UCLA in the News lists selected mentions of UCLA in the world’s news media. Some articles may require registration or a subscription. See more UCLA in the News.
Can reducing fossil fuels lead to light pollution? | Los Angeles Times
Travis Longcore, an urban ecologist at UCLA, estimates that artificial lighting causes the night sky in Los Angeles to shine 1½ times brighter than a night lit by a full moon. All creatures are affected by the brighter nightscapes, especially those who cannot close the blinds for a sound sleep. “There are many, many species who don’t go out and forage during the full moon because it’s too bright and they know they’re going to be vulnerable to predators,” he said.
California so dry that rain can’t cut fire danger | Los Angeles Times
With experts now predicting a rare, third consecutive year of dry La Niña conditions, the combination of winds and desiccated fuel could prove perilous. “We still have to be really vigilant,” said Alex Hall, director of the Center for Climate Science at UCLA. “The heart of the fire season — especially for Southern California and the central part of California — is coming up.”
Experts say elimination of monkeypox possible | ABC News
“There’s a lot to be encouraged by” but it’s “going to depend upon if we’re able to contain this in the human population,” said Dr. Anne Rimoin, a professor of epidemiology at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Mental health is political | New York Times
(Commentary by UCLA’s Danielle Carr) But are we really in a mental health crisis? A crisis that affects mental health is not the same thing as a crisis of mental health. To be sure, symptoms of crisis abound. But in order to come up with effective solutions, we first have to ask: a crisis of what?
Walnuts linked to reduced heart disease risk | Healthline
“Walnuts are extremely high in both monounsaturated fats, which are heart healthy, and also polyunsaturated fats (omega-3s) from ALA — the plant-based source of ALA,” said Dana Ellis Hunnes, PhD, MPH, RD, a senior clinical dietitian at UCLA Medical Center, assistant professor UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, and author of “Recipe for Survival.”
The war on Southern California’s urban coyotes | Los Angeles Times
Chase Niesner, a PhD candidate at the Institute for the Environment and Sustainability at UCLA, has coined the phrase “cloud coyotes” to describe the disharmony between urban dwellers and the intelligent predators that have lived here for 47,000 years … “They are manifestations of people’s need to domesticate every square foot of space in the region,” he said, “to the level of comfort and safety they feel within their own homes.”
Paid family leave for working families | Capital & Main
“California in the past has stepped up to the plate in the absence of federal action, and that is to be applauded,” said Misael Galdámez, a research analyst at the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute (LPPI). “But policy is often a work in progress. SB 951 builds off what came before it.”
How willing are children to care for aging stepparents? | Phys.org
“It is possible that norms regarding such support may shift as stepfamilies become more common,” said co-author Judith Seltzer, research professor at UCLA’s California Center for Population Research. “Whether these types of stepfamilies with stronger ties will become more or less common over time is an important outstanding question for family demographers.”
The true origin of South America’s canids | Scienmag
South America has more canid species than any place on Earth, and a surprising new UCLA-led genomic analysis shows that all these doglike animals evolved from a single species that entered the continent just 3.5 million to 4 million years ago. Scientists had long assumed that these diverse species sprang from multiple ancestors. (UCLA’s Robert Wayne and Daniel Chavez are quoted.)
Hospital financing in black and white | STAT
(Commentary co-written by UCLA’s Gracie Himmelstein) During our training as doctors, we have rotated through safety-net hospitals, elite academic medical centers, and private clinics. The resources for patient care and comfort were sumptuous in some facilities, spartan in others. The differences were often night and day or, as we quantified in a later analysis, black and white: we cared for far more white patients at highly resourced facilities and many more Black patients and other patients of color at those with fewer resources.
COVID still kills, but demographics are shifting | California Healthline
Clearly, vaccinations made a difference. COVID death rates fell in recent months as COVID shots and prior infections afforded much of the population significant protection against severe illness, said Dr. Timothy Brewer, a professor of medicine and epidemiology at UCLA. Brewer said the omicron variant, while more transmissible than earlier strains, appears to be a milder version of the virus.
