Scientists have known that bacteria produce small spherical versions of themselves. Lacking basic materials to function like normal cells, the role of minicells has remained a mystery. Now, researchers at UC San Diego have demonstrated for the first time that minicells play a key function in the survival of bacteria.
The Center for Large Scale Data Systems (CLDS) at the San Diego Supercomputer Center, UC San Diego, formally opened a new blockchain research laboratory to exploring technologies and business use cases in distributed ledgers, digital transactions, and smart contracts.
Scientists know that upward currents of warm air assist birds in flight. To understand how birds find and navigate these thermal plumes, researchers used reinforcement learning to train gliders to autonomously navigate atmospheric thermals. The research highlights the role of vertical wind accelerations and roll-wise torques as viable biological cues for soaring birds. The findings also provide a navigational strategy that directly applies to the development of UAVs.
Artificial neural networks—algorithms inspired by connections in the brain—have “learned” to perform a variety of tasks, from pedestrian detection in self-driving cars, to analyzing medical images, to translating languages. Now, researchers at the University of California San Diego are training artificial neural networks to predict new stable materials.
The Nikon Imaging Center, a microscopy center providing researchers with the latest imaging technologies, has opened UC San Diego. The center provides researchers with access to the latest microscopic tools and technologies, including point-scanning and field-scanning confocal, high-content, total internal reflection fluorescence and wide-field fluorescence microscopes.
A new wearable ultrasound patch that non-invasively monitors blood pressure in arteries deep beneath the skin could help people detect cardiovascular problems earlier on and with greater precision. In tests, the patch performed as well as some clinical methods to measure blood pressure. Applications include real-time, continuous monitoring of blood pressure changes in patients with heart or lung disease, as well as patients who are critically ill or undergoing surgery.
Lytx, a San Diego-based video telematics and analytics pioneer, has established the Lytx Graduate Fellowship for Masters of Science in Business Analytics (MSBA) students at the university’s Rady School of Management.
Aira, a San Diego-based startup, leverages wearable technology, artificial intelligence and live, human agents, to deliver real-time visual description for people who are blind or have low vision.
University of California San Diego and Deerfield Management announce today the creation of Poseidon Innovation, LLC to advance disease-curing therapeutics. Through Deerfield’s $65-million commitment in Poseidon, UC San Diego investigators will have the funding and support to weather risky early-stage processes and expedite the drug-development cycle, allowing patients to receive treatment faster.
World-renowned composer Lei Liang has been named the inaugural Research Artist in Residence at the UC San Diego Qualcomm Institute. Appointed for three years, the Department of Music professor will expand his research on the sonification of coral reefs.
Engineers have developed neutrophil “nanosponges” that can safely absorb and neutralize a variety of proteins that play a role in the progression of rheumatoid arthritis. Injections of these nanosponges effectively treated severe rheumatoid arthritis in two mouse models. Administering the nanosponges early on also prevented the disease from developing. The nanosponges are nanoparticles of biodegradable polymer coated with the cell membranes of neutrophils, a type of white blood cell.
Researchers at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC), an Organized Research Unit of UC San Diego, have been awarded a three-year National Science Foundation (NSF) grant worth more than $818,000 to design and develop cyberinfrastructure that allows researchers to efficiently share information about their scientific data and securely verify its authenticity while preserving provenance and lineage information.
A team of physicians and computer scientists at the University of California has shown that it is easy to modify medical test results remotely by attacking the connection between hospital laboratory devices and medical record systems.
A new study led by scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego and the Coral Reef Research Foundation (CRRF) in Palau describes a novel approach for predicting warm temperature-induced stress on corals from the sea surface through a deeper expanse ranging from 30-150 meters (100-500 feet) known as the mesophotic zone.
The University of California San Diego has been named the #1 public university in the nation by Washington Monthly for contributions to social mobility, research and public service.
Andrew J. Viterbi, a renowned pioneer in the communications world, is creating a lasting legacy in health care through a philanthropic gift of $50 million to the University of California San Diego. Inspired by his father, an ophthalmologist, Viterbi’s gift will name The Viterbi Family Department of Ophthalmology and The Viterbi Family Vision Research Center, and create six new endowed chairs for faculty.
The CIPRES science gateway, which supports major discoveries about evolutionary relationships among our planet’s living creatures, has been awarded grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) that will provide more than $2.8 million to sustain and enhance the gateway.
