described in this paper, says James R. Smith, a professor in the division of molecular virology at Baylor College of Medicine and codirector of the Roy M. and Phyllis Gou

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, a winner of the 1983 Nobel Prize in physics whose theories about the evolution of stars led to the concept of black holes, died of heart failure on August 21 at the University of Chicago Hospitals. He was 84 years old. STELLAR: Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar "In a sense, Chandra's [death] comes as an end of an era," comments his friend and colleague Eugene Parker, who is currently the S. Chandrasekhar Distinguished Professor, Emeritus, at the University of Chicago, whe

On The Decline Author: Neeraja Sankaran The time-honored tradition of visiting professorships -- invitations extended to faculty taking sabbaticals from their own institutions to teach and do research here -- will once again be in evidence as schools reopen in the fall. As throngs of students return to their classrooms and laboratories, they may find that certain familiar faces are missing or replaced by new ones, or that there are new names and courses listed in the fall directories. The pra

T. Söllner, M.K. Bennett, S.W. Whiteheart, R.H. Scheller, J.E. Rothman, "A protein assembly-disassembly pathway in vitro that may correspond to sequential steps of synaptic vessel docking, activation, and fusion," Cell, 75:409-18, 1993. (Cited in more than 100 publications through August 1995) Comments by Thomas Söllner, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York TO TRAP A SNAP: In their paper, Thomas Söllner and his colleagues assigned functions to previouslly identified

E. Li, C. Beard, R. Jaenisch, "Role for DNA methylation in genomic imprinting," Nature, 366:362-5, 1993. (Cited in more than 70 publications through August 1995) Comments by Rudolf Jaenisch, Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, Mass. "The fact that DNA methylation--a modification in which methyl groups are added to cytosine residues--was involved in gene expression had been suggested for a long time," says Rudolf Jaenisch, a professor of biology at the Whitehead Institute f

As the school year commences, returning scientists are again applying for grants, awards, and other financial support to pursue their various disciplines. But six academic scientists among the 24 recipients of this year's John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Fellowships--popularly known as the "genius awards"--are in an extremely fortunate position: Their explorations for the next five years will extend as far as their imaginations will take them. "When the director called me up to co

T.R. Sosnick, L. Mayne, R. Hiller, S.W. Englander, "The barriers in protein folding," Nature Structural Biology 1:149-156, 1994. (Cited in approximately 40 publications through July 1995) Comments by S. Walter Englander, University of Pennsylvania Medical Center "The protein folding problem--the way in which unfolded proteins manage to reach their native, three-dimensional, functional form--has become a central focus for many scientists," declares Walter Englander, a professor of biochemistry a

L.K. Su, B. Vogelstein, K.W. Kinzler, "Association of the APC tumor-suppressor protein with catenins," Science, 262:1734-7, 1993. (Cited in more than 100 publications through July 1995). Comments by Kenneth Kinzler, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore. This paper, says Kenneth Kinzler, an associate professor in the department of oncology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, gives evidence for "the association of [a protein called] APC with the catenins--intracellul

Immunology Author: Neeraja Sankaran This year, the New York City-based Cancer Research Institute (CRI) honored three prominent scientists with its William B. Coley Awards for Distinguished Research, which recognize outstanding research in the field of cancer immunology. The awards were presented at a black-tie dinner on June 28. Malcolm A.S. Moore, a hematologist at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC), New York, and Timothy A. Springer, a professor of pathology at the Center for Blo

Among the numerous events being commemorated that coincided with the end of World War II, the University of Pennsylvania is preparing to celebrate the 50th anniversary of ENIAC, the world's first general-purpose electronic computer, built on campus to help the war effort. Although details of the celebration have not yet been finalized, university officials point to a number of projects under way, with festivities due to kick off on Feb. 14, 1996. On that date in 1946, ENIAC--Electronic Numerica