Arthur M. Wolfe, an American astrophysicist who for a decade directed the Center for Astrophysics and Space Sciences at the University of California, San Diego and achieved widespread recognition for his discoveries about star formation and the early universe, died on February 17 following a battle with cancer in La Jolla, Calif. He was 74.
The retreat of sea ice in the Arctic Ocean is diminishing Earth’s albedo, or reflectivity, by an amount considerably larger than previously estimated, according to researchers at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
The deep ocean, the largest domain for life on earth, is also its least explored environment. Humans are now encroaching more vigorously than ever into the ocean’s deep regions, exploiting the deep’s resources and placing its wealth of vibrant habitats and natural services for the planet at risk.
Researchers at the San Diego Supercomputer Center at the University of California, San Diego, have developed software that greatly expands the types of multi-scale QM/MM (mixed quantum and molecular mechanical) simulations of complex chemical systems that scientists can use to design new drugs, better chemicals, or improved enzymes for biofuels production.
Astronomers see huge clouds of gas orbiting supermassive black holes at the centers of galaxies. Once thought to be a relatively uniform, fog-like ring, the accreting matter instead forms clumps dense enough to intermittently dim the intense radiation blazing forth as these enormous objects condense and consume matter, they report in a paper to be published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, available online now.
Each year, approximately 600,000 total knee replacement procedures are performed in the United States, a number that is expected to rise in the next decade as the population ages. UC San Diego Health System is the first in the nation to use iASSIST, a computer navigation system with Bluetooth-like technology that improves surgical precision and accuracy in total knee replacements, decreasing the need for revision surgery.
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