California Is a Nobel Powerhouse

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You can keep your Oscars, Emmys, Grammys, and Tonys. Take your Pulitzers, Bookers, and Peabodys, too. Even the Pritzker and the Fields Medal don’t quite measure up. For me, nothing competes with the Nobel Prize as a symbol that someone has truly changed the world.

I’m not a scientist, but my mind lives in that space. Science, more than anything else, runs the world and reshapes it. This newsletter was born out of my fascination with how things work and the quiet mechanics behind the visible world and my love for all that California has to offer in the way of innovation and natural beauty. I love standing in front of something familiar and asking: why? how? what exactly is going on here? And nothing satisfies that intense curiosity more than science.

That said, I’ve never loved the word science. It feels cold and sometimes intimidating, as if it applies to people in lab coats and not to everyone else. I kinda wish there were a better word for that spirit of discovery that lives in all of us. Maybe it’s wonder. Maybe curiosity. I dunno. “Science” turns people off sometimes, unfortunately.

Whatever you call it, the Nobel Prize represents the highest acknowledgment of that pursuit. It is the world’s way of saying: this mattered. This changed something. And there are few places (if any) on Earth that can rival California when it comes to the number of people who have earned that honor.

This year, 2025, was no different. Three of the Nobel Prizes announced this week carried California fingerprints, adding to a tradition that stretches back more than a century.

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine came first. It went to Mary Brunkow, Shimon Sakaguchi, and Fred Ramsdell, the last of whom studied at UCLA and UC San Diego. (In epic California fashion, Ramsdell, who studied at UCLA and UC San Diego, didn’t even learn he’d become a Nobel laureate until after returning from a trip deep into the Wyoming wilderness, where he’d been out of contact with the outside world. What’s more Californian than that?) Their research on regulatory T cells explained how the immune system knows when to attack and when to stand down. Ramsdell’s discovery of a key gene that controls these cells has transformed how scientists think about autoimmune disease and organ transplantation.

Next came the Nobel Prize in Physics, awarded to John Clarke of UC Berkeley, Michel H. Devoret of UC Santa Barbara and Yale, and John M. Martinis of UC Santa Barbara (big shout out to UCSB!). Their award honored pioneering work that revealed how the strange laws of quantum mechanics can be seen in circuits large enough to hold in your hand. Beginning in Clarke’s Berkeley lab in the 1980s, the trio built superconducting loops that behaved like subatomic particles, “tunneling” and flipping between quantum energy states. Those experiments helped create the foundation for today’s quantum computers.

The Chemistry Prize followed a day later, shared by Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson, and Omar M. Yaghi of UC Berkeley for discoveries in metal–organic frameworks, or MOFs. These are crystalline materials so porous that a single gram can hold an entire roomful of gas (mind blown). MOFs are now used to capture carbon dioxide, filter water, and even pull drinking water from desert air. Yaghi’s Berkeley lab coined the term “reticular chemistry” to describe this new molecular architecture. His work has become one of California’s most important contributions to the climate sciences.

California Institute of Technology (Photo: Erik Olsen)

Those three announcements in as many days lit up California’s scientific community, has garnered many headlines and carried on a tradition that has made the state one of the world’s most reliable engines of Nobel-level discovery.

The University of California system now counts 74 Nobel Prizes among its faculty and researchers. 23 in physics and 16 in chemistry. Berkeley leads the list, with 26 laureates, followed by UC San Diego, UCLA, UC Santa Barbara, and UC San Francisco. Even smaller campuses, such as UC Riverside, have ties to winners like Barry Barish, who shared the 2017 Nobel in Physics for detecting gravitational waves.

Linus Pauling with an inset of his Nobel Prize in 1955 (Wikipedia – public domain)

Caltech, which I have written about extensively and is quite close to my own home, counts 47 Nobel laureates (faculty, alumni, or postdocs). Its history is the stuff of legend. In 1923, Robert Millikan won for measuring the charge of the electron. In 1954, Linus Pauling received the Chemistry Prize for explaining the nature of the chemical bond. He later won the Peace Prize for his anti-nuclear activism, making him the only person to win two unshared Nobels.

Stanford University sits not far behind, with 36 Nobel winners in its history and about 20 currently active in its community. From the development of transistors and lasers to modern work in medicine and economics, Stanford’s laureates have changed the modern world in ways that is impossible to quantify, but profound in their impact.

These numbers tell a clear story: since the mid-twentieth century, about one in every four Nobel Prizes in the sciences awarded to Americans has gone to researchers based at California institutions, an extraordinary concentration of curiosity, intellect, and ambition within a single state.

University of California Santa Barbara (Photo: Erik Olsen)

California’s Nobel dominance began early. In the 1930s, UC Berkeley’s Ernest Lawrence invented the cyclotron, a device that would transform physics and eventually medicine. Caltech, meanwhile, became a magnet for the world’s brightest physicists and chemists.

Over the decades, California’s universities turned their focus to molecular biology, biochemistry, and genetics. In the 1980s, the state’s physicists and engineers drove advances in lasers, semiconductors, and now, quantum circuits. And as biotechnology rose, San Diego and the Bay Area became ground zero for breakthroughs in medicine and life sciences. One of the great moments in genetics took place in Asilomar on the coast.

Nobel Museum in Stockholm, Sweden (Photo: Erik Olsen)

This is all about more than geography and climate (although those are a big sell, for sure). California’s research institutions kick ass because they operate as ecosystems rather than islands. Berkeley physicists collaborate with engineers at Stanford. Caltech chemists trade ideas with biotech firms in San Diego. Graduate students drift between labs, startups, and national research centers like Lawrence Livermore and JPL. The boundaries between university and industry blur, with campuses like Stanford turning breakthrough discoveries into thriving commercial ventures (look how many of our big tech brains came out of Stanford). In California, research doesn’t end in the lab, it often turns into companies, technologies, and treatments that generate both knowledge and enormous economic value. Just look at AI today.

