Media Watch Archives
Capturing a big share of the AI industry
Irvine Standard -
Neil Sahota, UCI lecturer, school of engineering writes, “Consider, City.AI is a global network of AI pioneers, and the Orange County chapter is based in Irvine because that’s where opportunity and talent can be found. Why? Because we’ve built a phenomenal ecosystem within the city. And here are four reasons why: 1. First and foremost, we have incredible thought leadership. UC Irvine has a cornucopia of talent and research, and more importantly, is generating the workforce needed to bring AI from idea to execution. 2. We have a strong, interconnected hub. The Beall Center for Applied Innovation lies at the nexus to incubate ideas, provide resources, and connect the talent, funding and resources within Orange County to accelerate the growth of these opportunities. Read More
The Blue Box Is An Award-Winning Affordable Home-Testing Kit For Breast Cancer
Intelligent Living -
Judit Giró Benet, a 23-year-old Spanish engineer, invented a new way to detect breast cancer from the comforts of home using just a urine sample. The device – called The Blue Box – won the International 2020 James Dyson Award, the competition’s top prize. … Benet said: “The day that James Dyson told me that I had won the International prize was a real turning point as the prize money will allow me to patent more extensively and expedite research and software development I am doing at the University of California Irvine. But, most of all, hearing that he believes in my idea has given me the confidence I need at this vital point.” Read More
Diversity Dies At The Top: Human Or Robot, The Board Rules The Day (Part 2 Of The Time Capsule Project Series)
Forbes -
Neil Sahota, [UCI lecturer, school of engineering], writes, “While many organizations can point to better success with diversity and inclusion (D&I) at the lower-level positions, real D&I success is built upon at all levels, most especially the boardroom. In Part 1 of article series, we shared the general challenges of D&I and the need for the Time Capsule Project. Now, we will share the challenges that exist in achieving D&I in the boardroom.” Read More
The Western United States Is a Hotspot for Snow Droughts
The Good Men Project Magazine -
“The common ways to measure droughts are through precipitation, soil moisture and runoff,” says Laurie S. Huning, an environmental engineer at the University of California, Irvine. Her most recent work adds another dimension to that by looking at water stored in snowpack. Huning is the co-author of a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, with U.C. Irvine colleague Amir AghaKouchak, which developed a new framework for characterizing “snow droughts.” These can occur when there’s an abnormally low snowpack, which may be triggered by low precipitation, warm temperatures or both. Their research is timely. Read More
The Mantis Shrimp Inspires a New Material—Made by Bacteria
Wired -
So when a mantis shrimp’s hammer smashes into a thumb or a clam or a crab’s face, any crack in its structure will propagate in a twist pattern, dissipating the energy throughout the material. … Neat, said engineers at the University of Southern California and the University of California, Irvine, who’ve invented a clever kind of material based on the mantis shrimp’s clobber-sticks. … It’s a twist within a twist: They’ve been able to get minerals to grow within a 3D-printed shrimp-inspired Bouligand structure with the help of bacteria, of all things. Read More
Why all the hoopla about hydrogen?
The San Diego Union-Tribune -
San Diego Gas & Electric and Southern California Gas have partnered with the National Fuel Cell Research Center at UC Irvine on a blending program in which hydrogen will be injected into plastic pipes to see how it performs. The initial blend level will be 1 percent and may increase to 20 percent. Read More
California wastes its extra solar, wind energy. Could hydrogen be the storage key?
San Francisco Chronicle -
Jack Brouwer, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at UC Irvine and director of the National Fuel Cell Research Center, said hydrogen is more effective for longer storage because it doesn’t lose energy over time and can be stored underground easily and cheaply. [Subscription required, you can request an electronic copy of the article by sending an email to communications@uci.edu.] Read More
Is This Winter’s Sketchy Snowpack the New Normal?
Outside -
You might imagine droughts as long periods without rain, but they can also be caused by warm winters and a lack of water in the snowpack—referred to as snow drought—in places that depend on mountain runoff for their water supply and storage. One study from University of California at Irvine, led by [engineering] assistant researcher, Laurie Huning, looked at snow-water equivalent (the amount of water contained in snowpack), precipitation, and temperature to quantify snow drought and track it globally. It found that from 1980 to 2018, the western U.S. experienced a 28 percent increase in the duration of its snow droughts, the most severe in the world. Read More
Big Tech Looks To Hydrogen For Backup Generation At Data Centers
Forbes -
While Google has announced its plans to test batteries for backup, the key draw of hydrogen is its cost-effectiveness at longer durations. When comparing levelized costs for a completely resilient, 100% renewable data center with zero emissions, hydrogen is $119/MWh, while batteries could be over $4,000/MWh to ensure 48 hours of backup power. This finding comes from Jack Brouwer, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at the University of California, Irvine. Read More
California’s aging dams face new perils, 50 years after Sylmar quake crisis
Los Angeles Times -
“Emerging data of massive simulations of flooding suggest that existing flood control systems are a ticking time bomb,” said Brett Sanders, a professor of civil engineering at UC Irvine. “Southern California, in particular, is completely unprepared to deal with the consequences.” “Once the water goes outside of the structures intended to rein it in, it will go everywhere,” he said, “and there will be little time to get out of its way. … We ought to start spending more time studying the potential catastrophic risks to working-class communities in the floodplains.” [Subscription required, you can request an electronic copy of the article by sending an email to communications@uci.edu.] Read More