by Meghan D. Rosen | Nov 9, 2011 | Posts
On Halloween, an adventure-seeking Santa Cruz surfer braved wintery water temperatures and paddled a half-mile out past Seabright Beach wearing only a bikini. But she wasn’t trying to catch a wave. The scantily clad surfer was trawling for an intimate look at the...
by Amy E. West | Nov 7, 2011 | Posts
Would you like lemon on your transgenic fish? In the interest of subduing the emotional reaction many have to genetically modified salmon when calling it ‘frankenfish’, I’ll refer to it by its technical title. But what is an appropriate name for a modified fish...
by Sarah Jane Keller | Oct 31, 2011 | Posts
It took me a long time to learn that I have a touch of road rage. The first time my husband watched me come slightly unhinged in gridlock, he only had one thing to say: “If you’re complaining, you’re part of the problem.” Now that I’m spending a year as a California...
by Beth Marie Mole | Oct 28, 2011 | Posts
Zooommbieeees… Hordes of people—numbed by the Great Recession, perhaps—have once again staggered toward fresh zombie fare. But unlike other zombie fever outbreaks, splatters from the pop-culture feast are landing in the far corners of science—and they’re leaving...
by Helen H. Shen | Oct 27, 2011 | Posts
Wake up, Linus, the Great Pumpkin is finally coming! On Oct. 10, Leonardo Ureña of Napa won the Half Moon Bay giant pumpkin weigh-off with a 1704-pound behemoth — a new California record. Ureña is part of a blooming subculture of competitive pumpkin growers that are...
by Erin Loury | Oct 24, 2011 | Posts
On a little island off the coast of central California, researchers, conservationists and artists are teaming up to help some threatened sea birds raise their next generation. The helping hand comes in the form of some stylish new housing. The Rhinoceros Auklet is a...
by Tanya Lewis | Oct 20, 2011 | Posts
You drink it. You put it on your cereal. You dunk cookies in it. MILK! This magical substance is the first beverage most of us consume, when our wimpy newborn bodies can’t handle much else. But it’s not just a beverage, it’s a hyper-nutritious, calcium-packed nectar,...
by Marissa Fessenden | Oct 18, 2011 | Posts
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcHNYenN7OY] Today, 64 percent of Americans will drink and bathe in fluoridated water. Meanwhile Watsonville, CA is at the end of a decade-long debate and legal battle to keep fluoride out of their drinking water. The California...
by Nadia Drake | Jun 13, 2011 | Posts
Awhile ago, I wrote about the robots (Stormtroompas) working behind the scenes at the San Jose Mercury News. It would be great, I thought at the time, to capture these things on video. So I did. Here, for your amusement, is a behind-the-scenes glimpse at the...
by Melissae Fellet | May 20, 2011 | Posts
Last fall, our class visited the sea otter researchers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Sandeep summarized many neat tidbits about otters from that trip on this blog. Two items that really piqued my interest involved otter mortality. In California, many otters die from...
by Sascha Zubryd | May 16, 2011 | Posts
For this entire school year, I’ve been trying to find a story into which I could sneak some mention of my puppy. Every single time we got a project, I though, “Is this it? Is this finally THE ONE?” No. And no. And no again. Until one fine day at the...
by Nadia Drake | May 14, 2011 | Posts
The SciCom slugs have been out and about recently, perhaps seeking an escape from the swirling pre-graduation chaos? Part 1: Paintings and Pumas Last week, we attended the opening of the Science Illustration Program’s exhibit at the Pacific Grove Museum of...
