2007 March April Centennial Edition
Player Pianos and Parlor Tricks
The experimental music of Conlon Nancarrow moves from pianola rolls to the stage. Question: When you compose for the player piano, do you try to avoid writing something that a live pianist could realize? Nancarrow: Oh, no, not at all. I just write a piece of music. It just happens that a lot of them are […]
Talent On TAAP
Christie Poitra cleaned bathrooms and emptied grbage bins 35 hours a week at McDonald’s to pay her way through community college. “My parents didn’t have a college fund for me,” says Poitra. “They didn’t think I’d go. My parents supported me, but they didn’t know quite how.” Today the Berkeley senior and legal studies major […]
The Power Of Pessimism
Suppose you have just discovered a great new band and a website that offers instant gratification: You could download their album illegally with a click of the mouse. You know there’s a certain amount of safety in numbers—the more people downloading music, the less likely you’ll be caught. Of course, you don’t have any statistics […]
A Cloud Over India
Researchers link air pollution in India to shrinking harvests From space, a massive cloud looms over the Asian continent, stretching from the tip of India all the way to the Himalayas. This Atmospheric Brown Cloud, or ABC, is the result of air pollution, the kind caused by burning wood and driving cars. There are similar ABCs […]
Locked Out
Researchers discover a way to stop the spread of HPV Any woman who’s had less-than-totally-protected sex has spent at least one sleepless night worrying about human papilloma virus, the sexually transmitted disease that causes genital warts and cervical cancer. Though some women’s bodies rid themselves of the virus within a few months, others live permanently with […]
Glad You Asked
Q: Is marijuana addictive? —John Stone ’05 A: Often people will say things like: “Marijuana isn’t physically addictive, is it? It’s only psychological.” It is true that the tremors, nausea, and seizures that might accompany withdrawal from various other drugs are not present with marijuana. But there can be significant psychological dependence: cravings, inability to […]
Feeding the Forest
Researchers find fog brings more than just moisture—it brings fertilizer, too. It’s morning in big basin State Park, Santa Cruz County, about an hour after sunrise. Ten miles away, on the Pacific Coast Highway, drivers alternate high beams and low beams, trying to see more than 20 feet ahead of them in the thick fog. Deep […]
Don’t Have a Coronary
Nanotechnology allows scientists to build better blood vessels You could call Craig Hashi an interior designer, but he’s not designing the insides of homes or offices. His designs take shape within the human body, where he builds tiny, customized scaffolds shaped like blood vessels that, once implanted, help the body grow new arteries. The Berkeley bioengineering […]
It Pays To Come Clean For Black Applicants
When employers interview new applicants, they’re looking for people who are honest, reliable, and responsible. Running criminal background checks is one way to screen applicants, but critics say these checks are unfair to black men, who are stigmatized by statistics: Black men are seven times more likely to be incarcerated than white men over the […]
The Centenarian
Chester Zinn ‘29 has proved his mettle. The former ASUC president, who turned 100 this year, worked three jobs to pay his way through college before landing his first postgrad gig selling stocks. Only months later, Black Thursday launched the Great Depression, and Chester—”Chet” to friends and family—was unemployed. He scoured the Bay Area for work. […]
Lab & Field Notes
Some eBay users are falsely boosting their reputations online by paying for positive feedback on the site, says business professor John Morgan. In online communities, ratings and reputation lead to more, and larger, transactions. Morgan found the transaction was often initiated by sellers offering a “Buy-It-Now” item—sometimes listed as a “Positive Feedback Ebook”—for 1 cent. […]
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