May 22, 2017
May 22, 2017 —
An international team of researchers has uncovered the mechanism that allowed Volkswagen to circumvent U.S. and European emission tests over at least six years before the Environmental Protection Agency put the company on notice in 2015 for violating the Clean Air Act. During a year-long investigation, researchers found code that allowed a car’s onboard computer to determine that the vehicle was undergoing an emissions test. The computer then activated the car’s emission-curbing systems, reducing the amount of pollutants emitted. Once the computer determined that the test was over, these systems were deactivated.
May 17, 2017
May 17, 2017 —
Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed the first soft robot that is capable of walking on rough surfaces, such as sand and pebbles. The 3D-printed, four-legged robot can climb over obstacles and walk on different terrains. Researchers led by Michael Tolley, a mechanical engineering professor at the University of California San Diego, will present the robot at the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation from May 29 to June 3 in Singapore. The robot could be used to capture sensor readings in dangerous environments or for search and rescue.
May 1, 2017
May 1, 2017 —
A team of researchers at the University of California San Diego and Stanford University has received a $7.5 million, five-year grant to try to answer two fundamental questions: what is the memory capacity of a brain; and how does the brain process information with maximum energy efficiency. The grant was awarded by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research through a Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (MURI).
April 27, 2017
April 27, 2017 —
Explorers planning to settle on Mars might be able to turn the planet’s red soil into bricks without needing to use an oven or additional ingredients. Instead, they would just need to apply pressure to compact the soil—the equivalent of a blow from a hammer. These are the findings of a study published in Nature Scientific Reports on April 27, 2017. The study was authored by a team of engineers at the University of California San Diego and funded by NASA.
April 18, 2017
April 18, 2017 —
A partnership between computer scientists at the University of California San Diego and Google has allowed the search giant to reduce by 70 percent fraudulent business listings in Google Maps. The researchers worked together to analyze more than 100,000 fraudulent listings to determine how scammers had been able to avoid detection—albeit for a limited amount of time—and how they made money.
April 6, 2017
April 6, 2017 —
UC San Diego researchers published a systematic analysis of microgrids in Southern California to better understand business cases for private investment in microgrids. From the abstract: “Decentralization [of the electric power grid] could radically reduce customer energy costs, but without the right policy framework it could create large numbers of small decentralized sources of gas-based carbon emissions that will be difficult to control if policy makers want to achieve deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.”
March 27, 2017
March 27, 2017 —
Researchers led by Karen Christman, a bioengineering professor at the University of California San Diego, were awarded nearly $3.1 million by the governing Board of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine March 23. Their work aims to help people with peripheral arterial disease. The condition narrows and blocks arteries providing blood supply to the legs resulting in cramping, pain and fatigue condition called critical limb ischemia. It leads to an estimated 230,000 amputations every year in North America and Europe.
March 13, 2017
March 13, 2017 —
A team of engineers at the University of California San Diego and La Jolla-based startup Nanovision Biosciences Inc. have developed the nanotechnology and wireless electronics for a new type of retinal prosthesis that brings research a step closer to restoring the ability of neurons in the retina to respond to light. The researchers demonstrated this response to light in a rat retina interfacing with a prototype of the device in vitro.
February 8, 2017
February 8, 2017 —
Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a desktop diagnosis tool that detects the presence of harmful bacteria in a blood sample in a matter of hours instead of days. The breakthrough was made possible by a combination of proprietary chemistry, innovative electrical engineering and high-end imaging and analysis techniques powered by machine learning. The team details their work in the Feb. 8 issue of Nature Scientific Reports.
January 10, 2017
January 10, 2017 —
Computer scientists at the University of California San Diego have released a new version of a software system that processes images from the world’s coral reefs anywhere between 10 to 100 times faster than processing the data by hand.This is possible because the new version of the system, dubbed CoralNet Beta, includes deep learning technology, which uses vast networks of artificial neurons to learn to interpret image content and to process data.
