This week, UC Berkeley students and researchers protest the Russian invasion of Ukraine. What do they have to say? Also, the university loses a bitter legal fight over the future of CRISPR. What does the future have in store for Berkeley and gene editing?
California is easing mask mandates in schools. How will BUSD respond? This year, a record number of students apply to UC Berkeley. How will this look in light of the ongoing admissions controversy for both current students and the students who apply?
And finally, Andy the Falcon is alive. We'll give you updates on Berkeley's favorite alien couple. Welcome to the Daily Cal News Podcast. I'm your host, Chris King, the city news editor.
Stay tuned. We've got the five biggest stories you need to wrap up your week. Six days after Russia invaded Ukraine, UC Berkeley students and researchers rallied to express concerns over the humanitarian crisis. I'm joined by Winnie Lau, our beeper player who covered the event.
Winnie, thanks for joining us. So, Winnie, set the scene for us. What was the energy there like? Were there a lot of people?
Were there people holding signs? Stuff like that. Yeah, there were about 20 student and researchers, mostly from Russia and Ukraine. They were holding Ukrainian flags and signs with slogan like, A stop, put, and stop, walk, and chanting Sam with Ukraine.
They shared their stories and how the situation in Ukraine is. Some students who passed that even joined them in rallying asked how they could help. They sang the Ukrainian national anthem and it was emotional. So, what were the students' thoughts about the situation in Ukraine?
Were you able to speak to any students? Yeah, I was able to talk to some of the students at the rally. They told me that this is heartbreaking for Russians and Ukrainians, that no one wants to walk. They said this is just very scary for people in Ukraine right now, as bombing continues, causing possibility and destruction of infrastructure.
I talked to one student who described what it is like for her parents back in Ukraine. Most of my friends and their families were forced to flee the country because of the Russian aggression, and my friends are still in Kiev. They only go outside to get groceries, and they sleep in terms to not miss their raid alert. So, what has the campus response been to Ukraine so far?
Have they said anything? Yeah, Campus Diversity Equity and Inclusion Committee and some departments will list off the same as supporting students and scholars for Russia in Ukraine. offices also sent out emails to provide mentor and advice and support. However, some students expressed that UC Berkeley chancellor should also speak up, and that campus can do more to support Ukraine, such as providing scholarships to impact the student or direct donations to humanitarian funds.
All right, well, this is a very interesting story. Thank you for covering this, Winnie. I appreciate it, and thank you for joining us. Yeah, thank you so much.
In 2020, UC Berkeley professor Jennifer Doudna won the Nobel Prize for her work in CRISPR gene editing, along with Emmanuel Charpentier. However, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office ruled Monday that patents for some CRISPR technologies do not in fact belong to the UC, the University of Vienna, or Emmanuel Charpentier. I'm joined by David Villani, our Prime Court Speed Reporter, who covered this story.
David, thanks for joining us. Hey, thanks, Brad. So could you give us some context for this ruling, some background? You know, who were the parties involved, stuff like that?
Yeah, absolutely. So this has been an issue that had been going off for quite some time now, involving a legal team at Berkeley and a legal team with the Broad Institute at MIT and Harvard University over the question of the patents for some CRISPR eukaryote technology. Now, no one in this case is doubting that Doudna and her partner discovered this technology and that they were instrumental behind it. The Broad Institute just successfully argued that the application of CRISPR to eukaryote technologies is a different invention than the previous breakthrough.
So what exactly does this mean for UC Berkeley, UC, and the University of Vienna, and Emmanuel Charpentier? So this is kind of a double issue, right? So one is simply prestige. Berkeley is very proud to have been a place where this revolutionary technology was created.
And although no one is doubting the contribution of Doudna and her collaborator, this does mean that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office found that the use of CRISPR in eukaryote cells was first invented by the Broad Institute scientists. However, there's another issue at hand. It's probably a more materially important one, and that's that there's a lot of money that can be gained from this technology.
It's an emerging technology. The invention itself was only from 2012. But it really does seem to be one of the technologies of the future that will have major impacts in biomedical enterprises. There is a lot of money that the UC is listening on.
So what are the next steps that both the gene editing companies who bought these licenses from UC Berkeley and for UC Berkeley itself is the university pursuing more legal actions? Yeah, so as it stands, it's possible for UC Berkeley to appeal to the ruling, but the decision hasn't been made yet, right? And for the biomedical companies, they are in a tricky situation because those that had obtained licenses for the patents from UC Berkeley now also need to get them from the Broad Institute. And this obviously complicates things further for them.
I'll also add that Berkeley retains these patents internationally. So this is just a U.S. thing. Internationally, these patents continue to belong to UC Berkeley.
It's obviously a very complicated issue, right? And this complicates matters for biomedical industries. So Berkeley might want to help some sort of appeal, but there really isn't any indication of how this will turn out. All right, thanks, David, for covering the story.
We'll probably be keeping an eye on this one because of how important CRISPR is. But thank you for joining us. Absolutely, thank you. California announced that masks will no longer be required in schools soon.
How will this affect Berkeley? I'm joined by Malika Sachandri, our managing editor. Thanks for joining us, Malika. Of course.
So could you tell us what's the significance of lifting this mandate? Yeah, so governor's announced that masks will no longer be required in schools or child care centers in California after March 11th. This is a big deal. I mean, we've spent the better part of the past two years wearing masks.
