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A smiling student stands at a podium, gesturing with his left hand during a presentation. The screen behind him displays a large photo of a scuba diver underwater, along with a smaller video feed of a remote participant in the upper corner.

Bentson Foundation anchors future of ocean research with $3 million gift for graduate fellowships

2025-12-19

A new initiative at UC Santa Barbara removes financial barriers for marine science scholars, ensuring long-term stability for students tackling global environmental challenges.

$The image features a dark purple space background with a subtle blue grid representing the spatial plane. In the lower-left foreground, a large, rocky asteroid is glowing with intense white and yellow light as it fractures. A massive trail of blue rocky fragments and a wide, translucent orange light beam erupt from the asteroid, extending toward the upper right. In the distance, Earth and the Moon are shown within a faint orbital ring. A small disclaimer in the top right corner reads '*not to scale™$

‘What, You Don’t Know Who They Are?’

2025-12-18

A year-long collaboration between UCSB physicists and YouTube's Kurzgesagt resulted in a viral educational video that has reached millions worldwide.

Composite image of pictures of Nobel prize-winning physicists

Devoret, Martinis Officially Receive Nobel Prize in Physics

2025-12-11

Honored in Stockholm alongside mentor John Clarke, the duo received the award for their pioneering work on quantum tunnelling in electric circuits.

Mathilde Papillon standing in front of a whiteboard with mathematical diagrams, smiling and holding a Los Angeles Dodgers baseball toward the camera. Caption: Mathilde Papillon, a Ph.D. candidate in the Geometric Intelligence Lab at UC Santa Barbara, serves as an AI Research Scientist for the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The geometry of the game: How a UCSB physicist is helping the Dodgers rethink movement

2025-11-26

Moving beyond traditional stats, Papillon is ushering in "Moneyball 2.0" by using geometric intelligence and neural networks to decode the physics of the World Series champions.

Head and shoulders portrait of Boris Schraiman. He is wearing wire-rimmed glasses, a maroon sweater over a white collared shirt, and has gray hair. He is smiling slightly and looking off to the right. The background is a dark chalkboard with faint white diagrams and arrows.

Physics of life: Boris Shraiman awarded Max Delbrück Prize

2025-11-25

Describing theorists as "herders" of ideas, Shraiman's curiosity-driven journey from quantum materials to the life sciences has yielded profound insights into how living matter organizes itself.

In Memoriam: Professor Emeritus Gerald H. Jacobs (1934–2025)

2025-11-24

Gerald H. Jacobs, Distinguished Professor Emeritus at UCSB, passed away in Santa Barbara on October 15, 2025, after a year-long illness. Jerry was a renowned scientist, educator, and mentor, dedicating his life to unraveling the complexities of color vision across the animal kingdom and in elucidating the underpinnings of color blindness.

Bowers Women’s Brain Health Initiative receives transformative investments

2025-11-14

Partnerships with Noyce Trust and Chan Zuckerberg Initiative fuel groundbreaking research and earn a 2025 TIME magazine Best Invention of the Year award.

The Ann S. Bowers Women’s Brain Health Initiative (Bowers WBHI), headquartered at UC Santa Barbara, is the first large-scale, collaborative effort focused on closing the gender gap in neuroscience. The initiative unites seven University of California campuses, Stanford and Cornell to build the most comprehensive resource ever created for understanding women’s brain health.

Grace Han tapped for Scialog Award, joining collaborative team on sustainable materials

2025-11-13

The new chemistry professor will co-lead a project on sustainable lithium enrichment as part of the Scialog: Sustainable Minerals, Metals, and Materials initiative.

Grace Han, an associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry at UC Santa Barbara, has been named a 2025 Scialog Collaborative Innovation Award winner for a project aimed at developing new methods for sustainable lithium extraction.