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UBC This Week is a weekly summary of UBC people in the news, recent media releases and upcoming event highlights. UBC This Week past issues are also available on-line.
Sign up for UBC This Week and other UBC Public Affairs e-mail services at www.publicaffairs.ubc.ca/eservices.
Recent UBC Media Releases
- Jan. 15: UBC researcher gives first-ever estimate of worldwide fish biomass and impact on climate change
- Jan. 13: Study Finds High Rates of Street Involved and Marginalized Aboriginal Youth in BC
Upcoming Event Highlights
Visit UBCevents, UBC’s new campus-wide calendar: www.events.ubc.ca
- Jan. 16: The Skeletons in Holland’s Colonial Closet of the Dutch East Indies
- Jan. 17: Women’s Basketball vs. Manitoba Bisons
- Jan. 17: Men’s Basketball vs. Manitoba Bisons
- Jan. 19: After Strange Gods: Virtual Mysteries in the History of Religions
- Jan. 20: Automated Solution Oligosaccharide Synthesis and Vaccines
- Jan. 21: The Cambrian Explosion: A Reality Check for Evolution?
- Jan. 22: Hyperscientia? CSI, Media, Juries and Fear of Too Much Science in Criminal Justice
Find out what else is happening at UBC this week. For sports events, visit the UBC Athletics site at www.gothunderbirds.ca/schedule.asp.
UBC People
- Head of neurology part of Parkinson’s-related discovery
- Green College welcomes Simon Conway Morris as Visiting Professor
UBC People
Head of neurology part of Parkinson’s-related discovery
Prof. Jon Stoessl, UBC Director of Neurology and colleagues at the Pacific Parkinsons Research Centre have played an instrumental role in a recent Mayo Clinic-led discovery of a genetic defect causing a rare Parkinson’s-related disorder called Perry Syndrome.
The syndrome, named after the late UBC professor Thomas Perry who first described it in the 1970s, results in early-onset parkinsonism, depression, and difficulty breathing. Stoessl and colleagues provided a substantial number of the DNA samples that led to the discovery.
The findings will be published in the February 2009 issue of Nature Genetics, and is available in the online edition.
For more information visit www.brain.ubc.ca/updates.php
Green College welcomes Simon Conway Morris as Visiting Professor
Simon Conway Morris, renowned British paleobiologist and evolutionary theorist, will be in residence at UBC’s Green College as a Cecil H. and Ida Green Visiting Professor from January 20-23.
Morris holds an ad hominem chair in Evolutionary Paleobiology at the University of Cambridge, and is a leading authority on the Cambrian explosion and the Burgess Shale. In his recent book Life’s Solution, Morris narrows the gap between scientific and religious accounts of the origins and order of life in the universe by emphasizing the phenomenon of ‘evolutionary convergence’, arguing that evolution has surprisingly little choice on where it can go.
Morris will deliver a series of free presentations that are open to all at various locations on campus.
For more information, contact gc.programs@ubc.ca or 604-822-0676, or visit www.greencollege.ubc.ca.