NCSWHAT

NCSWA Newsletter, April 2005

Editor: Jane Stevens, jsteven@mmjourno.com

Twinkle, twinkle little star,
I don't wonder what you are
For by the spectroscopic ken
I know that you are hydrogen
-Lewis Fry Richardson

NEWS UPDATES

NCSWAns VISIT THE GLADSTONE

On March 15, more than two dozen NCSWAns toured the shiny world-class labs of the UCSF-affiliated J. David Gladstone Institutes at Mission Bay. NCSWA member John Watson, senior PR/communications manager for the Gladstone, organized the event. Overlooking the Bay Bridge and SBC Park, the Gladstone's 200,000-square-foot, six-story building sits in the center of an academic and industrial research park that will eventually occupy 300 acres.

After the tours, NCSWAns heard an overview from Gladstone President Robert Mahley and saw a brief video about the history of the institute, launched 25 years ago with a focus on heart disease, the number-one killer of Americans. The institute was founded with funds from the will of Southern California shopping mall developer J. David Gladstone, who died in 1971. Gladstone researchers now focus on HIV/AIDS and neurodegenerative diseases, as well as cardiovascular disease. The majority of Gladstone research is now supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health; Gladstone applicants for NIH grants have a 70 percent acceptance rate.

Mahley delivered a talk about research conducted at the Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease; workers there continue to elucidate the role of the lipid carrier apolipoprotein E in brain injury and the mechanism of the E4 variant, a major risk factor for Alzheimer's disease. Warner Greene, director of the Gladstone Institute of Virology and Immunology, spoke about harnessing the innate immune system to prevent HIV infection, including work with a promising innate antiviral protein, APOBEC3G. Clinician and investigator Tom Bersot spoke -- and sang !-- about what he called "the last frontier in heart disease": lowering the risk of cardiovascular disease by raising "good" HDL cholesterol levels, which has a more pronounced effect than lowering "bad" LDL cholesterol levels. Fifty percent of people are dead eight years after their first heart attack, he said, emphasizing that people shouldn't wait until their first myocardial infarction before taking care of themselves. Bruce Conklin, an investigator in the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, showed videos demonstrating how stem cells are great for making blood vessels and spoke of their promise in treating atherosclerosis.

Postcards from Ringworld

Planetary scientist Jeff Cuzzi of NASA's Ames Research Center in Mountain View delighted his audience on March 30 with new photos and movies from the ongoing Cassini-Huygens mission at Saturn. After a Spanish-tinged meal and cheesecake at Patio Espanol in San Francisco, Cuzzi -- one of the world's experts on planetary rings -- earned many oohs and aahs from 60 NCSWAns and their guests. His images included gossamer shadows of thousands of rings cast upon Saturn's atmosphere, a bizarre ridge on Iapetus that makes the satellite look like two halves of a walnut stuck together, and close-ups of sinuous rivers of hydrocarbons on the giant smog-shrouded moon Titan. Cuzzi closed with a spectacular mental image of marble-sized "raindrops" of methane falling onto Titan's goopy surface at the speed of snowflakes. The evening left all of us eager for more results from the four-year tour of Saturn's system.

Tireless Recruiters

Three NCSWAns composed 75% of an invited panel on "Science in the Media" at the annual Career and Research Days seminars for graduate students at the University of California, San Francisco, on April 4. Doing their best to persuade students to drop their joyless research careers in favor of endlessly fascinating stories and exotic journalistic travels were Amy Adams, Stanford University Medical Center; Carl Hall, San Francisco Chronicle; and Rob Irion, freelance and Science magazine. The panelists didn't mention the bits about tearing hair out on deadline and the frequently crushing solitude.

UPCOMING EVENTS

STEM CELL RESEARCH: WHERE IS IT GOING? WHERE IS IT TAKING US

NCSWA will host a panel discussion with top stem cell experts on Wed., May 4, from 6:30 p.m to 9:30 p.m. at Genentech Auditorium on UCSF's Mission Bay Campus. Directions to the site are online.

Last fall, Californians voted on an unprecedented proposition to make state funds available to fund research on stem cells. What perhaps was lost in the hype (and celebrity cries for cures NOW) was a clearheaded discussion of where stem cell research is today and where it is going. At this event, four prominent figures who are helping shape the future of stem cell research will make presentations.

Panelists include:

• Dr. Arnold Kriegstein, director of UCSF's developmental and stem-cell biology program, and a neuronal stem-cell researcher
• Dr. Susan Fisher, a UCSF researcher who has developed human embryonic stem-cell lines grown in culture on human, rather than mouse, "feeder" cells
• Dr. William Hurlbut, a Stanford physician and member of the President's Council on Bioethics
• Dr. Ann Tsukamoto, co-discoverer of the human blood-forming stem cell and now VP for R&D at StemCells Inc., a biotech dedicated to getting adult (i.e., differentiated rather than embryonic) stem-cell therapies into the clinic.

The event, which is free and open to all, is aimed at educating science journalists and other interested individuals about the promises and pitfalls of stem cells. The discussion will address potentials and timelines (what's realistic to expect -- and when?) as well as societal implications. What are stem cells? What are the technical and therapeutic strengths and weaknesses of using embryonic vs. adult stem cells? Do alternatives to the use of embryos exist? What are the prospects of medical results coming out of the lab and into the clinic? What is "therapeutic cloning," and what are its applications? What are the long-term consequences to society, if any, of a "spare-parts" medical world? To what extent can the clear benefits of stem-cell research be brought about without opening the door to less ethically palatable outcomes?