UC San Diego professor Craig Callender has been awarded the 2018 Lakatos Award, given annually for outstanding contributions to the philosophy of science in the form of a book. Callender’s “What Makes Time Special?” tackles the conflict between our intuitive model of time as flowing and the “static” time of fundamental physics.
A survey conducted by previous participants in the San Diego Supercomputer Center's annual Research Experience for High School Students (REHS) summer internships shows that many previous REHS participants followed a computer science and engineering (CSE) path into college, graduate school, and beyond.
An international team of researchers has uncovered a destructive mechanism at the molecular level that causes a well-known phenomenon associated with obesity, called leptin resistance.They found that mice fed a high-fat diet produce an enzyme named MMP-2 that clips receptors for the hormone leptin from the surface of neuronal cells in the hypothalamus. This blocks leptin from binding to its receptors. This in turn keeps the neurons from signaling that your stomach is full and you should stop eating. This is the first time that a destructive molecular mechanism has been observed and described.
International researchers, including UC San Diego physicists, conducted a “Cosmic Bell” test with polarization-entangled photons to further close the “freedom-of-choice” or “free will” loophole. The experiment tests Bell’s inequality, and results push back to at least 7.8 billion years ago the most recent time by which any causal influences from alternative, non-quantum mechanisms could have exploited the loophole.
Biologists have revealed that enhancer RNAs play a significant role in cancer dissemination. The researchers found that eRNAs have a direct role in the activation of genes that are important for tumor development. This role is facilitated by the ability of eRNAs to directly interact with BRD4, a protein known as a cancer disseminator.
The University of California San Diego raised $312 million in 2017-2018—a record-breaking amount for any San Diego institution of higher education in a single year. The funds go toward the university’s $2 billion goal as part of the Campaign for UC San Diego.
The arts and humanities will have a stronger and more influential presence on the University of California San Diego campus, thanks to a new $750,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Sulfur isotopes can serve as tracers of atmospheric oxygen, and new data collected from the present-day atmosphere in China by an international team of researchers, led by the University of California San Diego, indicate remarkable similarity to the isotopic footprint found in ancient rocks. This opens up new interpretations of the Archean Period’s sulfur isotope sedimentary signature—a proxy for the origins and evolution of atmospheric oxygen and early life on Earth.
The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) at UC San Diego a supplemental grant valued at almost $2.4 million to extend operations of its Comet supercomputer by an additional year, through March 2021. The extension brings the value of the total Comet program to more than $27 million.
The Charles Lee Powell Foundation has given more than $35 million in support during the past three decades to the Jacobs School of Engineering at the University of California San Diego. The generous San Diego-based foundation has funded research in the Department of Structural Engineering and the Charles Lee Powell Laboratories, a relationship that has been essential to the existence of these research laboratories. In addition, the foundation has established the Powell Fellows program for doctoral students, the H. Kunzel Endowed Scholarship/Fellowship Fund and endowed faculty chairs to help recruit and retain stellar scholars.
The University of California San Diego and Spin, the dockless personal mobility company, are announcing the results of a bikeshare partnership pilot program which was created to provide more than 36,000 students, faculty and staff with an affordable, equitable and eco-friendly way to get around campus.
“Percolation” theory is helping explain how communities of bacteria can effectively relay signals across long distances. Once regarded as simple microorganisms, communities of bacteria have been found to employ a strategy we use to brew coffee and extract oil from the sea. Percolation helps the microscopic community thrive and survive threats.
Nature freely puts together microscopic building blocks. To mimic this self-assembly would revolutionize science’s approach to synthesizing materials that could heal, contract or reconfigure. UC San Diego and NYU scientists explored this mimicry and introduced a new way to assemble specially designed microscopic blocks into small gear-like machines.
Using advanced fabrication techniques, engineers at the University of California San Diego have built a nanosized device out of silver crystals that can generate light by efficiently “tunneling” electrons through a tiny barrier. The work brings plasmonics research a step closer to realizing ultra-compact light sources for high-speed, optical data processing and other on-chip applications.
By doping alumina crystals with neodymium ions, engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a new laser material that is capable of emitting ultra-short, high-power pulses—a combination that could potentially yield smaller, more powerful lasers with superior thermal shock resistance, broad tunability and high-duty cycles.
