News Archives - Page 2 of 19 - UC Berkeley Mechanical Engineering

It’s Archie! Contest ends to name UC Berkeley’s new male peregrine falcon

Archie Williams, a Berkeley alumnus who ran fast enough to earn Olympic gold in 1936 and then flew U.S. Air Force planes during World War II has a new namesake — the new male peregrine falcon at UC Berkeley. Votes in a public contest that ended yesterday to name the raptor — Annie the falcon’s…

Researchers explore the phenomenon of holonomy

BB-8 of Star Wars fame is known for its adorable beeps, dome-shaped head and spherical body. But fighting alongside the Resistance is just one of its many talents. As this spherical robot rolls across surfaces, it’s exhibiting holonomy, a phenomenon in rigid body dynamics that Berkeley researchers think may have broad applications in real-life robotics.…

Three UC Berkeley professors named to NAE

The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) announced today that three UC Berkeley faculty members — Arpad Horvath, Ravi Prasher and Ion Stoica — have been elected to its ranks. Their election brings the number of engineering faculty members in the NAE to 76.

Small solar sails could be the next ‘giant leap’ for interplanetary space exploration

Nearly 70 years after the launch of the first satellite, we still have more questions than answers about space. But a team of Berkeley researchers is on a mission to change this with a proposal to build a fleet of low-cost, autonomous spacecraft, each weighing only 10 grams and propelled by nothing more than the…

Two UC Berkeley engineers elected to the National Academy of Inventors

UC Berkeley engineering professors Ashok Gadgil and Boris Rubinsky are among 162 inventors named 2023 fellows of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI), the organization announced today (Tuesday, Dec. 12). Election as a fellow in the academy is the highest professional distinction awarded solely to inventors.

A cool way to save coral

Coral is in crisis. Recent models estimate that 95% or more of the world’s coral could die by the mid-2030s due to climate change. But a new, rapid approach to coral preservation could help stem the tide. Technology discovered by Boris Rubinsky, Professor of the Graduate School at the Department of Mechanical Engineering and professor emeritus of…

Researchers demonstrate new 3D printing technique for quantum sensors

Quantum sensing is an emerging field that holds great promise, but building the crystal substrate for these nanoscale sensors has proved challenging. Now, Berkeley researchers have developed a novel fabrication method to structure quantum sensing particles into complex 3D configurations that can accurately detect changes in temperature and magnetic fields in microscopic environments.

Bears in Business: Toby Ricco

UC Berkeley allowed Toby Ricco ’13, M.S. ’14 to pursue his passion for engineering. Since then, Ricco founded Bimotal, a company aimed at evolving electric powertrain technology.

What It Takes to Grow Crystals in Space

ME Alum Debbie G. Senesky builds materials that can work on Venus.

Entrepreneurship at Berkeley

Started at UC Berkeley, Squishy Robotics provides lifesaving and cost-saving information in real time through rapidly deployable mobile sensor robots. As a majority female-owned startup, they prioritize diversity and inclusion while creating technology for a range of applications on planet Earth.

Ese Asoro awarded the 2023–24 Murray Slater Foundation fellowship

Ese Asoro, MEng ’24 (ME) is the latest recipient of funding from the Murray Slater Foundation, an award he says means “the world” to him. Expressing his gratitude, Ese added while the award came as a surprise, it has enabled him to embark on this journey towards his master’s degree with excitement.

ME Assistant Professor Grace Gu Selected as Inaugural Recipient of the LLNL Early Career UC Faculty Initiative

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) today announced that Grace Gu, a faculty member in mechanical engineering at the University of California (UC), Berkeley, has been selected as the inaugural recipient of the LLNL Early Career UC Faculty Initiative. The initiative is a joint endeavor between LLNL’s Strategic Deterrence Principal Directorate and UC national laboratories at the University of California Office of the…

‘Shoulders to stand on’: Statue of campus’ first Black professor unveiled

In 1952, Joseph Thomas Gier became the first tenured Black professor in the University of California system and the second at any highly-ranked predominantly white university. Despite his historical significance, the record of his existence as a UC Berkeley professor of engineering became lost over time. After uncovering details of his past, a sculpture now…

‘Reaching new heights’: STAR launches rockets, future careers

The first custom flight computer developed by Berkeley Space, Technologies and Rocketry, or STAR, will be tested this week. Conor Van Bibber, a deputy in the avionics specialty, is excited to see his hard work come to fruition. Since joining STAR in 2021, Van Bibber has been able to learn about a variety of specialties…

UC Berkeley’s Big Ideas Contest Builds Student-Led Social Innovations

Paige Balcom, the co-founder, co-CEO and CTO of Takataka Plastics, is changing Uganda — one plastic bottle at a time. In 2017, Balcom, who earned her Ph.D. in mechanical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, was settling into campus life after spending a year in Uganda on a Fulbright research grant. Only a month into…

UC Berkeley MEng Class of 2024 Full-Time Profile

Each year, the UC Berkeley Master of Engineering (MEng) program admits students from around the world who go on to become leaders in their respective fields. With 40 countries represented in the Class of 2024, the Fung Institute welcomes a student body of technical leaders who come from many different backgrounds and perspectives. The class…

