A digital noticeboard celebrating achievements and highlights in the college,
from grant updates to best paper awards.
Take a bite of some byte-sized news.
Discussing Ways to Improve the Built Environment
Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering Sabbie Miller was the featured guest on the National Science Foundation’s Discovery Files podcast, which explores the latest breakthroughs in science, technology and engineering. Miller discussed her research on next-generation building materials that can capture carbon from the air.
Raissa D’Souza Speaks on Federal Funding Impacts in UC Davis Labs to Lives Series
The associate dean of research and professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering and computer science emphasized the crucial role of federal funding for academic research, particularly in this time of developing artificial intelligence. “Without federal funding, we hand over AI dominance to foreign nations,” she said.
Alum Honored for Exceptional Contributions to Industry
Mechanical and aerospace engineer Farhad Ghadamli ’15, M.S. ’17 has received the 2025 Shiv Kapoor Outstanding Young Manufacturing Engineers award from SME. The honor celebrates Ghadamli’s outstanding contributions to the field of additive manufacturing throughout the early stages of his professional career.
Health Tech at the Exploratorium
Assistant Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Jonathon Schofield discussed the intersection of technology, fitness and happiness — and whether technology can improve our health — with a panel of experts at the Exploratorium’s After Dark series in San Francisco. The event was held in partnership with UC Davis Grand Challenges.
Alum Receives CSU Award for Outstanding Faculty Innovator in Student Success
Civil and environmental engineering alum Kimberly Stillmaker, M.S. ’13, Ph.D. ’16, an associate professor of civil and geomatics engineering at CSU Fresno, received a CSU Wang Family Excellence Award for her work as the director of the Foundation for Success Program, which aims to improve outcomes for first- and second-year engineering students.
Simon Bare Receives 2025 ACS Division Award
The Catalysis Science and Technology Division of the American Chemical Society has chosen Simon Bare, a UC Davis adjunct professor of chemical engineering and distinguished scientist at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, to receive the 2025 Award for Exceptional Achievements for the excellence and impact of his work in the field of catalysis.
Artificial Intuition at the Exploratorium
Assistant Professor Christina Harvey and Associate Professor Zhaodan Kong, both of mechanical and aerospace engineering, discussed different ways to align machines with our social and natural values, from care-based AI to biomimicry with a panel of experts as part of the Exploratorium’s After Dark series and UC Davis Grand Challenges.
Using AI in Teaching Wins Poster Award
Amir Saeidi, an assistant professor of teaching in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, earned the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Conference Committee’s Choice Poster Award for his initiative in training a large-language model to act as an assignment expert to better engage students and build critical thinking skills.
Marc Facciotti Recognized for Community Engagement Work at UC Davis
The UC Davis Office of Undergraduate Education has celebrated the biomedical engineering professor with the Marco Molinaro Award for Community Engagement in the Scholarship of Teaching & Learning. The award honors his work on the Know Your Students web application, which aims to achieve greater inclusivity and equity of learning in classrooms.
Nurturing Students into Global Engineers
Renetta Garrison Tull, an electrical and computer engineering professor, has been included in “Academic Leadership in Engineering Education,” a new book published by Springer Nature. Her chapter focuses on models for international engineering collaborations and includes examples from UC Davis initiatives, such as the PROMISE Engineering Institute.
Yayoi Takamura Named IEEE Magnetics Society Distinguished Lecturer
The professor and chair of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering was selected for her talk on tuning the magnetic properties of complex oxides at the nano- and micro-scales to build a better understanding of how these materials interact and open doors to faster and more efficient computing technologies in next-generation spin devices.
Aidan Gilchrist Receives Early Career Award
The American Federation for Aging Research has honored the assistant professor of biomedical engineering with a Glenn Foundation for Medical Research Grant for Junior Faculty. "This award is more than financial support," said Gilchrist. "It validates that our work has the potential to impact the field of aging and stem cell metabolism."
