Creek life
11/01/13 — Grad student Aysha Massell works to restore the storied Strawberry Creek on campus.
Sustainability & environment
Flood fate: What Colorado’s disaster can teach us
09/24/13 California Magazine blog — Trying to plan and prepare for the kind of disastrous flooding that recently inundated Boulder, Colo., is a futile effort, says UC Berkeley hydrologist and assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering Sally Thompson. "Rainfall events like that are simply off the charts,” she says.
Engineering benchmarks for cap-and-trade
05/01/13 — The Mechanical Engineering Laboratory for Manufacturing and Sustainability is helping the California Air Resources Board to develop methodologies for determining CO2 allocations for companies to help reduce the state's overall CO2 emissions to 1990 levels by 2020.
RadMAP rollout
05/01/13 — Nuclear detection is becoming portable with RadMAP, Berkeley's Radiological Multi-sensor Platform, a detection system built into a truck.
The worldwide reach of Berkeley Engineering
03/05/13 — Global problems demand global cooperation. To tackle a wide range of challenges, from clean energy and intelligent infrastructure to cost-effective healthcare delivery, we are launching ambitious research and teaching partnerships with a number of international colleagues.
A new loo
02/07/13 — Answering a challenge from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to improve sanitation in developing countries, environmental engineering professor Kara Nelson and postdoctoral researcher Temitope Ogunyoku have developed a toilet that safely disinfects waste. Their hand-cranked pHree Loo yields “safe sludge” that does not endanger human health.
Seafloor platform ‘cloaks’ structures from big ocean waves
11/19/12 Discovery News — Offshore oil drilling platforms, wind farms and buoys are vulnerable to waves and damage from storm swells. But a team led by Berkeley's Mohammed-Reza Alam, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, has found a way to make such structures invisible to waves, using a rippled platform that sits on the seafloor to 'cloak' the structure directly above.
Quake model aids in fault studies
11/05/12 — A new civil engineering study reveals that the more time an earthquake fault has to heal, the faster the shake it will produce when it finally ruptures. Because the rapidity and strength of the shaking are what causes damage to major structures, the new findings could help engineers better assess the vulnerabilities of buildings, bridges and roads.
Rerouting behavior
11/01/12 — Associate professors of civil and environmental engineering Raja Sengupta and Joan Walker created the Quantified Traveler app to quantify what influences travel behavior and to encourage more sustainable travel.
Arsenic water filter recognized with international prize
10/09/12 Berkeley Lab — A team led by Ashok Gadgil, Berkeley Engineering professor and head of LBNL's environmental energy technologies division, has received the Prince Sultan Bin Abdulaziz International Prize for Water. The prize recognizes his team's advances in developing an effective and economical way to treat arsenic contamination in groundwater.
Cal Energy Corps working worldwide on smart solutions
09/24/12 — Launched in 2011, the Cal Energy Corps provides undergraduates with practical research and experiential-learning opportunities through internships with partner organizations across the academic, corporate and nonprofit sectors. Modeled on the U.S. Peace Corps, the program aims to engage Berkeley students tackling alternative energy, climate change and sustainability issues around the world. This summer, 13 of the 32 Cal Energy Corps interns were Berkeley Engineers
The year of the ApoCALypse: Steel Bridge Team wins nationals
06/26/12 — Berkeley's Steel Bridge Team, based in the civil and environmental engineering department, won the 2012 national steel bridge title on May 25 and 26. Roughly 600 students from 47 engineering schools from across the country gathered to compete and test their steel structure design, fabrication and construction skills during this year's competition at Clemson University.
UC Berkeley Steel Bridge Team takes first place at Nationals
05/31/12 — The CEE Steel Bridge team and their entry, ApoCALypse, took first overall at the 2012 ASCE/AISC Student Steel Bridge Competition held at Clemson University, South Carolina over the Memorial Day weekend. "We held our breath when they announced third place (Cal Poly), and when MIT got second, we started cheering like crazy--for them--and for us, because we knew we were first," said Sabrina Odah, bridge project manager.
Floating robots provide insight into Delta waters
05/15/12 ABC News — UC Berkeley engineering researchers have developed floating robots that may help California in a number of scenarios. The sensors are equipped with GPS receivers and cellphone technology that provide data showing their exact movements in the waterway in real time. They can also deliver information on pollution, salinity and other variables. "The goal here is to be able to show the currents on a scale that was previously unknown, so we can understand better how the Delta works," UC Berkeley electrical engineer Alex Bayen said.
It starts with a stove
05/01/12 — The Berkeley-Darfur Stoves project addresses the needs of families displaced by violence in western Sudan.
Putting water online
05/01/12 — In spring 2012, the Floating Sensor Network project, led by associate professor of EECS Alexandre Bayen, launched a flotilla of 100 robots down the Sacramento River to provide data on water movement and pollutant spread.
Building green performance motorcycles
04/17/12 — Electric motorcycles are quiet, and from a power perspective more efficient. Both traits are not lost on the rider. “If you get on these electric motorcycles the first thing you notice is a magic carpet ride feel,” says Abe Askenazi, B.S'92, M.S'94 ME. “It's almost like flying. It feels like you are on a glider and this thing is propelling you forward. You don't hear all of the drama of power production, you are just doing it.” Askenazi has traveled a long road to become the chief technology officer at Zero Motorcycles, one of the nation's leading electric motorcycle manufacturers.
Smart sensors in the woods
03/19/12 — About 60 percent of the water used in California comes from Sierra Nevada snowmelt. Monthly measurements help water managers estimate the amount of water held in the snowpack and allow them to allocate the state's most precious resource. Now, the Sierra Nevada is going high tech. Wireless sensors developed by Steven Glaser, professor of civil and environmental engineering, are being tested in an ambitious pilot project at the UC Merced Sierra Nevada Research Institute.
When the car is the driver
02/17/12 National Public Radio — This week the state of Nevada finalized new rules that will make it possible for robotic self-driving cars to receive their own special driving permits. Do people notice a self-driving car and gawk? "We get a lot of thumbs up," says Berkeley Engineering alum Anthony Levandowski (M.S.'03 IEOR), one of the leaders of Google's self-driving car project. Google's fleet of robotic cars has driven more than 200,000 miles over highways and city streets in California and Nevada.
PEER signs contract with Caltrans to continue research on the seismic performance of lifelines
02/17/12 Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center — The Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center (PEER), headquartered at the University of California, Berkeley. has just signed a three-year research contract with the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) to carry out a comprehensive multidisciplinary research program on the seismic evaluation and performance of lifelines. This new funding from Caltrans launches a new phase of investigation for the PEER Lifelines Research Program.