Stephanie Gay
The Sustainable Subsea Networks (https://sustainablesubseanetworks.com/) research initiative investigates the sustainability of subsea cables, which are the backbone of global digital networks and carry over 99% of transoceanic internet traffic. This particular project works with industry professionals to document the various aspects of digital infrastructure network project planning. The course materials developed will chart the project life cycle from ideation to final delivery, including financial, legal and engineering considerations.
Zhengxu Yan
Healthcare facilities must adapt to growing demand with limited resources, but changes to space, staffing, and operations often have complex, interconnected effects. This project develops a new computational framework that uses reinforcement learning, a branch of artificial intelligence, to optimize how healthcare spaces, people, and activities are coordinated over time. Through simulation, we identify strategies that improve space use, patient experience, and operational efficiency at a cardiac catheterization lab. Our findings help reimagine healthcare buildings as dynamic, adaptable systems rather than static structures.
Zhengxian Jin
Throughout this semester, I conducted experiments using a custom-built wind tunnel combined with high-speed imaging techniques to study the aerodynamic behavior of pine cone seeds. We plan to digitally process these recordings in MATLAB to extract detailed motion data. Additionally, we utilized high-speed videography to capture the dynamic movements of various insects, specifically the jumping mechanics of water striders and the swimming techniques of selected marine organisms. Our next steps involve digitizing and analyzing these datasets to gain insights into their underlying biomechanical principles, ultimately aiming to apply these findings […]
Xiaopei Chen
Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in the US. In particular, heart failure has been declared a global pandemic. Heart failure is often a result of the human heart’s inability to regenerate damaged tissue after events like heart attack. Previous studies in the regeneration model zebrafish has shown that successful heart regeneration requires both cell proliferation and cell migration to the injury site, the latter process is less understood in mammalian model. Using neonatal mice, which can regenerate heart tissue for one week after birth, I aim to […]
Tommy Bordes
This research project explores a novel barrier to political dialogue in the U.S.: the belief that political opponents don’t genuinely believe their own views. While prior work highlights the benefits of perceived authenticity—like increased trust and social closeness—this study focuses on authenticity meta-perceptions, or whether people believe others truly mean what they say. We hypothesize that individuals are less likely to see opposing partisans as sincere, which could reduce their willingness to engage in political conversation. Using archival, correlational, and experimental methods, the project aims to uncover how these asymmetries […]
Thiri Than
The U.S. health system stratifies care by insurance, separating Medicaid patients from those with private insurance into different providers, settings, and care experiences—a practice known as “payer segregated care.” This is especially visible in academic medical centers (AMCs), where publicly insured pregnant patients are often assigned to resident clinics, while privately insured patients see faculty physicians. UCSF’s Health Care Segregation Study uses legal, historical, and qualitative methods to investigate the mechanisms and impacts of payer segregation. This summer, I will collaborate on a pilot study exploring the experiences of pregnant […]
Taylor Lui
Amblyopia is a neurodevelopmental disorder of vision characterized by reduced visual acuity even with the best optical correction. The current project I am working on aims to characterize visual perception in people with Amblyopia (compared to controls). We hope to contribute to the development of a better understanding of the underlying neural basis for amblyopia, with the long-term goal of developing more effective diagnosis and treatment.
Steven Zhang
This study maps the shape of perceptive fields across the visual field using a simple psychophysical task, where participants judge the position of a central dot relative to two outer dots arranged at different angles. By varying the location and orientation of stimuli, we aim to identify how the size and shape of perceptive fields change across central and peripheral vision. Clinically, this research could improve the diagnosis and monitoring of visual disorders like glaucoma or macular degeneration by enhancing visual field testing. It may also inform rehabilitation strategies for […]
Soumya Rai
Our sense of agency is influenced by the amount of control we have over the outcomes of our actions. Past research suggests that we adapt outcomes relative to their context when we do not have agency over the outcomes of our actions. Our preliminary results suggest that when we do have agency, we evaluate outcomes in an absolute manner. This summer, I will be conducting human experiments and analyzing behavioral data to test how agency leads to different contextual valuation strategies when outcomes vary in magnitude and valence.
Sophia Meyers
This project is focused on creating an in-depth vegetation map of the Okavango delta. My role in this involves analyzing high-resolution LiDAR products in order to delineate land features within the delta. This is done through creating algorithms and other processes of identification that can be further applied to other regions. In collaboration with the US army corp of engineers and on site researchers, this summer I will focus on ground-truthing the algorithms that have been created to identify termite mounds, as well as seeing how they can be adjusted […]