View in browser

December 2025

Dear SDSC Collaborators, Partners and All Friends:

As we close out 2025 and reflect on SDSC’s 40th year, I’m struck by both how much the technology around us has changed, and how consistently our role has remained the same at its core — enabling scientific discovery nationwide. The innovation across the SDSC community this year has been remarkable, as our team navigated advances in AI to expand access, increase national research capacity, and scale the infrastructure and services that translate scientific work into real-world impact.

You can read about recent highlights in the newsletter below. Much of this work happens behind the scenes, but it is essential to a thriving national research ecosystem.

Internet Security Project to Benefit U.S. Research and Education Networks

Strengthening Ukraine's Groundwater Resilience and Workforce Development

How Supercomputers Are Pointing to New Parkinson’s Treatments

SDSC-housed Protein Data Bank Brings Molecules Up to Size

HPC Ignites!

SDSC Receives Honors in 2025 HPCwire Readers’ and Editors’ Choice Awards
At SC25, SDSC was recognized with three Readers’ Choice Awards and one Editors’ Choice Award for its work enabling scientific breakthroughs and fostering partnerships with industry in service of the national research community. Notably, SDSC’s Societal Computing and Innovation Lab (SCIL) received the Readers’ Choice Award for Best HPC Response to Societal Plight. Listen to Ilkay Altintas describe SCIL’s mission and impact.

NRP: Celebrating Innovation at SC25
The National Research Platform (NRP) was honored with the SC25 Spirit of Innovation Award. Learn more about the project from Mohammad Firas Sada.

UC San Diego Team Takes Third Place at SC25 Student Cluster Competition
Now in its sixth year, the UC San Diego SCC program gives students a hands-on opportunity to apply theoretical knowledge to practical, HPC environments.

Congressional App Challenge Partners with SDSC to Strengthen the Nation’s Tech Workforce Pipeline
Several of San Diego County’s most promising high school coders recently visited SDSC to participate in the 2025 Congressional App Challenge.

SDSC Elevates and Ensures Secure Research Infrastructure for DOW Projects
The successful completion of the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) framework assessment marks SDSC as a trusted, fully compliant hosting platform for Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) and Federal Contract Information (FCI), opening new doors for defense, research and industry collaborations.

The Future of AI and SCIDS
Hear from SCIDS Dean Rajesh Gupta about UC San Diego's newest school — the School of Computing, Information and Data Sciences — and how it will approach training students to work in and around artificial intelligence. Read more in UC San Diego Today's release How Data Science Will Change the World.

Computer Modeling Illustrates Plastic-Degrading Fungus
Koji mold, has been used to produce staple foods like soy sauce and miso for thousands of years. While this fungus has solved the age-old problem of satisfying our taste buds, it may also hold the key to solving a distinctly modern dilemma: global plastic pollution. SDSC's Andy Goetz explains more.

Predictive Science Inc. Advances Dynamic Solar Corona Modeling
A team of scientists with Predictive Science Inc. used SDSC's Expanse supercomputer to create a near-real-time model that accurately depicts the dynamic nature of the sun's outermost atmospheric layer. PSI’s Cooper Downs explains more. 

UC San Diego Lab Advances Generative AI Research With NVIDIA DGX B200 System
Huge thanks to NVIDIA AI for empowering UC San Diego researchers and students with world-class AI infrastructure — and to Hao Zhang's Lab for pushing what’s possible in AI systems and large-scale models.

UC San Diego Will Lead a New California Effort to Make Fusion Energy a Practical Reality

UC San Diego has been selected to lead a new multi-institution research effort aimed at solving materials, fuel, diagnostic and workforce challenges required to make clean, affordable fusion energy a commercial reality.

Transforming Computer Science Education in the Age of AI

Educators, education researchers and computer scientists are teaming up as part of a consortium led by the University of California San Diego to reshape the future of computer science education in the era of generative AI.

Wearable Lets Users Control Machines and Robots While on the Move

Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a next-generation wearable system that enables people to control machines using everyday gestures — even while running, riding in a car or floating on turbulent ocean waves.

For a full listing of news around campus, please visit UC San Diego Today.