Seeing Patterns

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Berkeley Engineers: Changing Our World

Dean's Digest

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This summer, UC Berkeley graduate students will apply their classroom skills to real world problems as part of a new collaboration between the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the University's Management of Technology (MOT) Program, a joint effort of the College of Engineering, the Haas School of Business and the School of Information Management and Systems. The participants in the first-ever Berkeley/UNIDO Fellows Program will spend at least three weeks in developing regions conducting various research projects, from creating solar-powered lighting systems in China to advancing cancer prevention in southern Africa to extending microfinance loans in Uganda.

The Berkeley/UNIDO Fellows Program was launched in conjunction with a three-day conference, "Bridging the Divide - Technology, Innovation, and Learning in Developing Economies," held April 1-3 at the Haas School. Luminaries such as Sun Microsystems chief scientist John Gage, NEC Limited president Akinobu Kanasugi, and Zhang Xing Shen, vice minister of education for China, joined Berkeley faculty and students to discuss ways technology can improve the economy and quality-of-life in developing nations.

"UC Berkeley is an international leader in the exploration of sustainable engineering solutions to the world's most pressing problems," says College of Engineering Dean Richard Newton , a keynote speaker at the conference. "Not only does this important conference bring together experts from engineering and business and many other disciplines, but it also offers a rare opportunity for our students to get out in the field and make a difference in people's lives - an opportunity all engineering students should have in today's global economy."

The students will present the results of their research at the next UNIDO/MOT conference in April 2005. For more on their research goals and the College of Engineering 's new large-scale effort within the Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society (CITRIS) to bring information and communication technology to developing regions, please read the Summer 2004 issue of Forefront, out in September.

Bridging the Divide 2004

UC Berkeley Management of Technology (MOT) Program

United National Industrial Development Organization

Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society (CITRIS)

"Enrollment in UC Berkeley's Pioneering Management of Technology Program Continues to Grow" (Lab Notes, October 2003)

Lab Notes is published online by the Public Affairs Office of the UC Berkeley College of Engineering. The Lab Notes mission is to illuminate groundbreaking research underway today at the College of Engineering that will dramatically change our lives tomorrow.

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© 2004 UC Regents. Updated 4/30/04.