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CSUN Biologists enjoyed the smog-clearing power of a winter rainstorm this week, marked the 217th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth, and welcomed another alumna back to campus to discuss her doctoral research in the colloquium seminar.
Faculty in departments across the CSUN campus are joining a CSU-wide teach-in for immigration justice this coming Wednesday, February 18. All are welcome to join teach-in meetings all that day on the Bayramian Hall Lawn — and for a particularly botanical focus, catch Prof Jeremy Yoder’s Flowering Plants Systematics class at 2:30pm.
Student awards and scholarships presented by the Biology Department and the College of Science and Mathematics are still open for applications — the deadline for most CSM opportunities is Feb 28, and for Biology, March 5.
The Biology Colloquium seminar series continues Friday with Dr. Angela Cannata, an alumna of CSUN’s RISE and MARC U*STAR undergraduate research experiences who went on to earn her PhD studying the immune system’s role in asthma responses. Her talk, sponsored by the U-RISE program, will be titled “MAIT cells suppress IgE-mediated Asthma via IFNγ-dependent B cell regulation.” Colloquium seminars are held this semester at 2:30pm in Chaparral Hall room 5125.
Click through for more of what’s going on across the Biology Department:
Basu Lab reveals how turmeric beats the heat
Turmeric, the ginger-y yellow spice that flavors many classic dishes in South Asian cuisine, grows in hot, humid conditions in its native range — and a new paper from the Basu Lab provides a look into the gene expression and physiological responses that help the turmeric plant, Curcuma longa, thrive in that tropical climate. Led by Master’s alumnus Kirill Musaev, the paper presents transcriptomic data with photosynthesis activity profiles in turmeric plants subjected to the stress of 41°C (almost 106°F) temperatures. In comparison to un-stressed plants, the heat-stressed plants showed significant expression changes in genes related to photosynthesis, and lower effective photosynthesis rates. The full paper is available Open Access on the npg Science of Plants website.
A fun day of fungus among us this Sunday
The Los Angeles Mycological Society is hosting its 42nd Annual Wild Mushroom Fair this Sunday February 15, from 9am to 4pm at the LA County Arboretum’s Ayres Hall. The event is free with admission to the Arboretum, and includes a mushroom walk, cooking demonstration, art competition, and scientific talks.
