Winter 2025 Issue: Sense of Wonder

At UC San Diego, we are driven by a sense of wonder. It’s here where researchers, scholars and artists have the curiosity to explore, the drive to achieve and the focus to see the possible in the impossible. In a world that is rapidly changing, we remain steadfast in developing new tools to accelerate research and creating innovative solutions for today’s pressing issues.

On the Cover

“Superradiance. Embodying Earth.” is a multiscreen, video and sound installation by new media artist Memo Akten, an assistant professor in the Department of Visual Arts, and his collaborator, Katie Peyton Hofstader. It is a dramatization of complex ocean simulations and other natural world simulations, distilled and reimagined in the form of abstract visuals and sounds. It was inspired by SOARS, the Scripps Ocean-Atmosphere Research Simulator used to replicate and study air and sea interactions under controlled laboratory conditions. “Superradiance” was the centerpiece attraction of the exhibit “Embodied Pacific: Oceans Unseen” at Birch Aquarium at Scripps Institution of Oceanography.