Surpassing fundraising expectations ten-fold, thanks, in part to 12-year-old Paddy O’Brien, the Challenge for Children concluded December 16, generating more than $1 million for UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital at Mission Bay.

A UCSF shuttle bus stopped at a red light near San Francisco General Hospital was rear-ended this morning in a chain-reaction traffic collision, said the San Francisco Police Department.

The UCSF Challenge for the Children, a social media-based fundraising contest that won the support of prominent Silicon Valley companies, tech industry executives and other celebrities, concluded yesterday (Dec. 16, 2010), raising more than $1 million for UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital.

UCSF’s ongoing program called “Operational Excellence” has a new website to help faculty and staff better understand efforts to reorganize campuswide services and achieve both administrative excellence and financial savings.

Cystatin C, a blood marker of kidney function, proved significantly more accurate than the standard blood marker, creatinine, in predicting serious complications of kidney disease, in a study by researchers at the San Francisco VA Medical Center and UCSF.

UCSF researchers have shown for the first time that the human fetal immune system arises from an entirely different source than the adult immune system, and is more likely to tolerate than fight foreign substances in its environment.

Brain cancers are deadly more often than not, but UCSF researchers have determined that a particular genetic signature in is associated with longer survival, a discovery that may lead to better therapies for some of the deadliest brain cancers.

Weight gain and environmental pollutants might be linked, an award-winning worm researcher suggests.

With only days to go for employees to make donations through the UCSF Charitable Giving Campaign, so far fund totals are looking remarkably below those raised in previous years.

The University of California Board of Regents voted at a special meeting on Dec. 13 to change some of UC’s retiree health and pension programs. Read the story on the UC website.