News Archive

December 10, 2015 — Researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and University of Colorado Boulder have discovered that unique and changing microbial communities present during decomposition of human cadavers may provide a reliable “clock” for forensic scientists. The method could be used to estimate time of death in different seasons, as well determine the original location of moved corpses and help locate buried corpses.

November 25, 2015 — UC San Diego Launches CORE A set of best practices will guide Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) and researchers in the design and review of studies that use social media, self-tracking devices and other mobile technologies.to Foster Ethical Research Using Personal Health Data

November 20, 2015 — Engineers at the University of California, San Diego developed a new technology that uses an oscillating electric field to easily and quickly isolate drug-delivery nanoparticles from blood. The technology could serve as a general tool to separate and recover nanoparticles from other complex fluids for medical, environmental, and industrial applications.

November 17, 2015 — Bioengineer Todd Coleman, from the University of California, San Diego, has been named one of 100 outstanding individuals for 2015 by The Root, a premier news, opinion and culture site for African-American influencers. Other names on the list include tennis player Serena Williams, ballerina Misty Copeland and hip-hop artist Kendrick Lamar. Coleman will present his research at the prestigious TEDMED conference Nov. 18 to 20 in Palm Springs. His talk will focus on multi-disciplinary research and bioelectronics. He is part of the event’s Techno-Utopia session.

November 16, 2015 — Researchers at the University of California, San Diego report new insights into what nutrients fat cells metabolize to make fatty acids. The findings pave the way for understanding potential irregularities in fat cell metabolism that occur in patients with diabetes and obesity and could lead to new treatments for these conditions.

November 12, 2015 — A new proof-of-concept funding competition will pit UC San Diego undergraduate research teams against each other to develop projects or products with commercial potential. It’s part of a renewed campus focus on innovation, entrepreneurism, and moving university problem-solving ideas into the marketplace.

November 9, 2015 — An international team of researchers developed a method that identifies up to twice as many proteins and peptides in mass spectrometry data than conventional approaches. The method can be applied to a range of fields, including clinical settings and fundamental biology research for cancer and other diseases. The key to the new method’s improved performance is its ability to compare data to so-called spectral libraries--essentially a pattern-matching exercise--rather than individual spectra or a database of sequences.

November 5, 2015 — The recently formed Office of Innovation & Commercialization (OIC), a division of the Office of Research Affairs, is announcing the Open-Flow Innovation program, a new business-friendly approach to rapidly license technologies to new start-up companies.

November 2, 2015 — Researchers at the University of California, San Diego have developed a model that could be used to predict a drug’s side effects on different patients. The proof of concept study is aimed at determining how different individuals will respond to a drug treatment and could help assess whether a drug is suitable for a particular patient based on measurements taken from the patient’s blood.

October 27, 2015 — Bioengineers at the University of California, San Diego, have developed a method that cuts down by half the time needed to make high-tech flexible sensors for medical applications. The advance brings the sensors, which can be used to monitor vital signs and brain activity, one step closer to mass-market manufacturing. The new fabrication process will allow bioengineers to broaden the reach of their research to more clinical settings. It also makes it possible to manufacture the sensors with a process similar to the printing press, said Todd Coleman, a bioengineering professor at the Jacobs School of Engineering at UC San Diego. Researchers describe their work in a recent issue of the journal Sensors.