🎮 Video games have become a global cultural force, powered by the people who create, play, and love them. Hear from #BaskinEngineering Department Chair and Professor of Computational Media Noah Wardrip-Fruin on the invention of video games. Via Yahoo Tech: bit.ly/4vMpaUL

Who invented video games?

Video games are everywhere. So who was the first person to come up with the idea of playing a game on a computer screen?

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#BaskinEngineering Professor of Computational Media Magy Seif El-Nasr is a leading researcher in #games, #AI, and #HCI —she is also Editor-in-Chief of IEEE Transactions on Games. We spoke with her on how AI is reshaping the future of games, education, and research. 🔗 Read the Q&A: bit.ly/45hGnuk

Leading games research in the AI era

UC Presidential Chair Magy Seif El-Nasr shares insights on how AI has shaped academic publishing, and her observations on an emerging "AI divide."

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🚀 The UCSC Rocket Team reached new heights at the 2026 International Rocket Engineering Competition (IREC), earning 1st place in the 10,000-foot Commercial Off-the-Shelf (COTS) division and 4th overall out of 141 teams! Congrats, Slugs! The sky's the limit. ✨ Learn more: bit.ly/45efMhK

🎉 Congrats to #BaskinEngineering Professor of Computer Science and Engineering Alvaro Cardenas on receiving the Test of Time award at the 2026 @acm.org Asia Conference on Computer and Communications Security!

Congrats to a team of #BaskinEngineering students who took home a 2025-26 CITRIS Aviation Prize! ✈️ The team of students designed a vertiport (vertical aiport) placement simulation tool for California Airlink, the state's first advanced air mobility network. 🔗 Learn more: bit.ly/4oWVLpb

Thrilled to share that Ashesh Chattopadhyay (@ashesh6810.bsky.social), assistant professor of applied mathematics at #BaskinEngineering, was awarded the 2026 SIAM Activity Group on Mathematics of Planet Earth Early Career Prize! Learn more: bit.ly/4wlKxNk

Early detection can improve outcomes for esophageal cancer patients. #BaskinEngineering @profdanielkim.bsky.social is developing an RNA liquid biopsy that can detect cancer from a simple blood draw—and has partnered with Oxford @nanoporetech.com to advance the technology. Learn more: bit.ly/4vKcazW

Partnership with Oxford Nanopore Technologies will support development of RNA liquid biopsy for cancer early detection

The technology screens for cancer, and even abnormal “precancerous” cells, using a simple blood draw.

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“...the end product of jailbreaking an #LLM that’s capable of teaching you how to build a deadly virus is that you now have an LLM that’s capable of teaching anybody how to build a very dangerous virus.” says @ucscgenomics.bsky.social Director David Haussler. Via Vox: bit.ly/4ghNyJJ

The next AI safety fight may actually be about DNA

AI could make bioweapons easier to build. A rare coalition wants to stop that now.

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🔎 Where did life on Earth begin? #BaskinEngineering Professor Emeritus of Biomolecular Engineering David Deamer and Research Associate Bruce Damer guest edited a new special issue of Astrobiology, “An Origin of Life on Land,” exploring growing evidence of life's origins. Learn more: bit.ly/42Ph5m8

Land-based origins of life explored in UCSC-led special issue of 'Astrobiology'

The scientists hypothesize that an entire landscape might be implicated in life's beginning

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🧬 A partnership between @ucscgenomics.bsky.social & Google Research has developed new methods to improve pangenome references, cutting errors when identifying genetic variants by 50%! A step forward in making genomics more representative of human diversity. Via Google Research: bit.ly/42EkJ2j

Catalyzing scientific impact through global partnerships and open resources

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New work from the lab is up on bioRxiv, where we introduce “SpikeLab: Agentic tools for spike data analysis” was led by postdoc Tjitse van der Molen and supported the crew at @ucscgenomics.bsky.social and @baskinengineering.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

For years, residents of Pajaro Valley, CA have lacked access to timely, accurate air quality data. #BaskinEngineering Prof and Watsonville native @javigr.bsky.social is changing this by deploying a network of drones & sensors to empower community decision-making. Via the Pajaronian: bit.ly/4nBD49y

Community sensors provide Pajaro Valley with air quality info | The Pajaronian | Watsonville, CA

A UCSC professor and Watsonville native is looking to provide up-to-date information on air quality for Pajaro Valley residents.