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I think the secret is cultural. Over the years, I’ve lived on the East coast for almost two decades, and abroad for several as well, and nothing compares to the California vibe. California has never been afraid of big risks. Its scientists are encouraged to chase questions that might take decades to answer (see our recent story on just this idea). There’s an openness to uncertainty here that works well in the natural sciences, but can also be found in Hollywood, Silicon Valley and, of course, space exploration.

When next year’s round of early morning calls comes from Stockholm, it is a good bet that someone in California will pick up. Maybe a physicist in Pasadena, a chemist in Berkeley, or a physician in La Jolla. Maybe they’ll pick up the phone in bed, maybe a text from a spouse while camping, or on a morning jog. That’s when a Swedish-accented voice tells them that the world has just caught up to what they’ve been quietly building for years.

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A Tiny California Seaweed Could Make a Big Dent in Livestock Methane

Flasks of *Asparagopsis taxiformis* growing at Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Researchers are studying this red seaweed for its potential to slash methane emissions from cattle when added in small amounts to their feed. (Photo: Erik Olsen)

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Inside a long, brightly lit basement lab at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, a large aquarium filled with live corals sits against the wall, the vibrant shapes and colors of the coral standing out against the otherwise plain white surroundings. Nearby, in a side alcove, dozens of glass flasks bubble with aerated water, each holding tiny crimson clusters of seaweed swirling in suspension, resembling miniature lava lamps. These fragile red fragments, born in California and raised under tightly controlled conditions, are part of a global effort to harness seaweed to fight climate change.

Cattle and other ruminant livestock are among the largest contributors to methane emissions worldwide, releasing vast amounts of the gas through digestion and eructation. Burps, not farts. The distinction is not especially important, but it matters because critics of climate science often mock the idea of “cow farts” driving climate change. In reality, the methane comes primarily from cow burps, not flatulence.

But I digress.

Cattle at Harris Ranch in California’s Central Valley, one of the largest beef producers in the United States. Livestock operations like this are a major source of methane emissions, a greenhouse gas more than 80 times as potent as carbon dioxide over a 20-year period. (Photo: Erik Olsen)

Globally, livestock are responsible for roughly 14 percent of all human-induced greenhouse gases, with methane from cattle making up a significant portion of that total. The beef and dairy industries alone involve more than a billion head of cattle, producing meat and milk that fuel economies but also generating methane on a scale that rivals emissions from major industrial sectors. Because methane is so potent, trapping more than 80 times as much heat as carbon dioxide over a 20-year period, the livestock industry’s footprint has become a central focus for climate scientists searching for solutions.

Enter Jennifer Smith and her colleagues at the Smith Lab at Scripps in beautiful La Jolla, California. Their team is tackling urgent environmental challenges, from understanding coral die-offs to developing strategies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, among them, the cultivation of seaweed to curb methane from cattle.

The seaweed species is Asparagopsis taxiformis. Native to tropical and warm temperate seas and found off the coast of California, in fact right here off the coast in San Diego, it produces natural compounds such as bromoform that interfere with the microbes in a cow’s stomach that generate methane gas, significantly reducing the production of methane and, of course, it’s exhalation by the animals we eat. It turns out the seaweed, when added to animal feed can be very effective:

Asparagopsis taxiformis, commonly known as red sea plume, a tropical red algae being studied for its ability to cut methane emissions from cattle. (Photo: Wikipedia)

“You need to feed the cows only less than 1% of their diet with this red algae and it can reduce up to 99% of their methane emissions,” said Dr. Or Ben Zvi, an Israeli postdoctoral researcher at Scripps who studies both corals and seaweeds.

Trials in Australia, California, and other regions have shown just how potent this seaweed can be. As Dr. Ben Zvi indicated, even at tiny doses, fractions of a percent of a cow’s feed, other studies have shown that it can reduce methane by 30 to 90 percent, depending on conditions and preparation. Such results suggest enormous potential, but only if enough of the seaweed can be produced consistently and sustainably.

“At the moment it is quite labor intensive,” says Ben Zvi. “We’re developing workflows to create a more streamlined and cost-effective industry.”

Which explains to bubbling flasks around me now.

*Scripps Institution of Oceanography* at UC San Diego (Photo: Erik Olsen)

The Smith lab here at Scripps studies every stage of the process, from identifying which strains of Asparagopsis thrive locally to testing how temperature, light, and carbon dioxide affect growth and bromoform content. Dr. Ben Zvi is focused on the life cycle and photosynthesis of the species, refining culture techniques that could make large-scale cultivation possible. At Scripps, environmental physiology experiments show that local strains grow best at 22 to 26 °C and respond well to elevated CO₂, information that could guide commercial farming in Southern California.

The challenges, however, are considerable. Wild harvesting cannot meet demand, and cultivating seaweed at scale requires reliable methods, stable yields, and affordable costs. Bromoform content varies widely depending on strain and growing conditions, so consistency remains an issue. Some trials have noted side effects such as reduced feed intake or excess mineral uptake, and long-term safety must be established since we’re talking about animals that we breed and raise to eat.

“It’s still a very young area, and we’re working on the legislation of it,” says Ben Zvi. “We need to make it legal to feed to a cow that eventually we either drink their milk or eat their meat. We need for it to be safe for human consumption.”

And, of course, large-scale aquaculture raises ecological questions, from nutrient demands and pollution to the fate of volatile compounds like bromoform.

