Dean's Message
The new academic year is now in full swing and our biology programs continue to attract the best and brightest students. Through the hard work of our faculty and staff members across the campus, we have been able to accommodate our growing number of students in the core courses. The explosive growth in biochemistry and microbiology majors is creating additional demand for our world-renowned six-unit biochemistry laboratory course. We have almost doubled the number of offerings during the past four years, and we are still stretched to the limit.The growth of our programs has accelerated planning efforts to build a new laboratory instruction building on campus. The new facility will enable us to expand our offerings and to fully integrate new technologies and learning styles into our laboratory curricula. Hands-on laboratory and field courses are essential elements of our teaching philosophy, and we expect to set the standard for biology education as we enter the new millennium.
Since 1993 we have recruited 18 faculty members to the division, and our new colleagues are having a big impact on our teaching, research, service, and outreach activities. At a recent research symposium I had an opportunity to hear six of the newest assistant professors present overviews of their progress. I was very impressed by the quality of their work and the level of their enthusiasm. The creation of a core program in structural biology/X-ray crystallography promises to be a major advance for our faculty and students. We have the opportunity to make a significant impact in the biomedical sciences, and I am looking forward to a new era of growth.
We recently had a celebration for the opening of the Becton Dickinson Flow Cytometry Laboratory and Training Facility in the Life Sciences Addition, and are in the process of developing research collaborations with other biotechnology companies in the region. We welcome the assistance of our many alumni who are playing a role in the growth of the companies.
This newsletter provides you with a glimpse of our proposed DNA double helix sculpture for the Life Sciences Addition. I hope that you will want to contribute to the success of this project for the benefit of the next generation of students.
Mark G. McNamee, Dean
Division of Biological Sciences
UC Davis Biological Sciences Newsletter - Fall 1997