SoCal Minds

In Pomona, East L.A., advances in 21st century technology

From Cal Poly Pomona and CSULA

Great to see that the Luddite torpor that may seize some of us plays out in just the reverse in Pomona and East L.A. 

• In fact, for two dozen or so very different kind of summer campers, time spent on the Bronco campus may prove invaluable to them and to those seeking to combat cyber criminals. These recipients of an all-expenses, four-day immersion in the latest tools and thinking on cyber security won their spots by competing, online of course, in a 'security treasure hunt,' in which they tested for flaws in a target online system. Top competitors, some with serious IT credentials and others with no formal training, were invited to cyber camp, as part of the university's burgeoning effort to fill a targeted, dire need by society and industry for top talents to secure and protect our 21st century technology and online existence.

It's no dungeon with dragons: It's summer cyber security camp for top competitors

• Meantime, in East L.A., a quarter-mil or so grant from HP has helped more than 250 students in engineering classes, as well as their profs and the school, figure how to stay cutting edge in learning about and using the latest technology. This endeavor has employed tablet computers, wired classrooms and more virtual interaction for students and teachers so they can get hands-on experiences in working with, designing for and thinking about computers as customary, ordinary and crucial tools in the contemporary engineering workplace, as well as the machines and technology as teaching, learning and study tools.

HP grant, tablet computers, wired classrooms let engineering students, profs get with program 

A spotlight for those who build bridges, push boundaries

From CSUN & CSULA

In a time of budget slashing, program closings and seemingly curtailed opportunities for young folks seeking advanced education, here's a small cheer for two different boundary-pushing efforts:

• In Northridge, a smart push is under way to hook up a corps of world-class stem cell scientists in Westwood with energetic, capable and ambitious undergrads at the Valley campus known for turning out teachers, in hopes of getting more than a few of them into new careers in research. A $1.6 million grant from the state body that funds stem cell research will let 10 aspirants from the Valley campus pursue projects, study and training in this cutting-edge field with premier Bruin scientists, preparing the chosen few young folks, advocates hope, so they're ready to go on to graduate school or to top jobs as highly skilled and sought after technicians in research labs. 

Program builds stem-cell study 'bridge' between Northridge, Westwood 

• In East L.A., it took awhile. But the longtime, trail-blazing educational career of a longtime Los Angeles educator and college alum recently and finally got its own bit of recognition. There's a newly named middle school on the Los Angeles Unified School District's Belmont campus that gives a nod to Salvador B. Castro, who not only taught in the system for more than four decades but also played a key role in crucial protests against it in the Sixties. Castro was honored by President Clinton and featured in a 2006 James Edward Olmos film for his part as a teacher supporting youngsters in the 1968 'Chicano blowouts,' a student protest and walk-out that helped bring public attention and some reform to the dire inequities in LAUSD and the rotten schools that were serving Latino communities in East LA.

In East L.A., a small recognition for pioneering efforts of longtime educator, alum

Here's how the Times' Hector Tobar tells the tale

Something's funky with air above Gulf spill, Eurasia

From UCI & Cal State LA

Should anything less be expected of investigators from Southern California, an air pollution capital of the planet, that they're at the fore in finding matters amiss in the air from the Gulf to Eurasia?

• In Irvine, researchers say they're continuing to analyze samples extracted from the atmosphere above the BP oil spill in the Gulf and the preliminary findings aren't good: They say they have detected record levels of harmful chemicals -- and these are not particulates or materials related to oil burn-offs conducted to try to clean up the spreading mess. Instead, the researchers, who are struggling to find funding for their work and are cadging samples with the aid of fishermen and some helpful bureaucrats, say they are concerned about atmospheric gases, alkyl nitrates, methane, and hexane and butane compounds they have identified that could be from oil rising to the surface, the dispersant used to break it up or other unknown sources. While the official line is the gases still have not exceeded regulators' thresholds, there is skepticism and worry about this air problem adding the myriad spill woes.  

