WADING INTO HETCH HETCHY WATERS

Hetch Hetchy Valley in a historic photo.

As a ski patroller, Sarah Null fired explosives at snow-laden Sierra mountainsides to trigger avalanches. As a UC Davis geography student, she launched a bombshell into California water politics—a master’s thesis on the feasibility of draining Hetch Hetchy Reservoir with minimal harm to downstream cities and farms.

That thesis became a cornerstone of a series of editorials by writer Tom Philp in The Sacramento Bee that in April was honored with journalism’s highest honor, the Pulitzer Prize. And when Philp’s colleagues toasted him with sparkling cider in the Bee’s pressroom, Null and her faculty adviser, Jay Lund, were there. “I couldn’t have done this without Jay and Sarah,” Philp said. “Their work was objective research coming from a respected third party—UC Davis. It was crucial.”

Lund, a professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, said the Bee series, and the public discussion it generated, illustrate the essential role that university research plays in public-policy matters. “We are relied upon to develop and explore novel solutions to major problems of California and the world,” he said.

For the Hetch Hetchy study, Null used CALVIN (for California Value Integrated Network), a computer model developed by Lund to analyze water supplies and delivery. Using historical flow data for the Tuolomne River, she calculated how much water could be delivered by three other reservoirs if Hetch Hetchy’s O’Shaughnessy Dam were gone. She found San Francisco’s water supplies would be nearly the same. The Bee editorials called for restoring Hetch Hetchy Valley.

The CALVIN model is the product of several years of work by many UC Davis faculty and staff and almost 20 students from five graduate programs, Lund said. He emphasized in particular the contributions of Richard Howitt, a professor in the Department of Resource and Agricultural Economics in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.

Null and Lund have made dozens of public presentations on the Hetch Hetchy findings specifically and the potential uses of the CALVIN model generally.

Null was asked by California Assemblymember Lois Wolk, D-Davis, to report her conclusions to a large group of legislators’ staff members. Wolk was then instrumental in prompting the state’s natural resources chief, secretary Mike Chrisman, to order a report on the potential impacts of draining Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. It is expected this summer.

If the day ever comes when Hetch Hetchy Reservoir is drained, Null hopes to be there. Meanwhile, she is working to complete her doctorate and will continue trying to help Californians use their water supply and distribution systems more efficiently. “I think that’s an important topic, though nowhere near as controversial as taking out O’Shaughnessy Dam.”

— Sylvia Wright

Rx FOR ABUSE?

Pharmaceutical companies today are spending some $3.2 billion a year to advertise their prescription drugs. Are they having an undue influence? A recent study by UC Davis researchers indicates yes.

In the study, actresses posing as patients with a mild form of depression were more likely to receive unnecessary prescriptions for antidepressants if they asked for a drug advertised on TV.

On the other hand, actresses complaining of symptoms of major depression were more likely to get appropriate treatment—including medication, mental health referrals or follow-up care—when they asked for drugs.

“The short message for patients is to be careful of what you ask for, because you probably will get it,” said Richard Kravitz, the study’s lead author and director of the UC Davis Center for Health Services Research in Primary Care. “That could be a good thing for those who really need medication, but it could be a bad thing for those on the margin. For this latter group, there might be other options that could be just as effective and possibly safer, such as watchful waiting and non-drug therapies.”

The experiment, reported in the April 27 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, sent trained actresses, with minidisk recorders hidden in their purses, for office visits with 152 primary-care physicians in Sacramento, San Francisco and Rochester, N.Y., between May 2003 and May 2004.

The doctors had previously agreed to participate in a study on “social influences” on primary-care practices that would involve seeing two undercover patients several months apart.

In one part of the experiment, actresses portrayed 45-year-old divorcees who just lost their jobs and were suffering fatigue, stress, sleeping difficulties and back pain. The symptoms were of adjustment disorder, a type of depression not requiring antidepressants.

When they asked for the widely promoted Paxil, 55 percent received an antidepressant, compared to 39 percent who asked about medication in general and 10 percent who made no requests.

In a second part of the study, actresses posed as 48-year-old divorcees who had been “kind of down” for a month with fatigue, poor appetite and poor sleep, loss of interest in usual activities and other symptoms of major depression.

In that case, making general requests for medication resulted in the highest prescription rates—76 percent compared to 53 percent who asked for Paxil and 31 percent who requested nothing.

Doctors also were more likely to schedule follow-up visits and refer patients to mental-health care professions when they asked about antidepressants.

“The results of this trial sound a cautionary note for direct-to-consumer advertising but also highlight opportunities for improving care of depression (and perhaps other chronic conditions) by using public media channels to expand patient involvement in care,” Kravitz and co-authors wrote.

“Furthermore, physicians may require additional training to respond appropriately to patients’ requests in clinically ambiguous circumstances.”

— David Ong

HOMING IN ON AUTISM TEST

UC Davis scientists have identified differences in the immune system and blood of autistic children, offering new hope for developing a routine blood test for early detection—or even prevention—of autism.

Researchers from the UC Davis M.I.N.D. Institute presented their findings in May at an international meeting of autism researchers in Boston.

The brain disorder now affects as many as one in every 166 children. Diagnosis is currently done through a series of behavioral observations that are not reliable until a child is 2–3 years old.

