MCB Co-Chair, William V. Power Chair in Biology and Professor Nipam Patel has been named Director of the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) at Woods Hole, MA. Founded in 1888, and one of the world's premier research and educational institutes dedicated to scientific discovery, the MBL will provide an incredible opportunity for Nipam to continue to influence some of the things he is most passionate about including research, science education, and science outreach. He has taught an Embryology course, served on the education committee, and performed research at the MBL for almost 20 years.

While we will miss him as an outstanding colleague, teacher and mentor here at UC Berkeley, we wish him the very best in his new position. 

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On April 15, 2018, the campus community lost a great friend when Professor George Oster passed away in his Berkeley home at the age of 77. Professor Oster was affiliated with many departments on campus, including the MCB division of Cell and Developmental Biology.

Oster's career meandered among many different scientific disciplines, from mechanical engineering to entomology. He spent much of his career investigating the laws of mechanochemical coupling in cells, which led to a significant breakthrough in our understanding of energy transduction as it occurs in living organisms.

MCB, Chemistry & NST Associate Professor Daniel Nomura and MCB & Chemistry Professor Chris Chang partner with Novartis Pharmaceuticals to identify and utilize new drug targets in the human proteome.

These new advancements in chemoproteomics could increase drug efficacy and open up new protein sites for targeted drug treatment.

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"Is a PhD for Me?”, a conference for students with disabilities who are contemplating applying to graduate school in the biomedical sciences was held on Saturday, April 14th. The event drew students from UC Berkeley, UC Davis, San Francisco State University and Mills College.

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Industry-minded MCB students and postdocs were enthusiastic about the opportunity to meet industry representatives and ask questions about careers in biotech at the recent MCB Industrial Affiliates Program event on April 10, 2018.

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This semester MCB faculty, staff, and students have been working on an equity and inclusion grant we received from the PATH to Care Center on campus. Our goal is to raise awareness about positive social norms and promote an inclusive culture in biology.

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KQED's 'Deep Look' web series recently featured leeches from the lab of MCB Professor David Weisblat. Learn more about how these creepy crawlers are being used in surgeries in the clip below!

MCB graduate students Ze Cheng and George Otto are co-lead authors on a new study published in Cell. Their research reports the widespread use of an unconventional mode of gene regulation that employs “transcript toggling” to drive up- and down-regulation of protein levels during meiotic differentiation.

Faculty members Abby Dernburg, Gian Garriga, Evan Miller and Jeremy Thorner, along with lecturer Robin Ball, earned the title of “Faculty Fellows” by participating in the “Transforming STEM Teaching” Faculty Learning Program.

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MCB Professor Daniel Portnoy has been selected to become a fellow of the prestigious National Academy of Inventors (NAI). The fellowship is in recognition of Portnoy's research in microbial pathogenesis and significant contributions to the improvement of cancer immunotherapies and vaccine development.

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Professors Marla Feller and Britt Glaunsinger were both honored with 2018 Faculty Mentor Awards from the Graduate Assembly. Nominated by colleagues and current and former graduate students, they have demonstrated an outstanding committment to helping UC Berkeley graduate students to succeed academically, professionally, and personally. The Awards will be presented in a joint ceremony on April 12, 2018 from 4-6pm at Anna Head Alumnae Hall.

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MCB Professor Susan Marqusee is the 2018 recipient of The Protein Society's Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin Award, which recognizes researchers in protein science whose contributions have significant impacts in the broader field of biology.

Marqusee is a world expert in the field of protein folding, and her influential research "has produced the most detailed view of the energy landscape of a protein."

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Associate Professor of Cell and Developmental Biology Lin He was appointed to the Thomas and Stacey Siebel Distinguished Chair in Stem Cell Research for a period of five years. The honor recognizes her as "one of UC Berkeley's most distinguished faculty members in the area of stem cell biology, cancer and related research areas associated with the Siebel Stem Cell Institute."