Record levels of harmful chemicals detected in atmosphere over Gulf spill

• In East L.A., meantime, a researcher has raised noteworthy questions on scientific theories about a key greenhouse gas after observing its actions above Eurasia via historic and recent satellite data. Conventional wisdom has it that water vapor in the atmosphere acts as a greenhouse gas and can play a significant role in climate change, influencing sunlight reflection, cloud cover, temperature and precipitation, among other factors. But water vapor, at least according to accumulated data, does not work exactly as theories say it should, decreasing in hot, dry, subtropical areas of Eurasia, even as temperatures increase. This suggests, the expert says, that hot dry regions will experience more severe drought and higher temperatures in global warming.

A challenge to conventional theories on actions of water vapor, a key greenhouse gas

How parental income carries lifelong effect on kids

From UCI & the Cal States

As politicians and policy-makers slash and burn social programs in their effort to stanch the flow of government red-ink, especially in Sacramento, an education professor in Irvine has some noteworthy research they might consider. He has examined the deep, sweeping data from a study that has followed more than 9,000 U.S. families and individuals for more than four decades. And, with colleagues, the researcher asked what would happen to kids younger than 5 if their parents got more annual income but nothing else changed in the picture -- mom and dad don't get more education, they don't alter their parenting practices, the family structure remains the same and genetic factors don't shift a whit. Well, look down the road and those youngsters show higher incomes and less use of food stamps (social programs) when they become adults, the researchers found, arguing for the importance of governmental efforts, if necessary, to supplement the incomes of families with youngsters to break a long cycle of potential poverty.

A key insight into breaking the cycle of poverty

And speaking of funding arguments, the Cal State system, like its powerful siblings in the UC network, has been lobbying furiously to try to stem the budgetary bloodletting now under way in public higher education in California. Part of the latest campaign aims to show the economic impact of the various CSU campuses, and, finally, there are detailed, online break-outs on the hundreds of millions of dollars and thousands of jobs that can be linked to each of the institutions.

Click here for online look at Cal States' economic impact

2 takes on how LA can find a greener tomorrow

From CSULA & Sci-Arc

In East LA and on the Westside, there will be two different takes on how both to make a better and greener tomorrow for Los Angeles, whether the emphasis is on the business and economic means to get there or on how the millions in this metropolis can best feed themselves. The Edmund G. 'Pat' Brown Institute of Public Affairs kicks off the green Thursday this morning with a program that examines how to make Los Angeles not only a more environmentally sound but also a sustainable place to live. Business, academic and policy experts will take on the topic from economic and political perspectives asking, for example, what role government needs to play in the city's green efforts and how investments can be encouraged in cleaner technologies and infrastructure. This afternoon, then, at the Pacific Design Center, planners, architects, community activists and others will turn to 'dishing out' about LA, discussing how to feed residents of the region with sensible means of plotting, growing, producing and distributing food in this urban area. Participants also can take in a school exhibition on urban scale, planned and unplanned, including examinations of sustainable farming in Watts and a notion to distribute and move around the iconic Hollywood sign. 

In East LA, a discussion on 'sustainable' future for City of Angels

At Pacific Design Center, 'dishing' on how metropolis might better feed itself

A weekend homage to Nobelist Ocatvio Paz

From CSULA, CalArts & the Getty

In East LA, scholars from globe will descend on campus starting today for a major conference focused on the poetry, prose and politics of Mexican literary titan Octavio Paz, who just two decades ago was awarded the Nobel Prize. With speakers scheduled from Japan, Canada and Mexico and from multiple California institutions of higher education, organizers of the two-day Paz fest say they hope to put the diplomat and seminal thinker about Mexico and Mexican culture into a wider, deeper international and intellectual context. For those who want a performance-based peek at the power of Paz's poetry, the folks from Valencia will be popping over to a special space in Malibu to put on Mexican director Maria Morett's multimedia staging, inspired by his piece 'Piedra de Sol.' The poem, considered to be on his finest, is circular and is based on the circular calendar of the Aztecs, whose 'pantheon' is part of a major exhibit up on the hill in Brentwood, commemorating the 2010 bicentennial of Mexican independence.