To overcome these obstacles, collaborations are underway. UC San Diego and UC Davis have launched a pilot project under the UC Carbon Neutrality Initiative to test production methods and carbon benefits. In 2024, CH4 Global, a U.S.-based company with operations in New Zealand and Australia that develops seaweed feed supplements to cut livestock methane, partnered with Scripps to design cultivation systems that are efficient, inexpensive, and scalable. Within the Smith Lab, researchers are continuing to probe the biology of Asparagopsis, mapping its genetics, fine-tuning its culture, and testing ways to maximize both growth and methane-suppressing compounds.

At a time when university-based science faces immense pressures, the Smith Lab at Scripps provides a glimpse of research that is making a real impact. The coral tanks against the wall belong to another project at the lab, and we have another story coming soon about the research that readers will find very interesting, but the bubbling flasks in the alcove reveal how breakthroughs often start with small details. In this case, the discovery that a chemical in a widely available seaweed could have such a dramatic, and apparently harmless, effect on the methane that animals make in their guts. These modest but powerful steps are shaping solutions to global challenges, and California, with its wealth of scientific talent and institutions, remains at the forefront. It is one of many other stories we want to share, from inside the labs to the wide open spaces of the state’s natural landscapes.

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The Physics and Geology of The Wedge, California’s Most Dangerous Wave

Dangerous surf at The Wedge in Newport Beach, California (Photo: Erik Olsen)

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Having spent much of my youth in Newport Beach, my life was shaped by the ocean. I spent countless days in the surf, bodyboarding, bodysurfing, or playing volleyball on the sand with friends. When a southern storm rolled through, we’d rush to Big Corona and throw ourselves into the heavy swells, often getting slammed hard and learning deep respect for the ocean, a respect that I still harbor today. Sometimes the waves were so large they were genuinely terrifying, the kind of surf that would have made my mother gasp, had this not been an era when parents rarely knew what their kids were doing from dawn to dusk. That freedom, especially in Southern California, made the ocean feel like both a playground and a proving ground.

Across the channel at the Newport jetty was where the action was most intense. The surf was bigger, louder. We sat on the sand and held back, watching the brave and sometimes the foolish throw themselves into the water. That place, then and now, is called the Wedge.

The Wedge in Newport Beach, California (Photo: Alex Verharst 2016)

There is something unforgettable about the Wedge and the way its waves crash with such raw force. Sometimes they detonate just offshore, sending water skyrocketing into the air; other times they slam thunderously against the sand, eliciting groans and whoops from bystanders. The waves behave strangely at the Wedge, smashing into one another, often combining their force, and creating moments of exquisite chaos.

These colliding waves are what make the place both spectacular and dangerous, the result of a unique mix of physics and geology that exists almost nowhere else on earth. That combination has made it, to this day, one of the world’s most famous surf and bodysurfing spots. If you want a glimpse of what I mean, just search YouTube, where the insanity speaks for itself. This compilation is from earlier this year.

And of course, who could forget this one surfer’s unique brand of SoCal eloquence.

So how did the Wedge turn into one of the most famous and dangerous surf spots? The truth is, it’s mostly the result of human engineering.

The Wedge with Newport Harbor’s West Jetty in the background (Photo: California Beaches)

The Wedge’s origin story begins in the 1930s, when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers extended Newport Harbor’s West Jetty to protect the harbor mouth from sand buildup and currents. What no one anticipated was that this angled wall of rock would create a perfect mirror for waves arriving from the south and southwest. Instead of dispersing, these waves slam into the jetty and reflect diagonally back toward the shore. The reflected energy doesn’t dissipate, it collides with the next incoming wave. When the two wave crests line up in phase, their energies combine, and the result is a much steeper, taller, and more powerful wave. In physics this is known as constructive interference: two sets of energy stacking into a single, towering peak.

This wave-doubling effect only works under specific conditions. Long-period south swells, often generated by hurricanes off Mexico or storms deep in the South Pacific, line up nearly parallel to the jetty. Their orientation means maximum contact and reflection. Surfers and bodysurfers describe the result as a pyramid-shaped breaker, or wedge, rising steeply before collapsing with extraordinary force. On the biggest days, these waves can reach 20 to 30 feet, twice the size of surrounding surf.

Crowds gather to watch the carnage at The Wedge in Newport Beach (Photo by D Ramey Logan)

Geology and geography make the situation even more dramatic. The seafloor near The Wedge slopes upward very steeply into a narrow strip of beach. Instead of allowing waves to break gradually, the bathymetry forces them to jack up suddenly, creating a thick lip that pitches forward into shallow water. It’s called a shorebreak, and man, they can be dangerous. More on that in a moment.

Unlike classic point breaks such as Malibu, where waves peel cleanly along a gradual reef, The Wedge produces brutal closeouts: vertical walls of water that crash all at once, leaving no escape route.

It actually can get worse. After each wave explodes on the beach, the backwash races seaward, colliding with the next incoming swell and adding more turbulence. Surfers call it chaos; lifeguards call it dangerous, even life-threatening. Spinal injuries, broken bones, and concussions are common at The Wedge. By 2013, the Encyclopedia of Surfing estimated that the Wedge had claimed eight lives, left 35 people paralyzed, and sent thousands more to the hospital with broken bones, dislocations, and other trauma—making it the most injury-prone wave break in the world. A 2020 epidemiological survey places The Wedge among the most lethal surf breaks globally (alongside Pipeline and Teahupo’o), largely due to head-first “over the falls” impacts on the shallow sea floor.

Interesting fact: Long before the Wedge was built, the waves pounding that corner of the Newport Beach jetty were already fierce. In 1926, Hollywood icon John Wayne (then still Marion Morrison) tried bodysurfing there while he was a USC football player. He was slammed into the sand, shattering his shoulder and ending his athletic scholarship. The accident closed the door on his football career but opened the one that led him to Hollywood stardom.

