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Size comparison of liposomes and 3HM nanocarriers

Finding chemo

06/17/16 Berkeley Science Review — New cancer treatments come in tiny packages, like the 3HM nanocarriers being developed by materials science professor Ting Xu and her collaborators to protect drugs during their journey through the bloodstream to brain tumors.
Two two VelociRoACH robots work together to climb a step

Roach-like robots run, climb and communicate with people

06/13/16 National Science Foundation — While the ability of insects to go just about anywhere can be disturbing at times, electrical engineer Ronald Fearing sees their talent as inspiration for a special breed of tiny robots that can travel rough terrain, follow instructions, and work together to save lives in a disaster.
Per Peterson amid cooling pipes

An energy strategy that can take the heat

06/08/16 Berkeley Research — Working with Chinese colleagues through the Clean Energy Research Center for Water-Energy Technologies, nuclear engineering professor Per Peterson is exploring the use of superhot molten salts to boost efficiency in both nuclear and solar energy production.
Artist

On the road to driverless cars

05/24/16 Berkeley Science Review — How Berkeley research, including foundational work by PATH plus recent advances in engineering and computer science, is fundamental to industry progress on automated transportation.
Postdoctoral researcher Florence Bonvin and David Sedlak use liquid chromatography as one of their tools to track chemical contaminants in water supplies

Hazards and opportunities in the pipeline

05/10/16 Berkeley Research — Environmental engineering professor David Sedlak, whose book Water 4.0 calls for a new revolution in urban water systems, is studying the fate of chemical contaminants in wastewater, seeking better ways to treat and clean the water we depend on.
Madeline Foster-Martinez at the marsh organ she built at Richmond Field Station

Restoring tidal marshlands

05/01/16 — Are biosolids the answer to making tidal wetlands less vulnerable to storm surges similar to that of Hurricane Katrina? Doctoral student and Louisiana native Madeline Foster-Martinez is working to find out.
Jasjeet Sekhon

Election data Q+A

05/01/16 — Read a Q+A with Jasjeet Sekhon, senior fellow at the Berkeley Institute for Data Science, who uses massive data analysis to examine persuasion in elections and the effectiveness of digital advertising and personalized medicine.
"Average" faces by decade

Say cheese

05/01/16 — Computer scientists are using machine learning techniques to analyze large collections of American high school yearbook photos by superimposing the changes in hairstyles, clothing and even smiles from over the last century.
Photoluminescence of MoS2 monolayer: before (left) and after superacid treatment

Making monolayers work

05/01/16 — Berkeley engineers have found a simple way to fix the defects of monolayer semiconductors, leading to a dramatic 100-fold increase in the material's photoluminescence quantum yield.
Rikky Muller

Life with machine: Robot relationships get real

05/01/16 — Three Berkeley professors studying artificial intelligence and robotics are testing how machines and humans come into physical contact, behave independently and interact with one another. The common goal: to create machines with the intelligence to better serve and work with human beings.
Postdoc researcher Chinmayee Subban and Ashok Gadgil are refining an affordable water treatment technology to produce fresh drinking water from brackish water

The search for smarter energy and water strategies

04/25/16 Berkeley Research — Environmental engineering professor Ashok Gadgil, principal investigator for a $64 million joint U.S.-China research center, is seeking innovative ways to meet the energy and water needs of both developing and industrial societies.
Robot by a mirror

Robots that act differently when you’re around

04/19/16 The Atlantic — Roboticist Anca Dragan, head of Berkeley's Interactive Autonomy and Collaborative Technologies lab, is working on algorithms that can help robots coexist with people in the real world.

Watching snow melt

04/11/16 — The collaborative Sierra Net project builds wireless sensor networks in major California watersheds to modernize the way the state's water supply is measured.
From left, Xiang Zhang, Yu Ye, Jun Xiao, and Yuan Wang are part of a team of scientists that made a big advance in valleytronics.

Scientists push valleytronics a step closer to reality

04/04/16 Berkeley Lab — Scientists led by Xiang Zhang, professor of mechanical engineering, have taken a big step toward the practical application of “valleytronics,” a new type of electronics that could lead to faster and more efficient computer logic systems and data storage chips.
Inside a self-driving car

Automakers go back to school for self-driving cars

03/16/16 Bloomberg Business — Automakers Ford, Toyota and Volkswagen, along with electronic companies Nvidia, Samsung, Qualcomm and Panasonic, are collaborating to fund artificial intelligence research at UC Berkeley, hoping this DeepDrive alliance can help them build the brains behind self-driving cars.
Sonia Travaglini in Jacobs Hall.

Defining the original smart material

03/15/16 — Sonia Travaglini, a Ph.D. candidate in mechanical engineering, studies the properties of fungus to discover the composite materials of the future.
Pieter Abbeel with the Baxter Research Robot

‘Deep learning’ – a giant step for robots

03/04/16 Berkeley Research — For 15 years, Berkeley robotics researcher Pieter Abbeel has been looking for ways to make robots learn. In 2010 he and his students programmed a robot to fold towels. Now, he's gotten robots to learn from their experience.