Media coverage of top UCI stories: Nov. 6, 2007

1. Reuters, Nov. 6, 2007
Marijuana chemical may help treat depression
UCI MENTIONED:     “These findings raise the hope that the mood-elevating properties of marijuana can be harnessed to treat depression,” said Daniele Piomelli, director of the Centre for Drug Discovery at the University of California, Irvine, who led the study. “Marijuana itself has shown no clinical use for depression. However, specific drugs that amplify the actions of natural marijuana-like transmitters in the brain are showing great promise,” he added in a statement.

First Paragraph:     A drug that boosts levels of the brain’s own “bliss” chemical can help reverse symptoms of depression in rats, US and Italian researchers reported yesterday. The drug helps maintain high levels of a compound called anandamide, named after the Sanskrit word for “bliss,” which is chemically similar to the active ingredient in marijuana.

2. Asian News International (New Delhi, India), Nov. 6, 2007
Marijuana-like brain transmitter may work as antidepressant
UCI MENTIONED:     A study has found that by enhancing the amounts of a marijuana-like brain transmitter, called anandamide, antidepressant effects were produced in test rats. The study, led by Daniele Piomelli, the Louise Turner Arnold Chair in Neurosciences and director of the Centre for Drug Discovery at the University of California, Irvine, a drug called URB597, created by the researchers, which blocked anandamide degradation in the brain, thereby increasing the levels of this chemical.

Second Paragraph:     URB597 works by inhibiting FAAH, an enzyme in the body that breaks down anandamide. Dubbed “the bliss molecule” for its similarities to the active ingredient in marijuana, anandamide is a neurotransmitter that is part of the brain’s endocannabinoid system and it has been shown to play analgesic, anti- anxiety and antidepressant roles.

3. Daily Pilot, Nov. 5, 2007
Pot properties may be used to treat depression
UCI MENTIONED:     Scientists have concluded inhibiting a certain enzyme in the brain elicits antidepressant effects in rats, similar to the “high” feeling marijuana users get. American and Italian researchers at UC Irvine concluded that blocking this specific enzyme boosts anandamide, a marijuana-like chemical, by stopping its decline in the brain of rats, school officials announced Monday.

Second Paragraph:     The scientists used URB597, a drug they created, to slow the degradation of anandamide. “These findings raise the hope that mood-elevating properties of marijuana can be harnessed to treat depression,” said Daniele Piomelli, the director for the Center for Drug Discovery at UCI. While marijuana has not proved useful for clinical treatment for depression, the findings show boosting the brain’s own chemicals similar to those in marijuana have proved effective.

4. Chicago Tribune, Nov. 6, 2007
Discoveries: New science findings
UCI MENTIONED:     Possibly opening a hopeful new door for treating brain injury, researchers at the University of California at Irvine were able to restore the memories of mice by using the brain’s own stem cells. These neural stem cells work by protecting existing cells and promoting neuronal connections. Human applications are far off, obviously, but also could help victims of stroke or dementia.

First Paragraph:     A well-balanced diet has been shown to protect against cancer and heart disease, but supplements have come up broadly lacking in that category, according to the November Harvard Men’s Health Watch.

5. The Orange County Register, Nov. 6, 2007
United Nations to confer water prize on UCI scholar (blog)
UCI MENTIONED:     The United Nations is awarding its Great Man-Made River Water Prize to Soroosh Sorooshian, a UC Irvine hydrologist who created a real-time system for monitoring how much rain is falling in arid and semi-arid regions of the world. The data has become important in preventing flooding and improving irrigation in such areas as Africa, the Middle East and Australia.

Second Paragraph:     Sorooshian will accept the award on Nov. 10, when the UN agency known as the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (or UNESCO) honors him and his colleagues in Budapest, Hungary.

6. The Orange County Register, Nov. 5, 2007
Irvine students collect more than 10,000 pounds in pennies
UCI MENTIONED:     About 30 UC Irvine Sigma Chi fraternity students volunteered at the pennies collection, unloading and weighing bags and sorting out paper rolls, plastic bags and accidental nickels.

First Paragraph:     As part of Red Ribbon week, Irvine students collected 10,823 pounds of pennies, about $16,000, to go toward drug and violence-awareness and prevention programs. Schools traded pennies for cash from students who were competing for a pizza party.

7. The Orange County Register, Nov. 5, 2007
What to do with a gifted child?
UCI MENTIONED:     Is Sahana a genius? It’s too early to tell, said Darlene Boyd, director of the UC Irvine Gifted Students Academy, which offers intensive summer enrichment programs to the nation’s brightest elementary and middle school students. But it’s highly likely that she’s gifted, Boyd said. There are signs that emerge at a young age: an unstoppable curiosity and questioning of how things work. An ability to communicate clearly and comfortably with adults. A willingness to sit and focus on a single task for at least 15 minutes: all are indicators of above-average intelligence, she said.

First Paragraph:     It’s always a little humbling when someone reminds you that Detroit is not, in fact, the capital of Michigan. And that Florida’s statehouse does not sit in Miami. And that Anchorage is not the capital of Alaska. It’s easy to cut yourself some slack … after all, third grade was a long time ago. But when it’s a Lilliputian 2-year-old ticking off the correct cities with casual aplomb, it makes you want to hang your college-educated head and hit the

8. The Orange County Register, Nov. 5, 2007
A vision for living
UCI MENTIONED:     Feinerman had spent his residency in Long Beach as part of a UC Irvine program, and he had picked up enough Vietnamese from the patients there to get through an eye exam. He imagined old farmers whose view of the world had gone yellow, and then cloudy, and then dark, as cataracts set in, untreated.

First Paragraph:     In a brightly lighted room packed with whirring machines and computer screens, Dr. Gregg Feinerman performs a kind of magic with tools as fine as eyelashes and the cool confidence of someone who changes lives for a living.

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