Biosciences Area

Three from Biosciences Area Named AAAS Fellows

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), which was founded in 1848 and is the world’s largest general scientific society, announced that 489 of its members—among them nine scientists at Berkeley Lab—have been named Fellows. This lifetime honor, which follows a nomination and review process, recognizes scientists, engineers, and innovators for their distinguished achievements toward the advancement or applications of science.

The three newly named Fellows from the Biosciences Area are: Sanjay Kumar, a faculty scientist in the Biological Systems and Engineering (BSE) Division; Mary Maxon, the Associate Laboratory Director for the Biosciences Area; and Len Pennacchio, a senior scientist in the Environmental Genomics and Systems Biology (EGSB) Division and the Deputy of Genomic Technologies at the DOE Joint Genome Institute (JGI).

Brown Fat Flexes its Muscle to Burn Energy—and Calories

A multidisciplinary team of bioengineers and metabolic researchers led Andreas Stahl, a professor in the Department of Nutritional Sciences & Toxicology at UC Berkeley, has figured out a new pathway that triggers brown fat to consume calories and radiate them away as heat. Sanjay Kumar, a faculty scientist in Biological Systems and Engineering (BSE) and assistant professor of bioengineering at UC Berkeley, was a co-author on the study published March 6 in Cell Metabolism. One unexpected finding was that muscle-like myosin is responsible for causing brown fat cells to stiffen in response to signals from the brain; it is this increased tension that triggers a biochemical pathway that ends with these cells burning calories for heat. “This study offers a remarkable example of how mechanical and other physical forces can influence physiology and disease in powerful, unexpected ways,” Kumar said. Understanding how brown fat is activated could unlock new ways to combat obesity. Read more from UC Berkeley News.

‘Tug of War’ Among Skin Cells Key to Development of Chicken Feathers

Sanjay Kumar, a Berkeley Lab faculty scientist in Biological Systems and Engineering (BSE), and Elena Kassianidou, a graduate student working in his lab, are co-authors on a UC Berkeley-led study published in the journal Science which for the first time linked mechanical forces acting on skin cells in a developing organism to the activation of specific genes that make the cells differentiate into more specialized types, such feathers. The researchers grew skin taken from week-old chicken eggs on artificial substrates generated by Kumar and Kassianidou to mimic the stiffness of tissues that underlie the skin in the bird. The work could pave the way to growing artificial skin for grafts that looks like normal human skin with proper spacing of hair follicles and sweat pores. Read more from the UC Berkeley News Center.

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