Oceanographers have studied the physics behind the Wedge’s unique surfbreak in broader terms. Research into wave reflection and interference confirms what locals have known for decades: man-made structures like jetties can redirect swell energy in ways that amplify, rather than reduce, wave height. Studies on steep nearshore bathymetry show how sudden shoaling increases the violence of breaking waves. The Wedge combines both effects in one location, making it a rare and extreme case study in coastal dynamics. In other words, yes, it’s gnarly.

Of course, with all that danger comes spectacle, and when the Wedge is firing, it’s not unusual for hundreds of spectators to line the sand and jetty to watch. In August 2025, the California Coastal Commission approved plans for a 200-foot ADA-compliant concrete pathway and a 10-foot-wide viewing pad along the northern jetty, designed to make the experience safer and more inclusive. The project will provide better access for people using wheelchairs, walkers, and strollers, while also giving life guards and first responders improved vantage points when the surf turns chaotic.

I still get to the Wedge on occasion to watch the carnage. And while in my younger years, I might have ventured out to catch a wave or two if the conditions were relatively mellow, today, I prefer the view from shore, leaving the powerful surf to the younger bodysurfers hungry for a rush.

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The Salton Sea Was California’s Strangest Catastrophe

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In California’s southeastern desert, the Salton Sea stretches across a wide, shimmering basin, a lake where there shouldn’t be one. At about 340 square miles, it’s the state’s largest lake. But it wasn’t created by natural forces. It was the result of a major engineering failure. I’ve long been fascinated with the place: its contradictions, its strangeness, its collision of nature and human ambition. It reflects so many of California’s tensions: water and drought, industry and wilderness, beauty and decay. And it was only relatively recently that I came to understand not just how the Salton Sea came to exist, but how remarkable the region’s geological past really is, and how it could play a major role in the country’s sustainable energy future.

In the early 1900s, the Imperial Valley was seen as promising farmland: its deep, silty soil ideal for agriculture, but the land was arid and desperately needed irrigation. To bring water from the Colorado River, engineers created the Imperial Canal, a massive infrastructure project meant to transform the desert into productive farmland. But the job was rushed. The canal had to pass through the Mexican border and loop back into California, and much of it ran through highly erodible soil. Maintenance was difficult, and by 1904, silt and sediment had clogged portions of the canal.

The Southern Pacific Railroad was forced to move it lines several times as the raging, unleashed Colorado River expanded the Salton Sea. (Credit: Imperial Irrigation District)

To keep water flowing, engineers hastily dug a temporary bypass channel south of the clogged area, hoping it would only be used for a few months. But they failed to build proper headgates, critical structures for controlling water flow. In 1905, an unusually heavy season of rain and snowmelt in the Rockies caused the Colorado River to swell. The torrent surged downriver and overwhelmed the temporary channel, carving it wider and deeper. Before long, the river completely abandoned its natural course and began flowing unchecked into the Salton Sink, an ancient, dry lakebed that had once held water during wetter epochs but had long since evaporated. (This has happened many times over in the region’s history).

For nearly two years, the Colorado River flowed uncontrolled into this depression, creating what is now known as the Salton Sea. Efforts to redirect the river back to its original course involved a frantic, expensive engineering campaign that included the Southern Pacific Railroad and U.S. government assistance. The breach wasn’t fully sealed until early 1907. By then, the sea had already formed: a shimmering, accidental lake nearly 35 miles long and 15 miles wide, with no natural outlet, in the middle of the California desert.

In the 1950s and early ’60s, the Salton Sea was a glamorous desert escape, drawing crowds with boating, fishing, and waterskiing. Resorts popped up along the shore, and celebrities like Frank Sinatra, Jerry Lewis, Rock Hudson, the Beach Boys, and the Marx Brothers came to visit and perform. It was billed as a new Palm Springs with water, until rising salinity and environmental decline ended the dream. There have been few if any similarly starge ecological accidents like it.

The erosive power of the floodwaters was immense. The river repeatedly scoured channels that created waterfalls, which cut back through the ground, eroding soil at a rate of about 1,200 meters per day and carving gorges 15 to 25 meters deep and more than 300 meters wide. (Credit: Imperial Irrigation District)

The creation of the Salton Sea was both a blessing and a curse for the people of the Imperial Valley. On the one hand, the lake provided a new source of water for irrigation, and the fertile soil around its shores proved ideal for growing crops. On the other hand, the water was highly saline, and the lake became increasingly polluted over time, posing a threat to both human health and the environment.

Recently, with most flows diverted from the Salton Sea for irrigation, it has begun to dry up and is now considered a major health hazard, as toxic dust is whipped up by heavy winds in the area. The disappearance of the Salton sea has also been killing off fish species that attract migratory birds.

The New York Times recently wrote about the struggles that farmers face as the Salton Sea disappears, and how the sea itself will likely disappear entirely at some point.

“There’s going to be collateral damage everywhere,” Frank Ruiz, a program director with California Audubon, told the Times. “Less water coming to the farmers, less water coming into the Salton Sea. That’s just the pure math.”

Salton Sea can be beautiful, if toxic (Photo: Wikipedia)

To me, the story of the Salton Sea is fascinating: a vivid example of how human intervention can radically reshape the environment. Of course, there are countless cases of humans altering the natural world, but this one feels particularly surreal: an enormous inland lake created entirely by accident, simply because a river, the Colorado, one of the most powerful in North America, was diverted from its course. It’s incredible, and incredibly strange. What makes the region even more fascinating, though, is that the human-made lake sits in a landscape already full of geological drama.

The area around the Salton Sea is located in a techtonically active region, with the San Andreas Fault running directly through it. The San Andreas Fault is a major plate boundary, where the Pacific Plate is moving north relative to the North American Plate (see our story about how fast it’s moving here). As pretty much every Californian knows, the legendary fault is responsible for the earthquakes and other tectonic activity across much of California.

