College of Chemistry

Many people are only aware of climate change by way of public discourse and social media. Drawing on recent scientific papers organized for a course that he teaches at Berkeley, Jeffrey Reimer, Chair of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, demonstrates in this lecture how the atmosphere is changing, that humans are the cause, and that there are consequences. These consequences may be viewed in the context of Earth's historical carbon cycles, which demonstrate what the Earth will look like unless we consider every possible means to decarbonize the atmosphere.

New research from a team of scientists from Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), UC Berkeley and Scripps Institution of Oceanography of University of California, San Diego (SCRIPPS) has used synthetic biology to determine the active mechanism of E. Coli toxin in breaking down DNA.

The Welch Foundation, one of the nation’s largest sources of private funding for basic chemical research, has announced that Drs. Armand Paul Alivisatos and Charles M. Lieber are the 2019 recipients of the prestigious Robert A. Welch Award in Chemistry. Highly-respected and influential leaders in the fields of nanoscience and nanotechnology, Drs. Alivisatos and Lieber are being recognized for their important research contributions which have had a significant, positive impact on humankind.

Two faculty scientists in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (CBE) at UC Berkeley including Professor Roya Maboudian and Assistant Professor Markita Landry, have been named to the 2019-20 cohort of Bakar Fellows, an honor that gives the named fellows the money and time to translate their laboratory breakthroughs into technologies ready for the marketplace. The Bakar Fellows Program was launched at UC Berkeley in 2012 and fosters faculty entrepreneurship in fields including engineering, computer science, the biological and physical sciences and architecture.