In East LA, putting Paz's poetry, politics, diplomacy in a deeper, global context

In Malibu, CalArts performers in multimedia staging of Paz's 'Piedra de Sol'

Click here for full details of Paz conference

Click here for full info on Aztec 'pantheon' exhibit

For Latinos, eye woes, degrees, border insights

From USC, Cal State Fullerton & CSULA

For Latinos, developments that might make some say eye-yai-yai on the ophthalmology front but aye-aye in terms of academic accomplishment. And, for those interested in matters Latin American, a noteworthy Los Angeles appearance by a top-notch observer is on tap:

• In Exposition Park, a deep and broad study and a rare journal publication of five papers and an editorial all have served to underscore a serious message about the eye woes that confront Latinos. Based on one of the largest, most comprehensive studies of Latinos and their vision, Trojan researchers found that vision loss and eye diseases are increasing sharply among the 45 million Latinos in the U.S. They developed visual impairments and blindness at a higher rate than any other ethnic group in the country, based on demographic estimates from other U.S. population studies. Latinos have higher rates of developing visual impairment, blindness, diabetic eye disease and cataracts than non-Hispanic whites.

For Latinos, growing concern on visual impairment, blindness, eye diseases

• What's the No. 1 campus in California and No. 5 nationwide for awarding bachelor's degrees to Latinos? The folks in Fullerton, citing annual data compiled by the 'Hispanic Outlook in Higher Education' magazine, say they're pleased to have recorded those rankings, which also found the school, in terms of bachelor's degrees awarded in specific majors to be: No. 1 in communications degrees, No. 6 in business and marketing and No. 7 in education. By the way, for awarding bachelor's degrees, CSUN and CSULB rank Nos. 9 and 10, respectively, followed by CSULA (14), UCLA (16), UCSB (24), Cal Poly Pomona (30), UCR (31) and UCI (34). For master's degrees, it's USC (No. 7), CSULB (8), CSUN (10), CSULA (11), UCLA (14), Azusa Pacific (16), University of LaVerne (21) and Fullerton (29). As for Ph.D.'s, it's USC (No. 2), UCLA (4), UCI (7), UCSB (20), UCR (23), and University of Laverne (32).

On magazine list, Fullerton's No. 1 in California for awarding bachelor's to Latinos

Click here for Top 100 lists by 'Hispanic Outlook'

• In East LA, Tracy Wilkinson, one of the top U.S. foreign correspondents and an international analyst with an especially keen insight on Latin America, will provide her always brilliant insights in a free, public program at 6:30 tonight. Wilkinson, now the Mexico City bureau chief for the Los Angeles Times, covered the Central American strife in the 1980s, metropolitan LA in the late '80s and early '90s, then went on to distinguished combat-zone reporting in the Balkans and Iraq. She's written a book on the Vatican's exorcists and has been tracking Mexico's continuing war with its notorious drug czars and narcotics, guns and people traffickers -- all topics about which she will converse with history and Latin American studies Prof. Enrique Ochoa.

In East L.A., a top foreign correspondent in chat on 'Border Knowledges'

A big focus on diet, obesity, health in East L.A.

From UCLA, USC, CSULA & RAND

For Latinos and Asians, especially those in East L.A., there's lots of new attention on their diet, health and maybe even what their primary care physicians do or don't do, as researchers seek to curb the harms of bad eating, obesity, diabetes and heart disease with some programs, big and small.