If you look at a map of the area, you can see how the low lying southern portion of the Salton Sea basin goes directly into the Gulf of California. Over millions of years, the desert basin has been flooded numerous times throughout history by what is now the Gulf of California. As the fault system cuts through the region, the Pacific Plate is slowly sliding northwest, gradually pulling the Baja Peninsula away from mainland Mexico. Over millions of years, this tectonic motion is stretching and thinning the crust beneath the Imperial Valley and Salton Basin. If the process continues, geologists believe the area could eventually flood again, forming a vast inland sea, perhaps even making an island out of what is today Baja California. (We wrote about this earlier.)

Entrance to the Salton Sea Recreation Area (Wikipedia)

Yet even as the land shifts beneath it, the Salton Sea’s future may be shaped not just by geology, but by energy. Despite the ongoing controversy over the evaporating water body, the Salton Sea may play a crucial role in California’s renewable energy future. The region sits atop the Imperial Valley’s geothermal hotspot, where underground heat from all that tectonic activity creates ideal conditions for producing clean, reliable energy. Already home to one of the largest geothermal fields in the country, the area is now gaining attention for something even more strategic: lithium.

*An aerial view of geothermal power plants among the farmland around the southern shore of the Salton Sea.*
*(Credit: Courtesy Lawrence Berkeley National Lab*)

Beneath the surface, the hot, mineral-rich brine used in geothermal energy production contains high concentrations of lithium, a critical component in electric vehicle batteries. Known as “Lithium Valley,” the Salton Sea region has become the focus of several ambitious extraction projects aiming to tap into this resource without the large environmental footprint of traditional lithium mining. Gov. Gavin Newsom called the area is “the Saudi Arabia of lithium.” Even the Los Angeles Times has weighed in, claiming that “California’s Imperial Valley will be a major player in the clean energy transition.”

Companies like Controlled Thermal Resources (CTR) and EnergySource are developing direct lithium extraction (DLE) technologies that pull lithium from brine as part of their geothermal operations. The promise is a closed-loop system that produces both renewable energy and battery-grade lithium on the same site. If it proves viable, the Salton Sea could significantly reduce U.S. dependence on foreign lithium and cement California’s role in the global shift to clean energy. That’s a big if…and one we’ll be exploring in depth in future articles.

Toxic salt ponds along the Western shoreline (Photo: EmpireFootage)

Such projects could also potentially provide significant economic investment in the region and help power California’s green energy ambitions. So for a place that looks kind of wrecked and desolate, there actually a lot going on. We promise to keep an eye on what happens. Stay tuned.

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The Caltech Experiment That Proved How Life Copies Itself

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I love reading New York Times obituaries, not because of any morbid fascination with death, but because they offer a window into extraordinary lives that might otherwise go unnoticed. These tributes often highlight people whose work had real impact, even if their names were never widely known. Unlike the celebrity coverage that fills so much of the media, these obituaries can be quietly riveting, full of depth, insight, and genuine accomplishment.

For two years I managed the New York Times video obituary series called Last Word. We interviewed people of high accomplishment who had made a difference in the world BEFORE they died, thus giving them a chance, at a latter age (in our case 75 was the youngest, but more often people would be in their 80s) to tell their own stories about their lives. They signed an agreement acknowledging that the interview would not be shown until after their death. Hence the series title: Last Word. Anyway, when I ran the program, I produced video obituaries for people as varied as Neil Simon, Hugh Hefner, Sandra Day O’Connor, Philip Roth, Edward Albee, and my favorite, the great Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson. Spending time and learning about their lives in their own words was a joy.

All of that is to say that obituaries often reveal the lives and accomplishments of people who have changed the world. These are stories that might never be told so thoughtfully or thoroughly anywhere else.

Which bring us to a quiet lab at Caltech in 1958, where two young biologists performed what some still call “the most beautiful experiment in biology”. Their names were Matthew Meselson and Franklin Stahl, and what they uncovered helped confirm the foundational model of modern genetics. With a simple centrifuge, a dash of heavy nitrogen, and a bold hypothesis, they confirmed how DNA, life’s instruction manual, copies itself. And all of it took place right here in California at one of the world’s preeminent scientific institutions: the California Institute of Technology or CalTech, in Pasadena. The state is blessed to have so many great scientific minds and institutions where people work intensely, often in obscurity, to uncover the secrets of life and the universe.

Franklin Stahl died recently at his home in Oregon, where he had spent much of his career teaching and researching genetics. The New York Times obituary offered a thoughtful account of his life and work, capturing his contributions to science with typical respect. But after reading it, I realized I still didn’t fully grasp the experiment that made him famous, the Meselson-Stahl experiment, the one he conducted with Matthew Meselson at Caltech. It was mentioned, of course, but not explained in a way that brought its brilliance to life. So I decided to dig a little deeper.

Franklin Stahl in an undated photo. (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library and Archives)

The Meselson-Stahl experiment didn’t just prove a point. It told a story about how knowledge is built: carefully, creatively, and with a precision that leaves no room for doubt. It became a model for how science can answer big questions with simple, clean logic and careful experimentation. And it all happened in California.

Let’s back up: When Watson and Crick proposed their now-famous double helix structure of DNA in 1953 (with significant, poorly recognized help from Rosalind Franklin), they also suggested a theory about how it might replicate. Their idea was that DNA separates into two strands, and each strand acts as a template to build a new one. That would mean each new DNA molecule is made of one old strand and one new. It was called the semi-conservative model. But there were other theories too. One proposed that the entire double helix stayed together and served as a model for building an entirely new molecule, leaving the original untouched. Another suggested that DNA might break apart and reassemble in fragments, mixing old and new in chunks. These were all plausible ideas. But only one could be true.

