Other items in this column include:
* Salk Institute, Ben-Gurion University team on brain-spine study
* Sign Man’ will be filmed at two coastal city eateries
* Political bytes
* Mazal tov! Mazal tov!
SAN DIEGO — Professor Lisa Levin of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla will be awarded the Prince Albert I Grand Medal for science on Nov. 7 in Monaco by Prince Albert II, the principality’s reigning monarch, in a ceremony that also will honor former United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.
Levin, who grew up in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles became enchanted by oceanography during her high school years when she attended summer courses in marine biology and oceanography at Humboldt State University in northern California. She went on to Harvard University, and then became a graduate student at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution where she developed her specialty of deep-sea exploration.
Publicizing the honor, Scripps Institution of Oceanography wrote on its website that Levin has been in the “forefront of research that shows how environmental conditions shape deep-sea communities on continental margins and how climate change is impacting vulnerable ecosystems in the deep sea through ocean deoxygenation.
“Levin has been a leader in advancing conservation and observation of deep-sea ecosystems, but has also made valuable contributions to the fields of coastal wetland ecology and larval connectivity.
“Her deep-sea research has been conducted over the past three decades on the margins of the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic oceans using ships, submersibles and remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) to sample and conduct experiments. She has participated in more than 45 oceanographic expeditions around the world and served as chief scientist on about a third of these. Notably, she has descended to the deep ocean more than 50 times in Alvin, a mini-submarine operated by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.”
In announcing the award, the Oceanographic Institute of Monaco said Levin was nominated because her work “seeks to highlight the need for the political, technological and economic sectors to work alongside scientists with the aim of paying more attention to the impacts of human activity on marine environments.”
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Salk Institute, Ben-Gurion University team on brain-spine study
Bradley Fikes of the San Diego Union-Tribune reported in Saturday’s edition that David Golomb of the Ben Gurion University of the Negev will work with a team of scientists from the Salk Institute for Biological Studies on a National Institutes of Health-funded study of brain and spine circuitry in mice.
The $14.3 million, five-year study will focus on how mice control their forelimb movement and how that information may be relevant to human functioning of the arms and hands. The Salk team will be led by Professor Martyn Goulding and includes Samuel Pfaff, Tatyana Sharpes, Axel Nimmerjahn and Eiman Azim.
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‘Sign Man’ will be filmed at two coastal city eateries
Ken Stone in the Times of San Diego reports on moviemaker Reuben Guberek who with co-writer Luc Fevrier-Silberman will begin on Nov. 2 shooting locally a low-budget film with music composed by Adam Wollach.
Described as an absurdist dark comedy, Sign Man tells of a sign-spinner who falls on harder times and moves in with a pizza delivery guy, who is an escalating battle with a congressional candidate who can’t be corrupted.
Guberek, who drafted his brother Gedaly to serve as a camera assistant, says the movie will have its world premiere in Utah and that he hopes to have its San Diego County premiere next year at the Oceanside Film Festival.
How low is low-budget? Guberek, an Encinitas resident, said he expects to spend only $26,000 to make the film, which will be shot at such local venues as Gianni’s Pizza in Oceanside and the Salty Frog in Imperial Beach. Guberek is a 2009 graduate of Canyon Crest Academy who went on to graduate from the USC Film School.
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Political bytes
Assemblyman and San Diego mayoral candidate Todd Gloria, touting his working class credentials, says that as the son of a maid and a gardener, “I have seen the concerns of working San Diegans neglected and misunderstood by our elected officials for far too long. With rents rising in our city, wages stagnating for workers, and our public transit being inaccessible to many—now more than ever, we need a champion for working San Diegans in City Hall.”
Ramping up the opposition to the SOS (Save Our San Diego Countryside) initiative on the March 3 ballot, San Diego Chamber of Commerce Vice President Stefanie Benvenuto, who chairs the San Diego Housing Commission, says lack of affordable housing in San Diego is an impediment to the growth of business. “Whether it’s the small embroidery shop that spends six months training staff on their machines just to have them move to Murrieta and begin the training process again, or whether we are talking about the huge life sciences companies. Even they are recognizing that the chunk of their salary that they spend on housing does not reflect the quality of life they assumed they would have when they went to school and took to these very grinding careers.” The SOS Initiative would require a county wide vote to approve housing projects with greater densities than those allowed under the county’s general plan. To read the initiative, click here.
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Mazal tov! Mazal tov!
* You might say that Hadarya Tali Levy became a double bat mitzvah this weekend. On Friday night, the Soille San Diego Hebrew Day School seventh grader led maariv services at Tifereth Israel Synagogue, and then on Saturday morning chanted a Torah portion (Bereshit) and a Haftorah at Ohr Shalom Synagogue. Her parents, Yiftach Levy and Jennifer Tabak-Levy are active in both congregations. Last Thursday morning, Hadarya, who also has performed in local theatre productions, led morning minyan services at Tifereth Israel. From strength to strength, yasher koach!
* Tifereth Israel Synagogue celebrated with Kira & Mark Thomas at a kiddush luncheon they sponsored today in celebration of their going to a beth din and a mikvah and thereby becoming Jews by choice. Baruch Haba’im!
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Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World. He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com