Revolutionizing Energy Systems

Improving Indoor Air Quality for Better Public Health

UC Davis researchers, including Dean of the College of Engineering Richard Corsi, are tackling indoor air quality — an often-overlooked factor in health and productivity. From ventilation strategies to airborne disease transmission, their work is shaping cleaner, healthier indoor spaces in homes, schools and workplaces.

Charging Ahead

Renewable energy sources like wind and solar need a storage system capable of charging and discharging to relieve the power grid. Instead of building new infrastructure, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering imagines a system built from half-used EV batteries.

Harnessing AI to Advance Solar Cell Research

Professor of Materials Science and Engineering Marina Leite leads a team of UC Davis researchers in an AI-driven project to build foundational knowledge of halide perovskites, a promising material for solar cells.

Thermoradiative Photovoltaics

Researchers in the UC Davis Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering offer insights on devices that operate like solar cells in reverse and can generate power even in the absence of sunlight, offering an alternative route for energy production.

Charging, Not Range, is Becoming a Top Concern For Electric Car Drivers

Over the past four years, the number of public charging ports across the U.S. has doubled. As of August 2024, the nation had 192,000 publicly available charging ports and was adding about 1,000 public chargers weekly. But there’s still a need to make the charging experience more reliable and accessible for everyone.

Eclipsing the Limitations of Solar Energy

College of Engineering researchers aim to make around-the-clock solar energy a reality with a novel thermophotovoltaic device. Paired with an optical emitter, the device converts the sun’s heat into a concentrated light spectrum that can then be transformed into usable energy.