The American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science announced that Maggie Howard has been appointed as Associate Executive Director of its Southern California Region. Ms. Howard will play a critical role in advancing local philanthropic efforts to support the Weizmann Institute, a top-ranking, multidisciplinary research institution located in Rehovot, Israel.
July 10, 2018
The Weizmann Institute of Science has placed ninth in an international ranking of research quality. This is the second time that the Institute has ranked in the top 10 best research institutes in the world. (The Institute placed 10th in the 2015 ranking.) The assessment comes from the annual Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS) Leiden Ranking, Leiden University, the Netherlands.
July 09, 2018
Dr. Ran Budnik and his team at the Weizmann Institute of Science joined 165 researchers from 27 research institutes around the world working on the XENON1T experiment. This experiment is the most sensitive by far to search for dark matter, and the results they reported this week set a stringent limit on the possible mass of particles that could make up the elusive dark matter. Following these results, based on research that utilized a tank containing over a ton of liquid xenon and on data collected for almost a year, the scientists are planning an even larger, more-sensitive experiment – XENONnT – for 2019.
May 2018
Treating inflammatory diseases of the bowel is extremely challenging: genes, gut microbes, and disrupted immune function all contribute. Weizmann Institute of Science researchers are proposing a way around this complexity. In a study in mice, published in Cell Reports, they have found a way to trigger a natural defense mechanism that prompts the body itself to alleviate intestinal inflammation.
May 2018
In the course of writing his doctoral thesis, Emanuel (Emil) Eidin, a student in the Weizmann Institute of Science’s Department of Science Teaching, started thinking about the people he would like to thank in the acknowledgements section. He decided that some of the people to whom gratitude was due were the PERACH mentors who had helped him as a child.
May 2018
The American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science celebrated the return of its Washington, D.C. and Mid-Atlantic Office with a special event at the Embassy of Israel. The evening attracted about 65 local supporters of the Weizmann Institute, one of the world’s leading multidisciplinary research institutions located in Rehovot, Israel. After opening remarks by American Committee CEO Marshall S. Levin, National Chair Ellen Merlo discussed the significance of reestablishing the organization’s Mid-Atlantic Region. Reuven Azar, Deputy Head of Mission at the Embassy of Israel, then welcomed guests, and illustrated the power of scientific cooperation to build bridges between Israel and other nations.
April 16, 2018
About a third of the food produced for human consumption is estimated to be lost or wasted globally. But the biggest waste, which is not included in that estimate, may be through dietary choices that result in the squandering of environmental resources. In a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science and their colleagues have now found a novel way to define and quantify this second type of wastage. The scientists have called it “opportunity food loss,” a term inspired by the “opportunity cost” concept in economics, which refers to the cost of choosing a particular alternative over better options.
March 26, 2018
Three papers appearing in Nature on March 8 answer a question that scientists have been asking ever since Galileo first observed the famous stripes of Jupiter: Are the colorful bands just a pretty surface phenomenon, or are they a significant stratum of the planet? The Weizmann Institute of Science’s Prof. Yohai Kaspi led this research, in which measurements from NASA’s Juno spacecraft were analyzed to reveal that the stripes – belts of strong winds circling the planet – extend to a depth of about 3,000 km (about 1,900 miles). That is quite a bit deeper than previous estimates, and is revising scientists’ picture of Jupiter’s atmosphere as well as its inner layers.
March 07, 2018
The question of nature vs. nurture extends to our microbiome – the personal complement of mostly friendly bacteria we carry around with us. Study after study has found that our microbiome affects nearly every aspect of our health, and that the composition of our microbes, which varies from individual to individual, may hold the key to everything from weight gain to mood. Some microbiome researchers had suggested that this variation begins with differences in our genes, but a large-scale study conducted at the Weizmann Institute of Science challenges this idea and provides evidence that the connection between microbiome and health may be even more important than we thought.
February 28, 2018