NCSWA board member Bruce Goldman will moderate the discussion, which will include time for Q & A with the audience.

Light refreshments will be served during a mid-panel break. RSVP to Robin Mejia at mejia@nasw.org by April 29.

NEWS ABOUT MEMBERS

Charlotte Kempner Beyers, 73, an award-winning documentary filmmaker and a former NCSWA member, died last month. She was married to former Stanford News Service director and NCSWA member Robert Beyers, who died in 2002. She lived an amazing life, full of active compassion. You can read more about her in obituaries in the SFChronicle and Palo Alto Online.

Katherine Barr attended a great Innovative Journalism conference at Stanford April 4-6. The conference, started by the Innovation Journalism Fellowship Programme, a Swedish-U.S. initiative, investigates innovation journalism as a concept and community. Innovation journalism is journalism about innovation, not innovations in journalism. Innovation Journalism covers technical, business, legal and political aspects of innovations and innovation systems.

Meredith Dutton has moved back to Massachusetts, and says that she'll miss NCSWA very much.

Sylvia Wright, public information officer at UC Davis, writes:
"My fellow sciwriters will appreciate how very happy I am to be out of management and back on my enviro beat. Our News Service hired a former enviro writer from the San Jose Mercury News (who more recently was Northern California writer for the Wall St. Journal and communications director for the state treasurer Mitchel Benson, to be our new director. That makes three former Mercurials in our office now -- me, Mitchel and Lisa Lapin, who's now the big boss. I celebrated my recovered PIOness with a Dec. 20 news conference at Lake Tahoe about a UC Davis study of warming water temps and enjoyed talking with the Chron's Carl Hall, Merc's Lisa Krieger, Sac Bee's Chris Bowman, and CoCo Times' Mike Taugher. We sure have a terrifically skilled science media corps here in the Central Valley and Bay Area."

Sheila Stavish is returning to NCSWA after a short hiatus. This is what she writes: "I never intended to actually take up permanent residence in Santa Rosa, but it did lead me to the grant writing. I took a 'certificate course' in nonprofit development and grantsmanship at an organization called The Volunteer Center, which is a wonderful resource. This is a wonderful town for community development, local and national politicking, and general community-spiritedness. Anyway, I would be happy if Jane could throw in a line in the newsletter about my continued interest in medical economics, health care spending choices, and the grant writing." Done.

Edare Carroll, managing editor of San Francisco Medicine, announces the debut of her son, Nikolaos Carroll Boehne. She also makes a pitch for all in the job-search market for Media Alliance's excellent "jobs file" that can now be ordered (around $35 for three months) and emailed to you. She found her last three jobs through this excellent service and has referred many friends and colleagues in our field to this resource. Also, another kudo for Media Alliance is that they offer an excellent choice of health care plans (after you've been a member for a few months).

James Lamb, having passed the State exam for Clinical Lab Scientist, has gone from working as a phlebotomist to working in the Blood Bank at UCSF.

Mike Chorost, formerly an educational researcher at SRI International, is now a freelance science writer and educational consultant.

Jennifer LeBlanc, former scientific marketing consultant, is now president of Think Results Marketing.

Aging Today editor Paul Kleyman released the fourth annual "CDC's Spyglass on Aging" packet of media backgrounders for reporters in March at the Joint Conference of the American Society on Aging and National Council on the Aging. Paul and crew have worked with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to develop 11 2,500-word backgrounders -- each written by a journalist -- with lists of sources on under-covered subjects relating to chronic diseases or disabilities among older adults. The latest pieces are on oral health issues and cardiovascular diseases among seniors. Previous media backgrounders include disability, diabetes, preventing falls and injuries, arthritis, increasing physical activity and West Nile virus. The project is cosponsored by the American Society on Aging in cooperation with the Journalists Exchange on Aging (JEoA), which Paul heads. NCSWA members can obtain the CDC backgrounders online.

Those interested in the JEoA and its Age Beat Online e-newsletter should contact Paul: paul@asaging.org or 415-974-9619. JEoA is a network of almost 900 journalists in all media around the United States.

New members Dan Krotz is a science writer at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

Gail Barchfeld joined NCSWA to meet science writers and find out if this is something she'd like to do.

Michael Rigsby is based in Monterey.

Hannah Hickey is a new student member from the UC Santa Cruz Science Communication Program.

Gretchen Cuda is a freelance writer in San Francisco with interests in engineering, life sciences and medicine/health.

Timothy Lesle, an associate editor/designer with the Sierra Club. has a bachelor's degree in Earth Sciences, spent two years at the U.S. Geological Survey in Menlo Park, one year writing grants at the Sierra Club and started an undergraduate science journal.

Erik Vance, freelance writer, specializes in earth sciences, environment and life sciences.

John Moir, staff writer at the National Science Teachers Association, also writes books and articles about the environment.

Erik Vance, freelance writer, specializes in earth sciences, environment and life sciences.

Branwyn Wagman is communications coordinator at the UC Santa Cruz Center for Biomolecular Science & Engineering.