PhD alumnus Wilbur Lam, now Professor of Pediatrics and Biomedical Engineering, Emory University and Georgia Tech, has been named one of the 2023 new members of the National Academy of Medicine. Lam was recognized for “outstanding contributions in point-of-care, home-based, and/or smartphone-enabled diagnostics that are changing the management of pediatric and hematologic diseases as well as development of microsystems technologies as research-enabling platforms to investigate blood biophysics. He also leads national/NIH efforts to assess diagnostic tests (including those for COVID-19) for the entire country.”
Congratulations 2024 Siebel Scholars!
Five Bioengineering PhD students have been named Siebel Scholars of the class of 2024: Cindy Ayala, Ruiming Cao, Sita Srinivasan Chandrasekaran, Cameron Tadashi Kato, and Andre Lai. The Siebel Scholars program annually recognizes top students at the world’s leading graduate schools of bioengineering, business, computer science and energy science.
Alumni Li, Lupo and Ozhinsky Awarded $3.93M Grant to Develop Metabolic Imaging for Brain Cancer
Three bioengineering PhD alumni, all of whom are now UCSF-affiliated faculty, have been awarded a $3.93 million Translational Team Science Award from the Department of Defense. Led by Yan Li, associate professor, Janine Lupo, professor, and Eugene Ozhinsky, assistant professor of the VA Advanced Imaging Research Center, the grant will support their efforts to create new, AI-based approaches that will enable direct translation of non-invasive metabolic MR imaging methods into clinical practice.
Vlassakis receives NIH New Innovator Award
PhD alumna Julea Vlassakis, now Assistant Professor of Bioengineering at Rice University, has been named a 2023 NIH Director’s New Innovator! These prestigious awards support early-career investigators with ambitious, unconventional project proposals demonstrating broad impact potential.
Gu named to LLNL Early Career UC Faculty Initiative
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory announced that Berkeley ME professor Grace Gu has been selected as the inaugural recipient of the LLNL Early Career UC Faculty Initiative! Gu will receive up to $1 million in funding over five years to support a research project that seeks to advance AI-driven manufacturing for metal-ceramic composite structures.
Michelle Chang receive 2024 ACS National Award
Berkeley Professor of Chemistry and Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering has been given the 2024 Award for Creative Work in Fluorine Chemistry, sponsored by the American Chemical Society Division of Fluorine Chemistry!
Fearing and Messersmith win 2023 Bakar Fellows Spark Awards
Congratulations to Professors Ron Fearing and Phillip Messersmith, two of seven new recipients of the 2023 Bakar Fellows Spark Award, designed to accelerate faculty-led research and produce tangible, positive societal impact through commercialization.
Rubinsky papers receive Best Paper in Cryobiology awards
Two papers by Professor Boris Rubinsky have been selected for Best Paper in 2022 awards by the journal Cryobiology. “Methods to stabilize aqueous supercooling identified by use of an isochoric nucleation detection (INDe) device” was named Best Paper of 2022, and “Isochoric supercooling cryomicroscopy” was the runner-up best paper. The Rubinsky lab is a world […]
H.R. Lissner Medal Awarded to Boris Rubinsky
Professor Emeritus Boris Rubinsky has been awarded the 2023 H.R. Lissner Medal in Bioengineering from the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. The Medal recognizes achievements in the form of significant research contributions in bioengineering; development of new methods of measuring in bioengineering; design of new equipment and instrumentation in bioengineering; and/or educational impact in the training of bioengineers. Rubinsky is known for developing several technologies that are now clinical standards in the field, including imaging-monitored cryosurgery, non-thermal irreversible electroporation, non-invasive electromagnetic detection of internal bleeding, and MEMS technology for single cell analysis.
Jill Banfield Wins the 2023 van Leeuwenhoek Medal
Professor Jill Banfield has been awarded the 2023 van Leeuwenhoek Medal for her contribution to the understanding of microbial communities and interactions between microbes and the environment. Her pioneering work includes the development of genome-resolved metagenomics and advancing community proteomics to study diverse bacteria, archaea, and phages, adding new branches to the tree of life.
Joni Wallis named AAAS Fellow
UC Berkeley professor of psychology and graduate program member Joni Wallis has been named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), “for distinguished contributions to systems and translational neuroscience, using single cell and neural oscillations to delineate the physiological basis of decision making and reward processing in the prefrontal cortex.”
Sekar named Quad Fellow
Congratulations to Nandini Periyapalayam Sekar, first year PhD student, named to the 2023 class of Quad Fellows! The Quad Fellowship is an initiative of the governments of Australia, India, Japan, and the United States, designed to build ties among the next generation of scientists and technologists. The program sponsors 100 exceptional master’s and doctoral students in STEM to study in the United States.
