ARTEMIS – UCLA’s Most Advanced Humanoid Robot – Gets Ready for Action The five-time RoboCup championship team led by Dennis Hong, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, is ready to return to the international competition in France this July with its latest robot capable of walking on uneven terrain as well as running and jumping.
UCLA Engineers Design Solar Roofs to Harvest Energy for Greenhouses In a study published in Nature Sustainability, materials science and engineering professor Yang Yang and his team demonstrated greenhouse roofs built with new solar cell technology that could optimize energy generation and crop production simultaneously.
Mussels-Inspired Injectable Bioglue Offers Robust Sealing of Surgical Wounds A team led by bioengineering and materials science and engineering professor Paul Weiss in collaboration with Nasim Annabi, a chemical and biomolecular engineering professor, has created a biodegradable hydrogel adhesive that is three-times stronger than comparable bioglues.
New Implantable, Stretchable Bioelectronics Deliver High Performance Despite Strain Sam Emaminejad, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, led a team of UCLA doctors and engineers that has developed bioelectronics able to flex and stretch inside biological tissues without compromising their performance. The study was published in Science.
Combining Surgery and Robotics to Design Bionic Implants Tyler Clites, an assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, leads an interdisciplinary lab that is developing an implanted ankle-hindfoot prosthesis with the potential to alleviate pain and restore function to patients without requiring amputation.
UC Announces $15 Million in Climate-Focused Innovation Awards The two-year grants will help support ongoing research such as a super white paint designed to reflect as much as 98 percent of heat from the sun that is being developed by Aaswath Raman, an assistant professor of materials science and engineering, and his Ph.D. student David Abraham.
Omidyar Network Announces Winners of the Future of Data Challenge The network has chosen 15 teams among hundreds of candidates to receive the inaugural Future of Data Challenge Awards — including a joint project by Lixia Zhang, a professor of computer science, and Jeff Burke, a professor of theater at UCLA.
Nanomaterials Scientist Yu Huang Appointed Traugott and Dorothea Frederking Endowed Chair Yu Huang, a professor and chair of the Materials Science and Engineering Department, has been named the Traugott and Dorothea Frederking Endowed Chair for her work in enhancing the mechanistic understanding of nanoscale phenomena to address green energy applications.
UCLA CS Faculty Named Among Top Most Influential Scholars Several faculty in the Computer Science Department — including Jason Cong, Amit Sahai and Aidtya Grover — have been named among the top 100 of the AI 2000 Most Influential Scholars.
Sustainable LA Grand Challenge Launches Initiative Focused on Transportation Led by then-director Eric Hoek, a professor of civil and environmental engineering, the new program TRACtion (Transformative Research and Collaboration) will bring together UCLA faculty members and community partners to address various sustainability issues.
2023 UCLA Grad Slam The finals showcased a diverse group of emerging scholars from a variety of disciplines. Graduate students Siddharth Srivastava of materials science and engineering, and Ella Petter of computer science, placed second and third, respectively.
UCLA SAMUELI IN THE NEWS
Years of Warnings and Inaction in Turkish City Destroyed by Earthquakes Jonathan Stewart, a professor of civil and environmental engineering, shared his thoughts on the damages caused by the Feb. 6 earthquake in Turkey and explained how surviving buildings should be inspected for cracking in key structural areas to prevent imminent collapses.
Death Toll Rises Past 50,000 after Turkey, Syria Quake Jonathan Stewart, a professor of civil and environmental engineering, discussed building safety and Los Angeles County’s move to mandate seismic retrofits for some concrete buildings in the wake of the Feb. 6 earthquake in Turkey.
What the Snowfall in California Will Mean for the State's Drought Conditions Alvar Escriva-Bou, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering and a member of the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, joined CBS News to discuss the impact of the recent massive snowfall on the state's drought conditions.
Strange Material Breaks a Classic Rule of Physics Yongjie Hu, an associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, was featured on his recent research that found that when intense pressure was applied to boron arsenide — a promising semiconductor material — thermal conductivity actually decreased.
How to Engineer Buildings that Withstand Earthquakes Ertugrul Taciroglu, a structural engineer and professor of civil and environmental engineering, described in scientific terms what a building experiences during an earthquake as well as which factors could contribute to a structural failure.
How a Beam of Pellets Could Blast a Probe Into Deep Space Artur Davoyan, an assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, shared his NASA-supported pellet-beam propulsion system concept. This theoretical system would be more than 10-times faster than conventional propulsion systems.
How We Stay Cool: Getting Warmer Episode 6 Aaswath Raman, an assistant professor of materials science and engineering, described how next-generation buildings can be built with energy and cooling efficiency in mind, and how a change in our building habits could contribute to the overall decrease in city temperatures.
The World’s Largest 3D-Printed Neighborhood Is Here Gaurav Sant, director of the Institute for Carbon Management and a professor of civil and environmental engineering, commented on the future of 3D printing in building construction and the potential for introducing sustainable techniques into the carbon-intensive industry.
Startups Turning to the Ocean to Capture More Carbon Off Southern California’s Coast Dante Simonetti, an assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and a project lead on ocean carbon capture pilot programs along the Los Angeles and Singapore coasts, discussed the viability of carbon capture technology and explained the necessity of such programs.
STUDENTS
UCLA Engineering Student Leads Portable Solar Panel Project to Improve Accessibility Chen Zhang, a third-year mechanical engineering Ph.D. student, is focused on creating solutions with sustainable and accessible renewable energy as part of UCLA’s Smart Grid Energy Research Center directed by Rajit Gadh, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering.
ALUMNI
Triple Bruin Alumna Shares Lessons Learnt from Academia to Industry Diana Skaar ’00, M.S. ’08, MBA ’08 has come a long way in breaking the bamboo ceiling. The first-generation Thai-American is now a tech executive leading business development at X, the moonshot factory at Google’s parent company Alphabet.