Watson and Crick with their model of the DNA molecule (Photo: A Barrington Brown/Gonville & Caius College/Science Photo Library)

To find out, Meselson and Stahl grew E. coli bacteria in a medium containing heavy nitrogen (nitrogen is a key component of DNA), a stable isotope that made the DNA denser than normal. After several generations, all the bacterial DNA was fully “heavy.” Then they transferred the bacteria into a medium with normal nitrogen and let them divide. After one generation, they spun the DNA in a centrifuge that separated it by weight. If DNA copied itself conservatively, the centrifuge would show two bands: one heavy, one light. If it was semi-conservative, it would show a single band at an intermediate weight. When they performed the experiment, the result was clear. There was only one band, right between the two expected extremes. One generation later, the DNA split into two bands: one light, one intermediate. The semi-conservative model was correct.

Their results were published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in 1958 and sent shockwaves through the biological sciences.

Meselson and Stahl experiment in diagram.

To me, the experiment brought to mind the work of Gregor Mendel, an Augustinian monk who, in the mid-1800s, quietly conducted his experiments in the garden of a monastery in Brno, now part of the Czech Republic. By breeding pea plants and meticulously tracking their traits over generations, Mendel discovered the basic principles of heredity, dominant and recessive traits, segregation, and independent assortment, decades before the word “gene” even existed. Like Mendel’s experiments, the Meselson-Stahl study was striking in its simplicity and clarity. Mendel revealed the rules; Meselson and Stahl uncovered the mechanism.

There’s a fantastic video where the two men discuss the experiment that is worth watching. It was produced produced by iBiology, part of the nonprofit Science Communication Lab in Berkeley. In it Meselson remembered how the intellectual climate of CalTech at the time was one of taking bold steps, not with the idea of making a profit, but for the sheer joy of discovery: “We could do whatever we wanted,” he says. “It was very unusual for such young guys to do such an important experiment.”

Most people think of Caltech as a temple of physics. It’s where Einstein lectured, where the Jet Propulsion Laboratory was born (CalTech still runs it), and where the gravitational waves that rippled through spacetime were detected. But Caltech has a quieter legacy in biology. Its biologists were among the first to take on the structure and function of molecules inside cells. The institute helped shape molecular biology as a new discipline at a time when biology was still often considered a descriptive science. Long before Silicon Valley made biotech a household term, breakthroughs in genetics and neurobiology were already happening in Southern California.

Meselson and Stahl in the iBiology video (Screen grab: Science Communication Lab)

The Meselson-Stahl experiment is still taught in biology classrooms (my high school age daughter knew of it) because of how perfectly it answered the question it set out to ask. It was elegant, efficient, and unmistakably clear. And it showed how a well-constructed experiment can illuminate a fundamental truth. Their discovery laid the groundwork for everything from cancer research to forensic DNA analysis to CRISPR gene editing. Any time a scientist edits a gene or maps a mutation, they are relying on that basic understanding of how DNA replicates.

In a time when science often feels far too complex, messy, or inaccessible, the Meselson-Stahl experiment is a reminder that some of the most important discoveries are also the simplest. Think Occam’s Razor. Two young scientists, some nitrogen, a centrifuge, a clever idea, and a result that changed biology forever.

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Caltech Fly Labs and a Century of Genetic Discovery

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Few organisms in the history of science have been as important to our understanding of life as the humble fruit fly. The genus Drosophila melanogaster holds a particularly esteemed spot among the dozens of model organisms that provide insight into life’s inner workings. For more than 100 years, this tiny, but formidable creature has allowed scientists to unwind the infinitesimal mechanisms that make every living creature on the planet what it is.

And much of the work to understand the fruit fly has taken place and is taking place now, right here in California at the Cal Tech fly labs.

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Over the decades, Drosophila have been key in studying brain, behavior, development, flight mechanics, genetics, and more in many labs across the globe. These tiny, round-bodied, (usually) red-eyed flies might appear irrelevant, but their simplicity makes them ideal models. They’re easy to breed—mix males and females in a test tube, and in 10 days, you have new flies. Their 14,000-gene DNA sequence is relatively short, but extremely well-studied and there are some 8,000 genes which have human analogs. (The fly’s entire genome was fully sequenced in 2000.) Crucially, a century of fruit fly research, much of it led by Caltech, has produced genetic tools for precise genome manipulation and shed light on the act of flight itself.

But how did Drosophila become the darling of genetics?

In the early 20th century, the field of genetics was still in its infancy. Thomas Hunt Morgan, a biologist at Columbia University with a background in embryology and a penchant for skepticism began with an effort to find a simple, cheap, easy-to-breed model organism. At Columbia, he established a laboratory in room 613 of Schermerhorn Hall. This cramped space became famous for groundbreaking research in genetics, with Morgan making innovative use of the common fruit fly.

Thomas Hunt Morgan in the Fly Room at Columbia, 1922 (Cal Tech Archives)

Morgan, who joined Columbia University after teaching at Bryn Mawr College, chose the fruit fly for its ease of breeding and rapid reproduction cycle. Morgan observed a male fly with white eyes instead of the usual red. Curious about this trait’s inheritance, he conducted breeding experiments and discovered that eye color is linked to the X chromosome. He realized a male fly, with one X and one Y chromosome, inherits the white-eye trait from its mother, who provides the X chromosome. This led him to conclude that other traits might also be linked to chromosomes. His extensive experiments in this lab confirmed the chromosomal theory of inheritance, demonstrating that genes are located on chromosomes and that some genes are linked and inherited together.

After his groundbreaking research in genetics at Columbia University, Morgan moved to Pasadena and joined the faculty at CalTech in 1928, where he became the first chairman of its Biology Division and continued his influential work in the field of genetics establishing a strong genetics research program. Morgan’s work, supported by notable students like Alfred Sturtevant and Hermann Muller, laid the foundation for modern genetics and earned him the Nobel Prize in 1933.