“Finding a sensitive and accurate biological marker for autism that can be revealed by a simple blood test would have enormous implications for diagnosing, treating and understanding more about the underlying causes of autism,” said David Amaral, research director at the UC Davis M.I.N.D. Institute.

“Not being able to detect autism until a child is close to 3 years old eliminates a valuable window of treatment opportunity during the first few years of life when the brain is undergoing tremendous development.”

Amaral, pediatric neuropsychologist Blythe Corbett and colleagues took blood samples from 70 autistic children and 35 without autism, all 4–6 years old. The samples were then analyzed by a biotech company that specializes in measuring levels of immune cells, proteins, peptides and metabolites in small amounts of blood.

“Scientists have long suspected there were distinct biological components to autism but the technology needed to reveal them has only recently become available,” Amaral said.

The study has generated an enormous amount of data, and M.I.N.D. Institute researchers say it will take months before all of the information has been fully evaluated. But initial findings clearly demonstrate differences in the immune system, as well as proteins and other metabolites in children with autism.

Amaral said a diagnostic blood test is probably still years away. And more research needs to be done to confirm the findings in a larger group and with younger children.

“There is a growing view among experts that not all children with autism are ‘doomed to autism’ at birth,” Amaral said. “It may be that some children have a vulnerability—such as a genetic abnormality—and that something they encounter after being born, perhaps in their environment, triggers the disorder.

“Studying the biological signs of autism could lead to new ways to prevent the disorder from ever occurring. And even if it can’t be prevented, intervening early in life—ideally shortly after birth—could greatly improve the lifetime outlook for children with autism, particularly those who now respond poorly to therapy initiated when they are 3 or older.”

— Karen Finney

NAMESAKES: BOHART MUSEUM

At age 91, Richard “Doc” Bohart doesn’t collect insects anymore. But—even though his memory of past events and people sometimes fails him—he still refers to wasps, beetles, ants and mosquitoes by their scientific names. And the entomology professor emeritus still enjoys discussing the life cycle of wasp and bee parasites, expeditions to islands around the world and his running battle with ants, which, given the chance, would eat his mosquito larvae and other specimens.

“I have always been an entomologist, from the time I was a little kid,” Bohart said in a recent interview at his Davis home. Back then, before he got his first net, he used to chase and catch butterflies with a window screen. Bohart went on to become an authority on mosquitoes and wasps. He was a UC Davis faculty member in 1946–79, chairing the entomology department in 1958–68.

He traveled around the world to collect specimens, published more than 200 scientific papers and six books, and helped develop the UC Davis Bohart Museum of Entomology, which today, with more than 7 million specimens, is the ninth largest insect collection in North America and the third largest university insect collection.

Bohart has other namesakes. When he turned 70 in 1983, the Pan-Pacific Entomologist journal dedicated an issue to him; former students and colleagues named two new insect genera and 15 species after him.

A fair number of the specimens in the Bohart Museum were collected by Bohart himself. But he also added to the collection through a sort of service fee—paid in bugs.

When other entomologists and collectors asked for his help in identifying and classifying specimens, Bohart reserved the right to keep up to 10 percent.

The other collectors didn’t always like it, Bohart recalled, but most agreed to his terms.

After all, he was known worldwide for his expertise on insect taxonomy and systematics—or insect family trees—especially for wasps. And his services were otherwise free.

Now he sometimes helps identify insects for his wife, Elizabeth Arias, a UC Berkeley entomology researcher.

— Kathleen Holder

VYING FOR THE FARM

UC Madison? It could have happened. A century ago, the tiny Yolo County town about 11 miles west of Woodland was a proposed site for the new University Farm.

So, too, were Woodland, Hayward, Suisun and more than 70 other cities throughout northern California. But among them, the burg of Davisville would prove to have the right combination: fertile farmland, plenty of water, railroads and, perhaps most importantly, tireless backers with the political know-how and right connections.

Leading the charge for a Davisville site were George Washington Pierce Jr. and Jacob “Gene” LaRue, both farmers and early UC graduates with ties to Sacramento.
Pierce, from a Republican pioneer family, was a former assemblymember, the first UC graduate from the Central Valley, an acquaintance of UC President Benjamin Wheeler and a boarding-school classmate of Gov. George Pardee.

LaRue farmed down the road from Pierce. His father, Hugh LaRue, a 49er-turned-farmer, was an influential Democrat who had served as Assembly speaker, state agricultural society president, Sacramento sheriff and ex-officio UC regent. The elder LaRue owned a house across the street from the governor’s mansion. Another LaRue son had been a state senator.

Davisville already had an edge. Sacramento judge Peter J. Shields had been persuaded by locals to require, in his bill authorizing the University Farm, that the chosen site already have an irrigation system or water rights.

In the weeks after Pardee signed the act, Pierce, LaRue and other Davisville advocates met a number of times with the governor, UC president and other members of the University Farm site-selection commission. Pierce also approached an aging Davisville farmer, Martin Sparks, about selling his land.

In May 1905, with Pierce in the lead car, the site-selection commission toured Yolo County sites near Davisville, Woodland, Yolo, Madison, Esparto and Winters. The competition would cause a bitter rivalry between Davisville and Woodland.

Pierce also led the newly created Davis State Farm Promotion Committee, or “Boom Committee,” which printed a booklet promoting Davisville as an “An Ideal Spot for a University Farm.”

Within a year, the state commission would agree that it was.

— Kathleen Holder