On April 26, 2014 alumni, faculty, and students celebrated the 30th anniversary of the UC Berkeley – UC San Francisco Graduate Program in Bioengineering. See photos and videos of the event online.
Kapil wins dissertation fellowship
BioE PhD student Monica Kapil has been awarded a UC Berkeley Dissertation-Year Fellowship. This award is open to doctoral students who demonstrate strong potential for university teaching and research, and who are in their final year of dissertation work. Monica has been extremely active in recruitment and community outreach activities, and is a member of Professor […]
Roorda is new Guggenheim Fellow
Congratulations to Professor Austin Roorda, awarded a 2014 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation fellowships. Roorda is Chair of the vision science graduate group, professor of optometry and vision science, UC Berkeley, and member of the Bioe graduate program faculty.
Congratulations Judy Savitskaya, new Hertz Fellow
First year PhD student Judy Savitskaya has been awarded on of only fifteen 2014 Hertz Foundation Fellowships in the United States. The highly prestigious Hertz Fellowship is among the oldest and most coveted awards in science and engineering graduate studies. Judy is the only current student awardee at UC Berkeley or UCSF. Congratulations!
Neuroengineers consult on “Transcendence”
Two of our graduate faculty – Jose Carmena and Michel Maharbiz – provided inspiration and technical consulting to the new Johnny Depp movie, Transcendence. The movie, released in April 2014, depicts Depp working to create a sentient machine that combines the collective intelligence of everything ever known with the full range of human emotions.
UCSF team develops early-warning system for preterm labor
A UCSF team including recent PhD Mozzi Etemadi was featured in the SF Chronicle for their Smart Diaphragm to detect preterm labor. This research was also a Master of Translational Medicine program project in 2010-11.
Program ranked 7th best in the U.S.
New rankings from US News & World Report placed our bioengineering graduate program tied for 7th best in the nation, up from 10th for the past several years.
Scientists ‘herd’ cells in new approach to tissue engineering
Researchers led by recent BioE PhD Daniel Cohen and Professor Michel Maharbiz found that an electrical current can be used to orchestrate the flow of a group of cells, an achievement that could establish the basis for more controlled forms of tissue engineering.
Stem cell research may unlock secrets of incurable diseases
Stem cell research in Professor David Schaffer’s lab is profiled in the Daily Cal.
Chemical temporarily restores sight in blind mice
UC Berkeley professor Richard Kramer and his colleagues have restored sight to blind mice using a small molecule called DENAQ, which, as a photoswitch chemical, changes conformation in response to light.
Mofrad shows how Staph bacteria adhere to nanostructures
Professor Mohammad Mofrad and his lab have investigated, for the first time, how individual Staphylococcus Aureus cells glom onto metallic nanostructures of various shapes and sizes. Their research could guide the development of bacteria-resistant materials.
Vlassakis going to Lindau Nobel Meeting
Graduate student Julea Vlassakis has been selected to participate in the 64th Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting, to be held from 29 June to 4 July 2014, in Lindau, Germany. Only the 600 most qualified young researchers can be given the opportunity to enrich and share the unique atmosphere of the Lindau Nobel Laureate Meetings.
Alumni Profile: Timothy Mills
Timothy Mills,1986 – our second Ph.D. graduate – spoke with us about his career from academia to venture capital, and memories of the early Bioengineering Graduate Program. I graduated from the University of Colorado in 1980 and was very interested in bioengineering, but there weren’t a lot of formal programs available. Stanford had a work/school co-op […]
Ganguly receives Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers
Karunesh Ganguly, MD, PhD, assistant professor in residence at the UCSF School of Medicine and the UCSF Department of Neurology and affiliate member of the graduate program, has been awarded the highest honor bestowed by the United States government to science and engineering professionals in the early stages of their independent research careers.
MTM and PhD team gets $2.7mil to reduce premature births
A team led by bioengineering Master of Translational Medicine and PhD students, along with UCSF bioengineering and medical faculty and staff, has received a Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grant of $2.7 million over three years for a collaborative project aimed at reducing premature births.
Eight students named UCSF Discovery Fellows
Bioengineering PhD students Alec Cerchiari, Trey Jalbert, Bertram Koelsch, Christine Leon, Harrison Liu, Yekaterina Miroshnikova, Matthew Rubashkin, and Lawrence Uricchio were named to the inaugural cohort of UCSF Discovery Fellows.
DeRisi wins NAS Carty Award
Professor Joseph DeRisi, professor and vice chair at the UCSF Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, was presented the National Academy of Sciences Carty Award for noteworthy and distinguished accomplishment in genome biology.
Video lecture by Professor Tejal Desai
Maharbiz develops smart bandages to track wound healing
Gallant featured in Nature
Neuroscientist Jack Gallant was featured in the latest edition of the journal Nature, discussing his team’s work on creating algorithms to decode brain scans and decipher what people are seeing, hearing and feeling.
Jay Keasling on synthetic scents in the New York Times
Li Lab shows physical cues help mature cells revert into embryonic-like stem cells
October 21, 2013 Professor Song Li and his research team have shown that physical cues can replace certain chemicals when inducing mature cells back to a pluripotent stage, capable of becoming any cell type in the body.
Michelle Chang’s work touted in Science
A new synthetic biology technique could revolutionize medicinal chemistry by enabling site-selective insertion of fluorine into natural products in vivo. Read more (subscription required) at Science.
Tim Downing in BMES video
Check out BioE Ph.D. student Tim Downing explaining his research in this video from BMES 2013.