On Wednesday, October 9, the College of Letters & Science Administrative Advisory Committee (AAC) hosted its inaugural L&S Brown Bag Lunch and Learn. One of several new initiatives by the recently revamped AAC, the Lunch and Learn provides L&S staff members an opportunity to connect with their colleagues and...
In the last hundred years, particle physicists have developed a fine-grained understanding of how the building blocks that make up the universe fit together, called the Standard Model. The concrete and steel are basic particles like protons, neutrons, and electrons, and the energies that weld them together are divided into three or four forces: strong, electromagnetic, weak, and sometimes gravity. Testing shows that the Standard Model is very accurate, but it’s not quite perfect. In building construction each trade needs to know enough about the other’s work to make the...
Bill Boos started out as a physics guy at a big public institution (SUNY-Binghamton) and that’s the way he still sees himself. He’s a professor in Earth & Planetary Science here at UC Berkeley now, but “earth science is physics, just with a particular focus.” Boos’ research focuses on large-scale climate dynamics—how atmospheric circulations, ocean interactions, radiative transfer, and land surface processes control regional and global climate. He helps discover how the world around us works, and he gets there through careful theory and...
Stanford alumnus (Honors BS ’15) Michael Lindsey chose UC Berkeley for his PhD program largely because he wasn’t sure what areas of mathematics he was interested in pursuing – the Berkeley department encompasses a very broad range of theoretical and applied topics, and therefore afforded him a lot of flexibility. Lindsey wasn’t certain about a lot of things, actually. Most Stanford STEM majors assumed they would end up as engineers in Silicon Valley, him included. He grew up in Washington, DC with a professional policy wonk dad and pediatrician mom with no physical science...
Professor Joshua Simon Bloom first joined the Astronomy Department in 2005. By then he had already bounced between the US and the UK, between the ivy-covered brickwork at Harvard and the sun-drenched courtyards at Caltech, and there would still be many career ricochets to come before he landed in the Chair’s desk at UC Berkeley. In 2020. Just as the pandemic lockdown was unfolding. Perfect. He ran the department during COVID the same way he aims to in all the projects he leads: by striving to provide the best tools and right support so that everyone involved can do their best work. This...
The UC Berkeley community spans countless disciplines and provides a unique environment for creation and innovation. “Collaborative Innovation,” one of the College of Letters & Science’s Big Idea Courses, seeks to foster that culture by bringing together the disciplines of business, theater,...
William “Bill” Wing Yen Chu used to enjoy poker and golf until those hobbies were overtaken by a new passion: philanthropy. Hearts to Humanity Eternal is the radical experiment that formed out of Chu’s efforts to rethink what a grantmaking organization can be.
Michael Botchan is the dean of biological sciences at UC Berkeley and a professor of biochemistry, biophysics, and structural biology. On June 30, Botchan will step down as dean and start a new life as faculty emeritus in the Graduate Division and senior advisor at the Innovative Genomics Institute. The prospect of a calmer role appears to delight him.
“Being dean is a 24/7 job,” said Botchan. “I'm looking forward to...
Berkeley Social Sciences launched a new program recently to better equip students for successful careers by giving them real-world experiences. The Social Sciences Career Readiness Internship Program (SSCRIP) prepares students for a variety of professions by offering skills workshops, personalized coaching, internship placement assistance, and stipends for unpaid and low-paid internships.
In October, Audrey Liddle joined dozens of students in Durant Hall’s bookshelf-lined atrium to listen to a group of accomplished alums share lessons from their careers. Liddle, a first-year student in astrophysics, was still processing all the opportunities available to her at UC Berkeley and beyond. Her future’s open-ended horizon could feel overwhelming at times.
“I grew up assuming that adults somehow had an ‘aha’...
