To begin to understand the field of plasmonics, picture the rich colors of stained glass windows in Gothic cathedrals; or, the pixelation of a digital photo on a laptop screen. In some way, shape or form these are plasmons on display. Basically, plasmons are traveling waves of rippling electrons that can be excited in plasmas, metals or semiconductors. They lie at the heart of plasmonics. In such systems, plasmons bunch up and spread out as a group, enhancing and manipulating electromagnetic energy and concentrating optical energy beyond the diffraction limit of light. But much of this energy in common materials is quickly lost, or dissipated, as heat. And, while plasmons have found commercial applications in chemical sensors (e.g., common drug-store pregnancy tests), they have not been applied more widely or ambitiously because of high dissipation, which has frustrated scientists—until now.
The race is on between new antibiotics and drug-resistant bacteria—and scientists are challenged to keep up. By 2050, according to a Wellcome Trust study, deaths from deadly infections will be more common than cancer deaths. Scientists report that currently antimicrobial resistance causes 23,000 deaths annually in the U.S.; 700,000 deaths worldwide. Better methods to treat bacterial infections are urgently needed. So researchers, including a University of California San Diego professor, are gaining ground by demonstrating the first example of an effective gene therapy for deadly bacterial infections.
The headaches of heavy traffic may be universal, but University of California San Diego’s Ruth Williams works to ease the pain. The Department of Mathematics professor analyzes traffic congestion within the field of stochastic networks. This area of math describes real-world systems running at near-maximum capacity. It applies to things like the Internet when congested, assembly line glitches, customer service queues and freeways at rush hour. For this work, and for her many contributions to probability theory and collaborative research, Williams has been selected as a Corresponding Member of the Australian Academy of Science. The U.K.’s Professor Richard Ellis joins her as a new academy member.
A new world ranking names the University of California San Diego among the globe’s top 20 best universities; the campus netted the 16th spot on among U.S. universities. The annual rankings from the Center for World University Rankings (CWUR), released today, measure universities’ quality of research, faculty, influence, enterprise and successful alumni.
As if taken from a Star Wars or Star Trek movie script, the term “exciton” (pronounced ˈek-sə-tän) comes from condensed matter physics. Excitons are bound states of electrons and electron holes attracted to each other by electrostatic force. They can be created both by light and transformed into light. Electrically neutral, these quasiparticles exist in systems like insulators and semiconductors, but University of California San Diego physicists have established a way that may bring them into future cell phones and laptops.
Undergraduate students from UC San Diego designed and built an extremely affordable solar-powered lantern to provide not only light, but a source of income to a partner village in the Philippines. Their engineering and business savvy earned them the top spot in the Energy and Resources category at the Big Ideas social innovation competition at UC Berkeley, a third place finish at Booz Allen Hamilton’s Ideas Festival, and a spot at the Clinton Global Initiative University.