It's become the new normal. And now we've been saying that won't be the case anymore. This is largely a result of defining COVID-19 infections after the young prime surge. So what does this mean for Berkeley Unified School District and child care centers in Berkeley?
Yeah, so superintensive rent stuff in the mask in a press release at Berkeley Unified will continue requiring everyone to wear a mask indoors while making masks optional outdoors. Child care centers like Pixar Child Development Center are also going to continue masking children under five years of age who are not vaccinated. However, other child care centers like Bella's Babies are saying that the change won't really affect them since most of the children at Bella's Babies are under two and don't wear a mask anyways. So what about other institutions?
You know, public transportation, health care centers, shelters for the houseless. Will masks still be required for those? Or is it, you know, just across the board lifting masks? Yeah, so Newsom said that masks are still required in quote-unquote high risk settings and that includes public transportation, emergency shelters, health care settings, correctional facilities, long-term care facilities, and shelters for the houseless.
According to the press release, it's also important to note that while Newsom is no longer requiring masks indoors, he still strongly recommends them and that local jurisdictions can have strict their masking guidelines on the state. Awesome. Well, we'll keep a track on this story. Thanks so much for joining us, Malika.
Once again, UC Berkeley has talked to the previous record-breaking student applications for the upcoming fall semester. We got a record number of applicants to Berkeley this semester for the upcoming year. Maria, you edited the story. Thanks for being with us.
So how many more students applied this year? So despite a nationwide decrease in university applications, more than 128,000 high school seniors applied for the fall 2022 freshman class, and this is a 13% increase from last year. Our campus associate vice chancellor of enrollment and dean of undergraduate admissions highlighted the diversity of the application pool and said that UC Berkeley continues to be a top choice for talented scholars. So what does this all mean for campus enrollment, especially in light of the enrollment cap controversy that's going on right now?
Yeah, so despite the increase in applications, a recent court-ordered cap on enrollment could potentially cut enrollment to the 2020-2021 levels, which was the level at which the pandemic caused a lot of students to leave. So if this court order is not overturned by the Supreme Court of California, the freeze would result in about a third fewer enrollment seats, which is a cut of about 3,050 admits. So do current students have any feelings about the number of students who applied? Will this impact current students?
Yeah, so campus students really favor the rise in student applications. One student, Mohamed Abed, said during an interview that it's good that more students applies, but that he hopes people have the opportunity to go here because it genuinely sucks, as he said, that we have a court order and a housing crisis. Another student said he's not surprised that campus saw more applications because everyone wants to go to a good school, but he also expressed concern about housing, saying that there should be more housing available and there are many students who can't afford the housing that is offered by UC Berkeley. All right, so it looks like we're going to have a lot more housing controversy coming up and be sure to check back in to see what happens with that.
I'm sure that we'll see the end of this court order fight. After being announced missing a day before, Annie the Peregrine Falcon returned to the Camp Neely on Tuesday to put a stop to rumors of her death. I'm joined by Claire Daly, a reporter who recovered the recent drama and toxic Camp Neely. So Claire, can you tell us what happened?
Yeah, so the Cal Falcons team, which monitors the cameras on the Camp Neely that show where the Peregrine Falcons are nesting, noticed a lot of unknown females in the area that they hadn't seen before and then realized that Annie, one of the two Peregrine Falcons who normally lives on top of the Camp Neely, was missing. So they announced that she had been missing for about a week on Monday and they said that she was presumably injured, dead, or had been forced out of the territory due to competition. But then on Tuesday, they spotted Annie on the cameras. According to Cal Falcons, this is the first time this behavior has been seen.
Can you tell us a little bit about why this is out of the ordinary? Yeah, so Peregrine Falcons are normally highly territorial, particularly during breeding season. Annie and Grinnell, the bonded pair who live at the Camp Neely, would normally escort competition away from their territory. So the Cal Falcon team said that they have never in their years of monitoring Peregrine Nax had a female disappear during the peak of breeding season and reappear a week later like nothing had changed, especially with so much competition around.
Okay, and finally, could you tell us a little bit about what this means for the future of these Camp Neely Falcons? So right now, Annie and Grinnell seem to be back to normal, which is very surprising due to her week-long vacation. On Wednesday, they were seen performing a head bow display, which is a key courtship behavior used to strengthen the bond between Falcons, according to the Cal Falcons researchers. However, Annie could still face competition from the other females who have been spotted in the area, and at the very least, the Cal Falcons team expects that breeding season will be a little bit delayed this year for Annie and Grinnell.
Okay, and why do people care so much about these Falcons? Annie and Grinnell have nested in Camp Neely since 2016 and have raised 13 chicks there together, and the Falcons are very popular on campus and beyond. The Cal Falcons Twitter account currently has over 6,000 followers and posts highlights from the cameras quite regularly. Awesome.
Well, thank you so much, Claire. And that's it for this week, February 28th to March 4th. Thanks for joining us on our first episode of the Daily Cal News Podcast. We'll be here every week on Spotify, Apple Music, and SoundCloud.
If you'd like to find out more information about these stories, either pick up a copy of the Daily Cal on campus or visit our website at dailycal.org. Also, speaking of dailycal.org, if you go to projects.dailycal.org, you can find our project department's analysis of the drop in Berkeley and Alameda County's black population using data from the U.S. Census and the California Department of Education. See you all next week.
Take care and go big. Take care and go big.