U.S. News ranks Berkeley Mechanical Engineering undergrad program No. 3 in the nation

Berkeley Engineering continues to rank No. 3 in the top undergraduate engineering schools nationwide, according to U.S. News & World Report’s 2024 undergraduate program rankings. The college also remains the top public engineering program, tied with Georgia Tech. While most of the individual undergraduate programs retained their 2023 positions, three moved up this year: materials engineering…

Berkeley engineers partner with Siemens Energy on $3.7M DOE project to explore direct air capture for carbon sequestration

The U.S. Department of Energy has awarded Siemens Energy, Inc., and partners Constellation Energy, UC Berkeley and Battelle a $3.7 million grant to explore the feasibility of a multi-technology direct air capture (DAC) hub that will extract carbon dioxide directly from the air to help combat climate change. According to the DOE announcement, made Aug. 11, the Teras…

‘Hidden Revolutionaries’: Campus alumni inducted into CA Hall of Fame

“Our state’s most revolutionary, innovative, and brightest” was the phrase Gov. Gavin Newsom used to describe the California Hall of Fame, according to a press release announcing its 16th class of inductees Aug. 14. Two of the seven remarkable inductees were UC Berkeley’s very own alumni — Olympic gold medalist and educator Archie Williams, ’39,…

New Technique Could Facilitate Rapid Cryopreservation of All Coral Species

Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute (NZCBI) researchers have achieved a breakthrough in the fight to save the world’s coral reefs from climate change annihilation, and it may further the goal of cryopreserving human organs. In a paper published today, Aug. 23, in Nature Communications, Mary Hagedorn and E. Michael Henley, research scientists at NZCBI, and colleagues…

‘Look to the atmosphere’: Campus researchers develop technology to collect clean water from fog

UC Berkeley researchers have developed a method of collecting and purifying water from fog, offering an alternative water source. Microscopic droplets of water can be harvested from fog as it passes through a mesh, which is coated with particles that degrade pollutants in the water, said Thomas Schutzius, assistant professor of mechanical engineering on campus…

This device from Berkeley’s Squishy Robotics looks like a toy, but acts like an action hero

A recently posted YouTube video shows a firefighter putting what looks like a toy, but is actually a robot, into a clear testing chamber. He fills the chamber with hydrogen gas, and then gleefully ignites the atmosphere. “You can guess what happens then — there’s a BIG boom,” said Alice Agogino. Agogino, the co-founder and CEO of Squishy…

Why wildfires are at their deadliest in more than a century

Fire Research Group

Washington Post: Large wildfires are happening more often because the hazards that trigger them — dry conditions, strong winds, plenty of stuff to burn — are becoming more common, says Michael Gollner, associate professor of mechanical engineering, who heads Berkeley’s Fire Research Lab.

Scientists develop parallel method for fog harvesting and water treatment

Fog harvesting offers regions devoid of lakes and rivers another source for freshwater, but in urban centers, where water is often scarce, there is the added challenge of air pollution. Now, researchers have developed a simple way to simultaneously collect water from fog and remove harmful contaminants, an advancement that could help provide millions of…

Combining superlative AI research with Berkeley’s next unicorn

Shelton AI, a San Francisco-based start-up, is making waves in the financial world with its groundbreaking AI for sovereign wealth funds. Since its inception, Shelton AI has had major success by combining Berkeley’s top engineering talent with the highly regarded industry expertise of C-level executives from top sovereign wealth funds and financial firms. A deep…

2023 Tillman Scholar: Gregory Zaborski Jr.

Gregory served as a infantry team leader in the Marine Corps, deploying in 2008 on the USS Tarawa with the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit and then in 2009 deploying to Helmand Province, Afghanistan for Operation Khanjar, the largest Marine offensive since the Battle of Fallujah and the biggest offensive airlift by the Marines since the…

Researchers achieve extremely fast charging speeds for commercial lithium-ion batteries

For consumers considering an electric vehicle (EV), long charge times, some up to 12 hours, can be a deal-breaker. But researchers may have discovered a way to reduce the charging time of the lithium-ion batteries used in EVs to less than 15 minutes. Led by Ravi Prasher, adjunct professor of mechanical engineering at UC Berkeley…

ME Professor Boris Rubinsky Helps Team With Advances in Cryopreservation

The rat kidney on the operating table in front of Joseph Sushil Rao looked like it had been through hell. Which it had—a very cold one. Normally a deep pink, this thumbnail-size organ was blanched a corpselike gray. In the past 6 hours, it had been plucked from the abdomen of a white lab rat,…

A Eureka-1 Moment

“Let’s light this candle!” yelled Benjamin Tait (B.S.’23 EECS), the since-graduated chief engineer for Space Enterprise at Berkeley (SEB). On the count of five, Eureka-1 shot up into the sky to the loud cheers of the undergraduate throng.

Keep it cool

Salt has been long used to prevent ice from forming on roads by lowering the freezing point of water. Now, mechanical engineering Ph.D. student Drew Lilley and adjunct professor Ravi Prasher, working with Berkeley Lab researchers, have used this same concept to develop a new method of heating and cooling. Known as ionocaloric cooling, the technique has the potential…