CalTech then became a world center for genetics research using the fruit fly. Other notable names involved in fruit fly research at CalTech include Ed Lewis, a student of Morgan, who focused his research on the bithorax complex, a cluster of genes responsible for the development of body segments in Drosophila. His meticulous work over several decades revealed the existence of homeotic and Hox genes, which control the basic body plan of an organism (for which he won the 1995 Nobel Prize).

Novel prize winner Edward Lewis (Nobel Prize.org)

Seymour Benzer, another luminary at CalTech, shifted the focus from genes to behavior. Benzer’s innovative experiments in the 1960s and 1970s sought to understand how genes influence behavior. His work demonstrated that mutations in specific genes could affect circadian rhythms, courtship behaviors, and learning in fruit flies. Benzer’s approach was revolutionary, merging genetics with neurobiology and opening new avenues for exploring the genetic basis of behavior. His contributions are chronicled in Jonathan Weiner’s “Time, Love, Memory: A Great Biologist and His Quest for the Origins of Behavior,” a riveting account of Benzer’s quest to uncover the genetic roots of behavior. Lewis Wolpert in his review for the New York Times wrote, “Benzer has many gifts beyond cleverness. He has that special imagination and view of the world that makes a great scientist.”

Since Benzer’s retirement in 1991, new vanguard in genetics research has taken over at CalTech, which continues to be at the forefront of scientific discovery, driven by a new generation of researchers who are unraveling the complexities of the brain and behavior with unprecedented precision.

Elizabeth Hong is a rising star in biology, with her Hong lab investigating how the brain orders and encodes complex odors. Her research focuses on the olfactory system of Drosophila, which, despite its simplicity, shares many features with the olfactory systems of more complex organisms. Hong’s work involves mapping the synapses and neural circuits that process olfactory information, seeking to understand how different odors are represented in the brain and how these representations influence behavior. Her findings could have profound implications for understanding sensory processing and neural coding in general.

David Anderson, another prominent figure at Caltech, studies the neural mechanisms underlying emotions and behaviors. While much of Anderson’s work now focuses on mice as a model organism, the lab’s research explores how different neural circuits contribute to various emotional states, such as fear, aggression, and pleasure, essentially how emotions are encoded in the circuitry and chemistry of the brain, and how they control animal behavior. Using advanced techniques like optogenetics and calcium imaging, Anderson’s lab can manipulate specific neurons and observe the resulting changes in behavior. This work aims to bridge the gap between neural activity and complex emotional behaviors, providing insights into mental health disorders and potential therapeutic targets.

In 2018, the Anderson laboratory identified a cluster of just three neurons in the fly brain that controls a “threat display” — a specific set of behaviors male fruit flies exhibit when facing a male challenger. During a threat display, a fly will extend its wings, make quick, short lunges forward, and continually reorient itself to face the intruder.

Michael Dickinson is renowned for his studies on the biomechanics and neural control of flight in Drosophila. In the Dickenson Lab, researchers combine behavioral experiments with computational models and robotic simulations, seeking to understand how flies execute complex flight maneuvers with such precision. His work has broader applications in robotics and may inspire new designs for autonomous flying robots.

“He’s a highly original scientist,” Alexander Borst, a department director at the Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology in Germany, told the New York Times.

Dickinson’s investigations also delve into how sensory information is integrated and processed to guide flight behavior, offering insights into the general principles of motor control and sensory integration.

As science advances, Caltech’s Fly Lab’s remind us of the power of curiosity, perseverance, and the endless quest to uncover the mysteries of life. The tiny fruit fly, with its simple elegance, remains a powerful model organism, driving discoveries that illuminate the complexities of biology and behavior. Just recently, scientists (though not at CalTech) unveiled the first fully image of the fruit fly brain. Smaller than a poppy seed, the brain is an astonishingly complex tangle of 140,000 neurons, joined together by more than 490 feet of wiring.

In essence, the fruit fly remains a key to unlocking the wonders and intricacies of life, and in the Fly Labs at Caltech, that spirit of discovery thrives, ensuring that the legacy of Morgan, Lewis, Benzer, and their successors will continue to inspire generations of scientists to come.

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From Desert Treasures to Resilient Glass: How a California Boron Mine Transformed the World

U.S. Borax borate mine in California (Erik Olsen)

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In the late 1800s, as California was emerging and gold fever captivated the public, a significant discovery in the vast, arid desert of modern-day Death Valley led to the development of a mining operation for one of the most versatile and useful materials on earth: borates.

With Hollywood and Silicon Valley dominating California’s identity, it’s easy to overlook the significant role extractive industries have played in shaping the state’s economic and industrial history. However, sites like the Rio Tinto Borax Mine in Boron, California, stand as enduring reminders of this often underappreciated chapter.

Despite the similar-sounding name, borates are far from boring. These indispensable compounds have a wide range of applications that significantly impact our daily lives. Remarkably, the mining operation in the desert of California is still active. In fact, it is one of the largest producers of borates in the world.

The evaporation ponds at the U.S. Borax Mine, used in the extraction of borates, have historically raised environmental concerns, including potential groundwater contamination and the management of hazardous waste byproducts. However, being located in a remote area far from major population centers has helped mitigate some of the risks associated with pollution, as the isolation reduces direct human exposure and minimizes immediate health impacts on surrounding communities. Additionally, the mine’s location in an arid climate helps slow the spread of contaminants in groundwater, though long-term environmental monitoring and mitigation remain critical. Efforts have also been made to manage waste responsibly and comply with environmental regulations to limit potential harm.