Congratulations 2023 Siebel Scholars
Five Bioengineering PhD students have been named Siebel Scholars of the class of 2023: Jordan Baker, Kelsey Gray DeFrates, Juan Eduardo Hurtado, Gabriela Lomeli, and Connor Tsuchida. The Siebel Scholars program annually recognizes top students at the world’s leading graduate schools of bioengineering, business, computer science and energy science.
Congratulations UCSF fellowship winners!
Four bioengineers will be receiving 2022-23 UCSF Graduate Division PhD fellowships! Gauree Shriram Chendke receives the Achievement Reward for College Scientists (ARCS), Nadia Mohammed Elmassalami Ayad the Lloyd M. Kozloff Fellowship, Caleb Tong the Shurl and Kay Curci Foundation PhD Scholarship, and Diana Cruz Garcia the NIGMS Initiative for Maximizing Student Development (IMSD) Fellowship. Congratulations!
Three faculty receive 2022 Bakar Fellows Spark Awards
Congratulations to Grace Gu, Phillip Messersmith and Wenjun Zhang, all faculty in the Bioengineering graduate program and 2022 recipients of the Bakar Fellows Spark Award. The Spark award is designed to accelerate UC Berkeley faculty-led research and produce tangible, positive societal impact through commercialization.
Ivry elected to American Academy of Arts & Sciences
Richard Ivry, professor of psychology and member of the bioengineering graduate program, has been elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences (AAAS). Ivry is also head of The Cognition and Action Lab and a member of the Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute. He studies cognitive neuroscience, with a focus on how people plan and execute actions and movements, and neurological disorders such as ataxia.
Landry selected for inaugural Philomathia Prize
Assistant Professor Markita del Carpio Landry of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering has been named the inaugural recipient of the Philomathia Prize. The prize recognizes demonstrated excellence and future potential of a UC Berkeley faculty member’s research. Landry’s Philomathia-funded project intends to image neuropeptide signaling with near-infrared microscopy, which would enable exploring the role of these newly visible neurochemical signals in autism spectrum disorders.
Nadia Ayad wins 2022 Outstanding Student Leader award
Congratulations Nadia Ayad, inaugural recipient of the Outstanding Student Leader of the Year award from UCSF Student Life. Nadia was recognized for her work leading the student group BE-STEM, as well as her work developing initiatives to apply justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion via the GRAD 210 course, and her phenomenal commitment to leadership in […]
Sirota, Garmire, Lam elected to AIMBE Fellows
Congratulations to graduate group faculty member Marina Sirota, Associate Professor of Pediatrics at UCSF, and alumni Lana Garmire, Associate Professor at the University of Michigan, and Wilbur Lam, Professor at Georgia Tech. All were elected as 2022 members of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) College of Fellows.
Congratulations new NSF Fellows!
Congratulations to bioengineers receiving new NSF Graduate Research Fellowships! Our winners are current PhD students Deniz Akpinaroglu, Joana Cabrera, Joy Chen, Benjamin Lesch, Alvince Pongos, Caleb Rux, Gabriel Sturm, and Jazmin Velazquez, and incoming PhD students Maple Chen, Russell Ro and Esther Sim. Great work!
Congratulations Outstanding GSIs!
Congratulations to Outstanding GSI Award Winners for 2021-22 from Berkeley BioE courses: Erin Akins, Gabriela Lomeli, Amanda Meriwether and Vivien Tran! The UC Berkeley Outstanding GSI Awards are given to the best GSIs of the year, nominated by the course instructor.
Thirteen faculty named Chan Zuckerberg Biohub Investigators
Congratulations to graduate program faculty members named to the second cohort of Chan Zuckerberg Biohub investigators: Ed Chang, Dan Fletcher, Zev Gartner, Amy Herr, Bo Huang, Tanja Kortemme, Liana Lareau, Hao Li, Aashish Manglik, Rada Savic, Seth Shipman, Aaron Streets, and Laura Waller. Congratulations also to BioE alumnus Stanley Qi, now a professor at Stanford.
Weaver wins BMES CMBE Shu Chien Achievement Award
Congratulations to Professor Valerie Weaver, named the 2022 BMES CMBE Shu Chien Achievement Awardee. This is the most prestigious honor bestowed by the BMES Cellular and Molecular Bioengineering Special Interest Group, recognizing an individual who has made exceptional contributions to the field, including groundbreaking scientific advances, the development of support programs, mentoring and training, and the advancement of diversity and inclusivity.
Best Inventions of 2021: Huue
Congratulations BioE startup Huue and founder PhD alumna Tammy Hsu! Huue’s process for creating environmentally friendly indigo dye through synthetic biology has been named one of Time Magazine’s Best Inventions of 2021.