Oct 04, 2009 Environmental Leader Manufacturers: Beware of 'greenwashing'

David Dornfeld, the Will C. Hall Family Chair in Engineering in Mechanical Engineering at UC Berkeley, cautions awareness of 'greenwashing,' a term used to describe the practice of companies disingenuously spinning their products and policies as environmentally friendly.

Oct 02, 2009 Forbes Calling all transhumanists

Technology futurists love to talk about the Singularity as the point in time when technology starts to progress so rapidly that machine intelligence melds with and surpasses human intelligence. But Ariel Rabkin, a third year Ph.D. candidate in UC Berkeley's computer science program, doubts that many technical people take the Singularity seriously. "Human-comparable AI is really hard," he says. "And we're nowhere close to achieving it."

Oct 01, 2009 New Scientist Free-flying cyborg insects steered from a distance

For the first time, researchers have controlled the movements of free-flying insects from afar, as if they were tiny remote-controlled aircraft. By connecting electrodes and radio antennas to the nervous systems of beetles, the researchers were able to make them take off, dive and turn on command. The cyborg insects were created at UC Berkeley by engineers led by Hirotaka Sato and Michel Maharbiz.

Sep 30, 2009 UC Berkeley NewsCenter Scientists discover clues to what makes human muscle age

A study led by researchers at UC Berkeley has identified critical biochemical pathways linked to the aging of human muscle. "Our study shows that the ability of old human muscle to be maintained and repaired by muscle stem cells can be restored to youthful vigor given the right mix of biochemical signals," said Professor Irina Conboy, a faculty member in bioengineering at Berkeley and one of the lead authors on the study.

Sep 29, 2009 Midwest AGnet Improving the journey of biomass from sunlight to the pump

A program called Engineering Solutions for Biomass Feedstock Production -- funded by the Energy Biosciences Institute, partly based at UC Berkeley -- will study the issues and logistics involved in getting biomass from field production to the gate of the biorefinery.

Sep 28, 2009 Sacramento Bee Berkeley, UCLA lead nation's elite colleges in economic diversity of students

U.S. News & World Report recently released its ranking of top U.S. colleges in terms of "economic diversity," or the proportion of low-income students enrolled at the institution. The magazine calculates such diversity by looking at the the percentage of students receiving federal Pell Grants, that are most often bestowed on undergraduates whose families earn less than $20,000 a year. UCLA and UC Berkeley lead the list of elite universities with 35 and 32 percent poorer students, respectively.

Sep 28, 2009 The New Yorker A life of its own: Where will synthetic biology lead us?

By using gene-sequence information and synthetic DNA, Berkeley Engineering professor Jay Keasling and his colleagues are attempting to reconfigure the metabolic pathways of cells to perform entirely new functions, such as manufacturing chemicals and drugs. Eventually, they intend to construct genes -- and new forms of life -- from scratch.

Sep 24, 2009 The Huffington Post New momentum on malaria

Since late 2004, OneWorld Health, UC Berkeley and Amyris have been working together as the Artemisinin Project to develop a new, low-cost technology platform to provide non-seasonal, high-quality and affordable artemisinin, a key ingredient in first-line treatments for malaria. The Artemisinin Project is based on breakthrough technology invented by engineering professor Jay Keasling at the University of California, Berkeley.

Sep 24, 2009 The Daily Californian Exercise machines may supply power for RSF

UC Berkeley's Recreational Sports Facility is currently in collaboration with the campus's department of mechanical engineering to develop a technology that will allow patrons to generate energy while they work out.

Sep 24, 2009 ABC News State program gives high-schoolers stem cell lesson

More than 40 researchers partnered with high school teachers statewide this week in an effort to educate young people about the science of stem cells. The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine organized the lectures across the state, reaching nearly 3,500 students. Participating faculty included David Schaffer, professor of bioengineering at UC Berkeley.

Sep 22, 2009 UC Berkeley NewsCenter Young Berkeley Engineering faculty member receives MacArthur 'genius' award

Maneesh Agrawala, a 37-year-old associate professor of electrical engineering and computer sciences at UC Berkeley, has received a MacArthur "genius" award, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation announced today. Agrawala's ressearch involves automating the process by which complex information is presented visually. He will receive $500,000 in "no strings attached" support over the next five years.

Sep 21, 2009 San Francisco Chronicle Bay Bridge S-curve slows drive time

Since the final segment of the curvy replacement roadway was rolled into place on the east span of the Bay Bridge, the drive time from San Francisco to Oakland takes 57 percent longer than it did a year ago. UC Berkeley transportation engineering Professor Michael Cassidy suggests that with the S-curve design on the bridge, the worse-than-usual bottlenecks won't go away.