Engineers at the University of California San Diego have shed new light on a scientific mystery regarding the atomic-level mechanism of the sulfur embrittlement of nickel, a classic problem that has puzzled the scientific community for nearly a century. The discovery also enriches fundamental understanding of general grain boundaries that often control the mechanical and physical properties of polycrystalline materials.
An international team of scientists has found the first evidence of a source of high-energy cosmic neutrinos, subatomic particles that can emerge from their sources and, like cosmological ghosts, pass through the universe unscathed, traveling for billions of light years from the most extreme environments in the universe to Earth.
New research has uncovered a protein enabling the replication of arenaviruses, lethal pathogens spreading in West Africa. The research identified DDX3 as a key factor through its unexpected ability to dismantle normal human immune system defenses. The study may pave the way to new therapeutic treatments for arenaviruses and hemorrhagic fever.
Researchers discovered an unexpected twist in the battle versus tumors. Researchers have found that some tumor cells display not only a weapon, but also a brake, essentially becoming a neutralizing function. The unexpected mechanism could help determine whether a cancer patient will respond to immunotherapy.
A team led by the University of California San Diego has developed a chip that can detect a type of genetic mutation known as a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) and wirelessly send the results in real time to an electronic device. The chip is at least 1,000 times more sensitive at detecting an SNP than current technology. The advance could lead to cheaper, faster and portable biosensors for early detection of genetic markers for diseases such as cancer.
PET plastic, short for polyethylene terephthalate, is the fourth most-produced plastic, used to make things such as beverage bottles and carpets, most of which are not being recycled. Some scientists are hoping to change that, using supercomputers to engineer an enzyme that breaks down PET. They say it's a step on a long road toward recycling PET and other plastics into commercially valuable materials at industrial scale.
For the second year in a row, the Melissa Dull Current Use Fund for CLS Program Support has provided a $1,500 stipend to 15 students of the UC San Diego Extension Clinical Laboratory Scientist Training Program.
Human activities have impacted the Earth’s atmosphere over time. To better understand the impact of the human biogeochemical footprint on Earth, scientists at the University of California San Diego are literally climbing mountains to study the planet’s sulfur cycle—an agent in cardiovascular fitness and other human health benefits and resources.
The West Big Data Innovation Hub (WBDIH) at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) at UC San Diego is one of four regional big data hubs partner sites awarded a $1.8 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) for the initial development of a data storage network during the next two years.
A graduate student at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego and colleagues from NOAA’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries have discovered the world’s first known manta ray nursery.
Graphene electrodes could enable higher quality brain imaging thanks to new research by a team of engineers and neuroscientists at UC San Diego. The researchers developed a technique, using platinum nanoparticles, to lower the impedance of graphene electrodes by 100 times while keeping them transparent. In tests on transgenic mice, the electrodes were able to record and image neuronal activity (calcium ion spikes) at of large groups of neurons and individual brain cells.
a team led by researchers at UC San Diego’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC), has used machine learning techniques to develop models for simulations of water with “unprecedented accuracy.”
Fourteen musicians. Three time zones. One live concert. The UC San Diego Department of Music is set to stage a monumental feat, melding the artistry of a live concert with the technical hurdle of crossing oceans and connecting continents at lightning-fast speeds.
In a study published in the May 21, 2018 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a team of researchers – aided with supercomputing resources from the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) based at UC San Diego – created a dynamic computer simulation to delineate a key biological process that allows the body to repair damaged DNA.
The graduating actors performed on both coasts for this year’s Graduate Actor Student Showcase, where casting agents, artistic directors, and television and film executives attended as an introduction to the students and their work. With two shows in each city, nerves ran high.
Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed tiny ultrasound-powered robots that can swim through blood, removing harmful bacteria along with the toxins they produce. These proof-of-concept nanorobots could one day offer a safe and efficient way to detoxify and decontaminate biological fluids.
Students participated in the very first, two-quarter undergraduate curating course: independent study opportunities made available by the Institute of Arts and Humanities and the Library’s Special Collections & Archives.
The winning submission in this year’s UC San Diego Adam Douglas Kamil Media Awards is an experimental narrative that focuses on urban landscapes, the environment and memory — a short film the Department of Visual Arts jury calls “striking and stunning.”
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