More than 200 leaders from government, industry, national labs and academia gathered at UC San Diego for the first statewide convening to accelerate California’s fusion energy economy. The message was clear: Now is the time to double down and solve the remaining challenges holding back abundant fusion energy — and California is extremely well positioned to do this. Working collaboratively, California can turn the promise of abundant, stable, clean energy from fusion into a commercial reality for the nation and the world. The summit was hosted by UC San Diego, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and General Atomics.

With $4 million from the University of California National Laboratory Fees Research Program, researchers at UC San Diego will 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. The new California Center for Fusion Energy – Materials and Diagnostics for Extreme Conditions (MDEC) is a strategic partnership among UC San Diego, UCLA, UC Irvine, UC Santa Cruz and two national labs — Lawrence Livermore and Los Alamos.

An upgraded fusion research facility at UC San Diego is expected to reduce the time and cost required to develop and demonstrate new materials that are fit to line the walls of fusion reactors. Researchers will now be able to expose materials samples to both fusion plasmas and to high-energy ions at the same time, in a controlled experimental setting. This is thanks to a $15 million Department of Energy award that funded the addition of a new ion beam accelerator.   

Generative AI can be harnessed to prevent injuries in athletes and also aid in rehabilitation after an injury. Bioengineers and computer scientists at the Jacobs School developed a model trained with athlete movements together with information about the biomechanical constraints on the human body, such as how much force a muscle can develop. This tool can generate videos that show the best motions athletes can execute during exercise to avoid injury and improve performance, or the best motions for athletes that need rehabilitation after an injury. Next steps include personalizing the model for specific individuals.

UC San Diego researchers developed a new way to biomanufacture large amounts of the octopus “camouflage pigment,” xanthommatin. A complex process involving this pigment is what allows octopuses, squids and other cephalopods to change the color of skin to blend in with their environment. The new method for producing large amounts of this color-changing, nature-inspired pigment involves robots and bioinformatics tools developed in bioengineering professor Adam Feist’s lab. The pigment could have potential applications in natural sunscreens, color-changing household paints and environmental sensors.  

UC San Diego has launched a global consortium with support from Google.org – Google’s philanthropic arm – to help teach the next generation of coders. The consortium brings together experts from education and nonprofit organizations, as well as industry and academia, comprising thousands of educators in dozens of countries around the world, who in turn will impact tens of thousands of students. The funding is part of Google’s recently announced $1 billion commitment to education in the United States.

A next-gen wearable system, developed by engineers at the Jacobs School, enables people to control machines using everyday gestures — even with excessive motion in the background, such as while a person is running, riding in a car or floating on turbulent ocean waves. The system combines stretchable electronics with AI to overcome a long-standing challenge in wearable technology: reliable recognition of gesture signals in real-world environments.The technology could enable patients in rehabilitation or individuals with limited mobility, for example, to use natural gestures to control robotic aids without relying on fine motor skills.

An electronic sticker can use the sweat from a person’s fingertips to both harvest energy and monitor that person’s vitamin C levels — no blood draws, lab visits or batteries required. This project is part of a larger effort at the Jacobs School to generate real-time insights into human health and wellness through smart sensing technologies. In this new work, the flexible sticker, which attaches to everyday objects such as a disposable drinking cup, collects trace amounts of sweat as a person grips the cup. Within minutes, the system harvests enough power from the sweat to analyze it for vitamin C and wirelessly sends the results to a nearby laptop.

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