• From Westwood comes the news that the Bruins and Trojans will join up under a $10 million National Institutes of Health grant to create a center for population health and health disparities, working with, among others, the Los Angeles County health department. They'll run an array of projects to cut the higher risk of obesity-related heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure and stroke among Latinos on the Eastside. In the center's first three initiatives, researchers will: prod families with members who are already in diabetes care and at risk of cardiovascular disease to eat more fruits and vegetables such as from the East Los Angeles farmers' market and to slash their salt consumption and television viewing; scrutinize the vascular health of individuals in multigenerational families to better understand how acculturation affects circulatory health; take over four corner markets to provide models for stores that stock healthier eats and educate customers on diet.

$10 million grant to help Latinos with diet, obesity, heart diseases, diabetes

• Of course it isn't as if there hasn't been work under way on the Eastside about diet, nutrition and disease, as researchers from the large state institution in the neighborhood have been reaching out to elderly Chinese Americans to help them reduce their incidence of type 2 diabetes even as students have engaged in community health initiatives, including one attention-grabbing program involving former President Clinton. The experts got kudos for their efforts with older Americans of Chinese descent who for various reasons, including language differences, don't get included in health studies and outreach program as often as some groups do. As for the recent opportunity for students to participate in a big summit on health, nutrition and obesity, attended by Gov. Schwarzenegger among others, notice that Big Bill, good for him, never minds getting in a photo.

Researchers reach out to older Chinese Americans to cut incidence of type 2 diabetes

For students involved in community health, a rewarding state summit 

• In poorer communities with larger minority populations, places like East L.A., the experts in Santa Monica warn that there's a potential problem with impending health reform plans to try to cut costs by rewarding primary care physicians based on their performance. Under such plans, certain federal programs might pay a doc a bonus, for example, for providing recommended blood tests to diabetes patients. But researchers say this push in Medicare and other programs may have some negative consequences based on their new projections. Instead of just cutting medical costs across the board, as advocates hope, this step, unless adjustments are factored in, also may reduce more the revenue for docs who work in under-served, poor, minority communities and ultimately cause them to stop serving them. That would be an especially troubling result as the studies by the Westside think tank also underscore that a key way for the country to improve health care and cut costs to strengthen the system based on primary care physicians.

Will primary docs' performance pay end up hurting poor, minority patients?

In East L.A., students help cut DNA case backlog

From CSULA

While the hours devoted and the actual duties may seem relatively modest, the actions by a quartet of graduate students in East L.A. are not. They're quietly working to help rectify what many advocates have seen as a crime atop a crime -- the budget- and bureaucracy-related backlog that threatens to keep victims of sexual assaults from the assurance that some nasty criminals might never be brought to justice. Aspiring criminalists are working under a $1 million federal appropriation to assist the Los Angeles police and sheriff's departments in reducing the backlog of evidence processing in rape and other sexual assault cases. The students aren't testing the DNA collected in evidence kits. Instead, they are working through the case files with their training and expertise, helping investigators, prosecutors and crime lab personnel figure which kits most urgently and productively need handling, especially to potentially identify attackers via DNA, since in many sexual assault cases there already is a known perpetrator. The students' labors also help direct kits to forensics labs, where experts are freed by these earlier efforts from paperwork and case research, meaning they can do more testing and undergo more and better training. At one point, authorities estimated that the backlog in DNA evidence had reached as many as 2,000 cases, prompting a public outcry and official reactions.

Aspiring criminalists apply skills to analyze which rape kits need most urgent testing

In East LA, soaking up a key area of studies

From CSULA

Here's the perfect topic for a stormy April day: Students in East LA, especially those from under-represented minority groups, will get new chances to soak up an especially Southern California valuable field of study -- hydrology and water policy. Seven students have launched into an enhanced program that aims to give them knowledge and training in the latest on water distribution, groundwater basin management, and hydrological processes (precipitation, runoff, water contamination, and groundwater recharge). They've also tackled some field work already in the Mojave Desert and in Verde Valley, Ariz. A $250,000 U.S. education department grant is helping to underwrite the study program.

Hydrology and water policy are focus of new program offerings