Biological Sciences

Announcing the 2025 L&S First-Year Pathways Course Enrichment Grant Recipients

September 19, 2025

The UC Berkeley College of Letters & Science is pleased to announce the 2025 recipients of the inaugural L&S First-Year Pathways Course Enrichment Grants.

Now entering its third year, the L&S First-Year Pathways program has significantly expanded for 2025-26, growing from 6 clusters serving 125 students to nearly 20 clusters serving more than 230 students. L&S Pathways provides a small cohort experience for groups of 17-30 incoming freshmen who take "clusters" of three or four courses together...

UC Berkeley's James Nuñez appointed a 2025 Vallee Scholar

September 18, 2025
The Vallee Foundation recently announced the appointment of six new Vallee Scholars, including UC Berkeley scientist James Nuñez. The Foundation celebrates its thirteenth year of providing unrestricted support to national and international early-career researchers at a pivotal stage of their tenure-track careers. Since 2013, the Foundation has invested more than $20 million to empower 65 exceptional young scientists worldwide.

Liquid lunch? Wild chimps likely ingest the equivalent of several alcoholic drinks daily

September 19, 2025

A chimpanzee in a fig tree, looking down at the camera

The first-ever measurements of the ethanol content of fruits available to chimpanzees in their native African habitat show that the animals could easily consume the equivalent of more than two standard alcoholic drinks each day, according to researchers at the University of California, Berkeley.

It’s not clear whether they actively seek out fruit with high...

Wing-like fans on the feet of ripple bugs inspire a novel propulsion system for miniature robots

August 21, 2025

A tiny bug’s unique, wing-like feet, which allow it to skim the surface of turbulent streams with amazing maneuverability, has inspired a robot that is similarly agile on the water.

A biologist from the University of California, Berkeley, and engineers from Ajou University in South Korea and the Georgia Institute of Technology report in this week’s issue of Science that water striders in the genus Rhagovelia — often called ripple bugs — have feet that bloom into a fan when immersed...

Sleep strengthens muscle and bone by boosting growth hormone levels. UC Berkeley researchers discover how.

September 8, 2025

As every bodybuilder knows, a deep, restful sleep boosts levels of growth hormone to build strong muscle and bone and burn fat. And as every teenager should know, they won’t reach their full height potential without adequate growth hormone from a full night’s sleep.

But why lack of sleep — in particular the early, deep phase called non-REM sleep — lowers levels of growth hormone has been a mystery.

In a study published in the current issue of the journal Cell, researchers from...

The Department of Molecular & Cell Biology welcomes its newest graduate students

September 5, 2025

MCB is pleased to welcome our newest graduate students to the department! Learn fun facts about their favorite model organisms, childhood career aspirations, and more.

Group photo of students standing outside

Berkeley Talks: Nobel laureate Jennifer Doudna on CRISPR and the future of gene editing

August 22, 2025

Portrait of Jennifer DoudnaFor UC Berkeley’s Jennifer Doudna, the revolutionary discovery of CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing began 15 years ago with a meeting at the campus’s Free Speech Movement Cafe.

“This is a quintessential story about Berkeley,” begins Doudna, a professor of molecular and cell biology and of chemistry, in a lecture she gave on campus in April. “The research that I’ll talk about today wouldn’t have happened … if I...

Scientists hack microbes to identify environmental sources of methane

August 14, 2025

Roughly two-thirds of all emissions of atmospheric methane — a highly potent greenhouse gas that is warming planet Earth — come from microbes that live in oxygen-free environments like wetlands, rice fields, landfills and the guts of cows.

Tracking atmospheric methane to its specific sources and quantifying their importance remains a challenge, however. Scientists are pretty good at tracing the sources of the main greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide, to focus on mitigating these emissions. But to trace methane’s origins, scientists often have to measure the isotopic composition of...

Is the ‘love hormone,’ oxytocin, also the ‘friendship hormone’?

August 11, 2025

A new UC Berkeley study shows that the so-called love hormone, oxytocin, is also critical for the formation of friendships.

Oxytocin is released in the brain during sex, childbirth, breastfeeding and social interactions and contributes to feelings of attachment, closeness and trust. Never mind that it’s also associated with aggression; the hormone is commonly referred to as the “cuddle” or “happy” hormone, and people are encouraged to boost their oxytocin levels for better well-being by touching friends and loved ones, listening to music and exercising.

But recent studies...

Sweet Dreams Are Made of Genes: The Molecular Blueprint of Jellyfish Sleep

August 13, 2025

By reducing the expression of a single gene, UC Berkeley researchers were able to get jellyfish to fall asleep during the day, subverting their natural circadian rhythm. The finding could reveal how other animals’ biologies manage sleep.

In 2017, Michael Abrams and his coauthors showed that upside-down jellyfish (Cassiopea xamachana)...