New Conversational AI Tool Uses Trusted Medical Protocols to Help People Decide When to Seek Care
April 23, 2026
A new chatbot could reliably help people decide what to do about their symptoms — and do so based on guidance that is both medically sound and easy to understand. Designed to improve self-triage, it could help reduce unnecessary hospital visits and ensure that those who need care seek it sooner. Full Story
Six New Projects Are Empowering Early-Career Engineering and Computer Science Faculty
April 23, 2026
Six teams from the UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering have been awarded funding to accelerate interdisciplinary research collaborations that include an early-career faculty member. The big idea is to empower early-career faculty to build interdisciplinary research collaborations to the point that they are competitive for multi-year external funding. The effort is funded by Irwin Jacobs and his late wife, Joan. Full Story
MRI and Augmented Reality for Better Back Pain Surgery Wins at Research Expo 2026
April 21, 2026
Mechanical engineering Ph.D. student Songyuan Lu won the grand prize at this year’s Research Expo, where more than 150 students presented their research posters across the six departments at the UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering. Lu’s work focuses on computer-assisted surgery using MRI and augmented reality. Full Story
AI-enhanced Microscopy Produces Crisp, Real-time Video Inside Live Cells
April 20, 2026
Using artificial intelligence, engineers have developed a new way to watch the inner workings of living cells in real time. The process both captures images that are twice as sharp as conventional microscopes and is fast enough to play as smooth video. Full Story
Using Physics, Engineers Create Fentanyl Test Strips That Are 100 Times More Sensitive
April 13, 2026
Engineers have developed fentanyl test strips that are about 100 times more sensitive than current commercial versions. They achieved this feat by creating a new physics-based model that explains, for the first time, how these test strips work and how to systematically improve them. Full Story
New Chip Design Could Boost Efficiency of Power Management in Data Centers
April 8, 2026
Engineers have developed a new chip design that could make data centers more energy efficient by improving a critical task in electronics: converting high voltages into lower levels for use in processors. Full Story
On the Rise: Jacobs School Ranks #9 Best Engineering School in the Nation
April 7, 2026
The UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering is ranked the #9 engineering school in the nation in the prestigious U.S. News & World Report Rankings of Best Engineering Schools. This is up from #10 last year. Full Story
KatoMed, a UC San Diego MedTech Accelerator Company, Shines
March 31, 2026
KatoMed, a San Diego-based startup that developed a navigation tool for spine surgery that could result in safer, less costly procedures and improved workflow for surgeons, has deep ties to UC San Diego. Those connections were on display recently, as the current and incoming presidents of Japanese electronics giant Kyocera attended a demo of KatoMed’s technology on campus, at the UC San Diego Center for the Future of Surgery. Full Story
Eight UC San Diego Researchers Elected 2025 AAAS Fellows
March 26, 2026
Eight researchers at the University of California San Diego have been elected 2025 Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS): Andrew D. Chisholm, Farinaz Koushanfar, Albert P. Pisano, Ravi Ramamoorthi, JoAnn Trejo, Emily Troemel, Meenakshi Wadhwa and Sheng Zhong. Full Story
Brain-inspired Device Could Lead to Faster, More Energy-efficient AI Hardware
March 11, 2026
A brain-inspired hardware platform could lead to the development of compact, low-power AI hardware. By mimicking how the brain processes information, the platform improved the speed, accuracy and energy efficiency of simulated tasks such as spoken-digit recognition and early seizure detection. Full Story