UCSD Police Corporal Alan Jenkins recently received the San Diego Police Officers Association’s Peace Officer of the Year Award for the UCSD Police Department.

Every year, the SDPOA asks police departments throughout San Diego to nominate one of their officers for this distinction. The awards were distributed at the organization’s Peace Officer of the Year Award Banquet on April 25, at the Bahia Resort Hotel in Mission Bay. This year was the 12th time the SDPOA gave out these awards.

Jenkins’ peers nominated him for this award for the hard work and dedication he has put into the department for the past 18 years at UCSD.

During his tenure, Jenkins has taken on many responsibilities that have contributed to making the UCSD community safer.

He serves as the department’s crime prevention officer as well as terrorism liaison officer, a position for which he received specialized training and conducted a threat and vulnerability assessment for the campus.

Through close partnerships with other campus groups such as the Student Safety Awareness Office, he has addressed issues such as date rape, substance abuse and personal safety, as well as increased community awareness of crime trends.

Jenkins also established and leads the Crime Analysis and Strategies Team. This group has helped reduce theft and vandalism at UCSD through problem-oriented policing techniques.

UCSD profs elected to Nat’l Academy of Sciences

UCSD professors Dennis A. Carson and Fred H. Gage have been elected to membership in the prestigious National Academy of Sciences.

Carson is a member of the Rebecca and John Moores UCSD Cancer Center and director of the Sam and Rose Stein Institute for Research on Aging at the UCSD School of Medicine. Specializing in autoimmune diseases and cancers of the lymphoid system, Carson investigates the molecular abnormalities that cause arthritis and cancer. Earlier in his career, Carson developed a drug called 2CdA, which is an effective treatment for hairy-cell leukemia.

Gage is a professor of genetics at the Salk Institute in La Jolla and a UCSD adjunct professor of neurosciences.

Carson and Gage join 71 other new members and 18 foreign associates from 11 countries who were also recognized.

Dell founder to make UCSD visit on May 20

Michael Dell, founder and chief executive officer of Dell Computer Corp., will present “”A Conversation with Michael Dell”” on May 20 at 4 p.m., in the International Relations/Pacific Studies Graduate School’s Robinson Auditorium.

Participating in the dialogue with Dell will be Robert S. Sullivan, founding dean of the Management School; Freider Seible, dean of the School of Engineering; and Ray Smilor, president of the Beyster Institute, a non-profit education, training and consulting organization dedicated to advancing the use of entrepreneurial employee ownership.

Under his direction, Dell has established itself as the world’s most preferred computer systems company and a premier provider of products and services required for customers to build their information-technology and Internet infrastructures. The company he founded is a leading hardware vendor with more than 39,000 employees worldwide, and in less than two decades, its sales have grown from $6 million to over $35.4 billion.

With the addition of Dell to the Fortune 500 list in 1992, Dell became the youngest CEO of a company ever to earn a ranking on the Fortune 500.

Scientists discover reg. role of pseudogene

Scientists in Japan and the UCSD School of Medicine have discovered a novel regulatory role for one pseudogene that could be used to treat human disorders.

While making transgenic mice for a completely different experiment, the researchers found that the pseudogene, called makorin1-p1 because it is similar to a full-fledged protein-coding gene called makorin1, stabilizes the protein-coding gene on another chromosome.

In examinations of normal mouse kidneys, the protein-coding makorin1 was shown to be strongly expressed and highly visible. In mice with the disabled makorin1-p1 pseudogene, the expression of the makorin1 gene appeared weak and irregular in the diseased kidney tissue. Additional lab tests and experiments in mice determined that makorin1-p1 played a key role in regulating the stability of makorin1.

When the pseudogene was disabled, protein production was compromised, resulting in abnormal kidneys and bones in laboratory mice. When a functioning pseudogene was reintroduced into mouse embryos, the mice developed normally.

The study is published in the May 1 issue of the journal Nature.