Rio Tinto U.S. Borax Mine in Boron, California (Erik Olsen)

U.S. Borax, part of the global mining company Rio Tinto, operates California’s largest open pit mine and the largest borax mine in the world, producing nearly half the world’s borates. It is located near Boron, California, just off California State Route 58 and North of Edwards Air Force Base. While the mine’s economic importance to California has been significant for decades, the critical contributions of borates to modern society remain a largely untold story.

U.S. Borax has roots stretching back to the late 19th century, when the company, then called The Pacific Coast Borax Company emerged as a leader in borate mining and production following the discovery of substantial boron deposits in California. Founded by Francis Marion Smith, known as the “Borax King,” the company initially gained fame for its iconic 20 Mule Team Borax brand. The brand originated from the company’s need for an efficient way to transport borates from the remote mines in Death Valley to the nearest railhead in Mojave, California, covering a distance of about 165 miles.

To accomplish this, the company used large wagons pulled by teams of 20 mules. Each team consisted of 18 mules and 2 horses, and the wagons carried loads of up to 10 tons of borax. These mule teams became legendary for their endurance and reliability, making the long and arduous journey through the harsh desert environment.

Smith’s innovative methods and relentless pursuit of high-quality borates propelled U.S. Borax to the forefront of the industry. Over the decades, U.S. Borax has evolved, focusing on sustainable mining practices and advanced technologies to maintain its status as a key player in the global market, providing essential borate products for various industrial and consumer applications.

Evaporation pools at US Borax in Boron, California (Erik Olsen)

These versatile minerals are critical in agriculture where borates serve as micronutrients, essential for the healthy growth of crops. They are also key ingredients in detergents, where their stain-fighting power ensures cleaner, brighter clothes. Moreover, borates are used in insulation and fiberglass, contributing to energy efficiency and safety in buildings. The importance of borates extends to pharmaceuticals and cosmetics, where they serve as vital components in various formulations. But perhaps the most impactful use of borates is in the production of borosilicate glass.

You’ve likely encountered borosilicate glass before, most recognizably under the brand name Pyrex, produced by Corning. This stable, clear, and robust material can withstand a wide range of temperatures, from the intense heat of a Bunsen burner to the extreme cold of deep space.

Hale telescope mirror on its way to California

Corning brought the future of borosilicate glass into the present by casting what was, at the time, the world’s largest primary telescope mirror. The primary mirror for the 200-inch Hale Telescope in California was cast out of Pyrex borosilicate glass and delivered to Caltech in the spring of 1936. Since manufacturing the Hale Telescope primary mirror blank, Corning has supplied many mirror blanks for astronomy tools worldwide.

Borosilicate glass is one of the unsung heroes of the modern age. Unlike regular glass, which can leach small particles into liquids when exposed to potent chemicals, borosilicate glass remains chemically inert, making it ideal for test tubes, lab beakers, and medical vials. Almost every medicine or vaccine in history, including those developed for COVID-19, has relied on borosilicate containers for their development, storage, and transport. However, we often overlook the importance of these materials until there’s a shortage.

This was the case during the COVID-19 pandemic when concerns arose that the primary obstacle to vaccine distribution might not be the pharmaceuticals themselves, but the containers needed for shipping. In response, thousands of workers along a complex supply chain—from mines to refineries to factories—helped avert a crisis. Corning even introduced a new type of glass, made with aluminum, calcium, and magnesium, to meet the high demand for medicinal vials.

Evaporation ponds at the US Borax mine in Boron, California (Erik Olsen)

The invention of borosilicate glass is credited to German chemist Otto Schott in the late 19th century. Schott was driven by the need for a type of glass that could withstand extreme temperatures and resist chemical corrosion. In 1887, he succeeded in creating this revolutionary material by adding boron oxide to traditional silica-based glass, resulting in a product with exceptional thermal and chemical stability. This breakthrough led to the founding of the Jena Glassworks, where Schott’s borosilicate glass was produced and quickly found applications in scientific and industrial settings. Its remarkable properties made it indispensable for laboratory equipment, cookware, and a variety of other uses. The material’s resilience and reliability have ensured its place as a critical component in modern science and technology, solidifying Schott’s legacy as a pioneer in glassmaking.

Due to its low coefficient of thermal expansion, borosilicate glass maintains the same optical properties across a range of temperatures, making it an ideal material for scientific lenses and other high-precision optical components, including lenses and mirrors for telescopes and microscopes.

It is also used in lighting, particularly for high-intensity lamps and projectors. Artists and craftspeople value borosilicate glass for its workability and durability in creating intricate glass sculptures and jewelry. Its robustness extends to the industrial sector, where it is used in chemical processing equipment, tubing, and sight glasses in high-temperature and corrosive environments. Overall, the unique properties of borosilicate glass make it indispensable across a wide range of applications, from everyday household items to specialized scientific and industrial equipment.

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The abundance of boron in the California desert, particularly the Mojave Desert, is due to a combination of geological conditions and historical processes. Volcanic activity in the region has contributed boron-rich rocks, which, along with tectonic activity, has created basins and depressions where water could accumulate and evaporate. These conditions, coupled with the arid climate, led to the evaporation of ancient lakes and the formation of borate minerals in playas—flat, dry lakebeds that form in desert regions when water evaporates completely, leaving behind a layer of minerals. Hydrothermal activity also played a role by depositing borate minerals through fractures in the Earth’s crust. These factors collectively resulted in significant boron deposits, such as those found in the U.S. Borax boron mine, one of the world’s largest sources of boron.

The US Borax mine in Boron, California, is a fine example of some of the little-known places where California’s industrial history is laid out for all to see, even if few people probably visit. The mine highlights the ingenuity and perseverance of those who ventured into the state’s arid deserts to unearth one of the most versatile and indispensable materials known to modern industry.

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