This Week's Stories Regular Features: News Briefs Awards More About... Obituaries Publications		Research Apprentice Proposals Due April 20 Faculty members who want to involve undergraduates in their research projects have until Monday, April 20, to submit their Undergraduate Research Apprentice proposals for fall 1998. Proposed projects will be publicized in the fall URAP brochure and web page, available to students in this semester’s last week of classes. Faculty select apprentices from applications submitted to the program at the start of fall term and receive a small grant to cover research expenses. Apprentices commit three to 12 hours weekly to a project. For an application or information, call Terry Strathman at 642-3795, or email urap@LS.berkeley.edu Hispanic, African-American Study Subjects Sought Healthy male and female Hispanic and African-American volunteers are needed for a 53-day UCSF drug study. Volunteers must be non-smokers between 20 and 45 years old, with no active medical problems, not receiving any prescription medications. Participation involves receiving the study drug(s), followed by repetitive blood sampling on six separate days for 13 hours each day. Volunteers will also receive the study drug followed by a single blood sampling (11/2 hours) on 30 additional days during the 53-day study period. The drugs used in this study include Tacrolimus, an immunosuppressant, and Fluconazole, an anti-fungal drug, both used in transplant surgery to fight infections. Volunteers completing this study will receive $1,650 for their participation. For information, contact Laviero Mancinelli at (415) 476-5890. Bird Expert Featured In Cable TV Special Research zoologist Walter Koenig and his research on avian social behavior were featured on “For a Few Acorns More,” which aired on TBS cable network March 29 as part of the National Geographic Explorer series. The half-hour segment was filmed almost entirely at Hastings Reservation in upper Carmel Valley, where Koenig is stationed. Operated by the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, Hastings is a 2,000-acre unit of UC’s Natural Reserve System. “For a Few Acorns More” features Koenig’s research on the acorn woodpecker, a common and conspicuous California resident that lives in highly social family groups and stores acorns in holes drilled in special “storage” trees within the group’s territory. The species has also developed other cooperative behaviors, including joint nesting, where more than one female shares the same nest and assistance at the nest from young, non-breeding acorn woodpeckers. Despite close genetic ties within groups, the birds also exhibit some of the most bizarre and dramatic competitive behaviors known in any species, including the destruction of eggs by closely related females within a group. Koenig’s work began as a PhD thesis under the direction of professor Frank A. Pitelka. According to Pitelka, it provides some of the most extensive data on social behavior and population ecology available on any bird species and offers intriguing insights into the workings of highly social species, including our own. Koenig received his PhD from Berkeley in 1978 and has been a faculty member since 1982. He is currently research zoologist for the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology and adjunct professor of integrative biology. Past UC President Reflects on Higher Ed Jack W. Peltason, UC president emeritus, will offer “Reflections on Higher Education: Proposition 209 and All That,” from 4 to 5 p.m. in the Stone Room of the Bancroft Library, April 21. His talk is part of the UC History Seminar Series on the past and future of the University of California. For information call 642-5040, email cshe@socrates.berkeley.edu or consult the web site of the Center for Studies in Higher Education, http://ishi.lib.berkeley.edu/cshe. Travers Conference Examines Ethics in Politics, Law, Media Ethics in politics, law and the media will be examined at the inaugural Col. Charles T. Travers Ethics Conference to be held April 22 in the Lipman Room, 8th floor, Barrows Hall. Titled “Deception and Democracy,” the conference will feature four panel discussions, each devoted to ethical problems currently facing researchers, journalists, lawyers and politicians. Topics include sunshine laws and their potential chilling effect on political deliberation, Presidential myth-making, spin doctoring and the expanding role of independent counsels. Participants include Tom Bates, former member of the State Assembly; presidential biographers Richard Reeves and Lou Cannon; Kennedy School Fellow Dan Schnur; and constitutional scholar Kathleen Sullivan, former press secretary to Gov. Pete Wilson. Representing the Fourth Estate will be veteran political writers Virginia Ellis, John Jacobs and Bob Forsyth. San Francisco attorneys John Keker and Jim Brosnahan will join the roundtable discussion on independent counsels. Berkeley faculty serving as panelists or experts at the conference include professors Bruce Cain and Mike Rogin, political science; Susan Rasky, acting associate professor of journalism; and Richard Abrams, professor of history. The free, day-long session begins with registration at 8:30 a.m. and includes breakfast and lunch as well as an afternoon coffee break. For information, phone 642-1474. Youth Workshop Launches New Berkeley Partnership More than 100 Berkeley teachers, youth service providers, community and business leaders, high school students, and UC faculty, staff and students will participate in the Berkeley Alliance for Youth workshop Thursday, April 16, from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at the Berkeley City Club. The workshop will focus on initiatives to support Berkeley youth, including: prenatal to kindergarten: preparing Berkeley children for school success adolescent/pre-adolescent health: supporting healthy kids and families afterschool opportunities: providing enrichment, leadership, recreation and guidance for youth after school school-to-career: linking Berkeley High School students with the world of work Speakers at the workshop luncheon will be Chancellor Berdahl, Mayor Shirley Dean, and Blas Guerrero, Director of UC’s Math, Engineering and Science Achievement (MESA) program. The youth workshop is sponsored by the Berkeley Alliance, a new partnership of the University of California, the City of Berkeley and the Berkeley Unified School District.

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