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Eric Brewer and graduate student Achintya Maduri inspect solar panels

Power to the people

06/01/15 Berkeley Research — Computer science professor Eric Brewer and the students in his cross-departmental Technology and Infrastructure for Emerging Regions (TIER) program are tackling power shortages in Africa, blindness in India, and other challenges where technology can make a major impact in the developing world.
Stuart Russell

Beyond drone warfare: Prof warns of ‘automated killing machines’

05/28/15 — In an op-ed piece for the science journal Nature, Stuart Russell, an expert in artificial intelligence, outlines the debate over the use of AI weapons systems, and notes widespread agreement on the need for “meaningful human control” over targeting and engagement decisions. “Unfortunately,” he adds, “the meaning of ‘meaningful' is still to be determined."
Pieter Abbeel and Michael Lustig

Two engineering faculty named Bakar Fellows

05/28/15 — Computer science professors Pieter Abbeel and Michael Lustig are now members of the Bakar Fellows Program, which is designed to translate research discoveries to marketable ventures. The fellows will receive up to five years of funding to help them introduce and scale new technologies that are likely to stimulate California's economy.
Robott scientists help BRETT learn new tasks

New approach trains robots to match human dexterity and speed

05/22/15 New York Times — Linking several powerful software techniques, as Berkeley engineers have done with BRETT (Berkeley Robot for the Elimination of Tedious Tasks), makes it possible for a robot to learn tasks rapidly with a relatively little training.

Robots are really bad at folding towels

05/20/15 NPR — Seven years ago, Berkeley researcher Pieter Abbeel set out on a quest: to teach a robot how to fold laundry. This proved to be a remarkably difficult task - and the difficulty of the task illuminates some key things about the limits of machines. See story and hear four-minute podcast.

How smart is today’s artificial intelligence?

05/20/15 PBS News Hour — How far away are we from making intelligent machines that actually have minds of their own? Berkeley researchers Stuart Russell and Pieter Abbeel weigh in on this nine-minute PBS News Hour segment, along with Elon Musk and Google's Ray Kurzweil.
Poppy field

Discovery paves way for homebrewed drugs, prompts call for regulation

05/18/15 — Research led by Berkeley bioengineers has completed key steps needed to turn sugar-fed yeast into a microbial factory for producing therapeutic drugs. But because the work could lead to home-brewing of opiates and other controlled substances, the researchers warn that regulators and law enforcement need to pay attention, too.
Lily drone

Throw this camera drone in the air and it flies itself

05/15/15 Wired — The Lily is a drone that doesn't need a controller, or a pilot; it just follows you. It's the first product from Lily Robotics, founded by a pair of recent UC Berkeley graduates including CTO Henry Bradlow (B.S.'13 EECS).
Microglia in young and old brains

Drug perks up old muscles and aging brains

05/13/15 — UC Berkeley bioengineers have discovered that a small-molecule drug simultaneously perks up old stem cells in the brains and muscles of mice, a finding that could lead to drug interventions for humans that would make aging tissues throughout the body act young again.
Aaron Wienkers

ME’s Wienkers is University Medal finalist

05/12/15 — Aaron Wienkers, a graduating senior in mechanical engineering, is one of four finalists for the 2015 University Medal, which honors honors outstanding scholarship, public service and strength of character. He is also the recipient of the ME department citation.

Smartphone video microscope automates detection of parasites

05/06/15 — A UC Berkeley-led research team has developed a mobile phone microscope, based on CellScope technology from bioengineer Daniel Fletcher's lab, that uses video to automatically detect and quantify infection by parasitic worms in a drop of blood.
Collagen in its twisted, curly form

The skinny on skin

05/04/15 Inside Science — A study co-authored by materials science and engineering professor Robert Ritchie has shown, for the first time, that collagen explains the great durability of skin. The finding could help scientists develop better synthetic skin and improve the strength of man-made materials.
Claude Shannon, the creator of Information Theory, and Alan Turing, the creator of modern Computer Science

Through the computational lens

05/01/15 Simons Institute — EECS professor Umesh Vazirani discusses efforts at the Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing to foster a dialogue between the disciplines of information theory and computer science.