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👏 Congrats to #BaskinEngineering Assistant Professor Yuanchao Xu on receiving a National Science Foundation CAREER Award! Xu will develop protocols to improve the security and efficiency of the software and hardware that power complex data centers. Learn more: bit.ly/3ON4koV

While the world focuses on the power consumption of massive AI data centers, #BaskinEngineering researchers are looking at a more efficient alternative: the human brain. Via @inc.com: bit.ly/4t5nRPy

Why the Most Powerful Computer of 2026 Might Be Made of Living Cells, Not Microchips

While the world focuses on the power consumption of massive AI data centers, researchers at the University of California, Santa Cruz, are looking at a more efficient alternative: the human brain.

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Clumps of mouse brain cells the size of peppercorns learned to keep a pole upright on a virtual moving cart — the video game equivalent of balancing a ruler vertically on your palm. Led by #BaskinEngineering reserachers. Via @sciencenews.bsky.social: bit.ly/41QflbU

Clumps of mouse brain cells can learn to play a virtual game

Sure, playing video game is fun. But the ability of tiny brain organoids to pick up a skill could provide insight into how healthy brains work.

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👏 CONGRATS to the #BaskinEngineering students and alumni who have been awarded the prestigious National Science Foundation (#NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship! The program has played a key role in developing the talent pipeline that sustains U.S. leadership in science. Learn more: bit.ly/3QE9ofD

NSF awards 20 students and alumni with highly coveted Graduate Research Fellowships

The fellowship program is one of the nation's most prestigious of its kind. Awardees at or from UC Santa Cruz represent fields ranging from engineering to the physical, biological, or social sciences.

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A new ranking shows @ucsantacruz.bsky.social #BaskinEngineering students are among the top coders in the country! 🎉 We are thrilled to be among top 50 universities nationwide for producing graduates with the skills today’s top employers are hiring for. Read more: bit.ly/4tIFKnM

UC Santa Cruz debuts on CodeSignal’s University Report

A new ranking demonstrates Banana Slugs’ software engineering career readiness

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🚀 #BaskinEngineering students are launching a satellite into space this weekend! SlugSat, a UCSC student org, is part of NASA's CubeSat Launch Initiative which supports the launch of student-built satellites. You can watch the SpaceX livestream of mission NG-24 and cheer them on! #NASA #Space

🏆 NVIDIA hackathon WINNER! 🤯 Congrats to #BaskinEngineering student Preet Karia for placing first at the #NVIDIA GTC 2026 Agents for Impact Hackathon! Preet built an #AI -powered tool called Loomin that turns physics notes into 3D visualizations.💡 Read the story 🔗 bit.ly/3Q096iR

Engineering student wins NVIDIA Agents for Impact Hackathon

Preet Karia built an AI-powered tool to turn physics notes into 3D visualizations.

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A #BaskinEngineering faculty-student team—Assistant Professor of Biomolecular Engineering Vanessa Jonsson and Ph.D. student Divya Venkatraman—will build a resource to understand ‘immune visibility’ with support from the W. M. Keck Foundation’s Bridge Funding Initiative. Learn more: bit.ly/3NQYPoH

Three UC Santa Cruz professor-student teams win Keck Foundation funding

The program provides funds to support the career trajectories of early- to mid-career faculty and their graduate students.

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🧠 “We’re trying to understand the fundamentals of how neurons can be adaptively tuned to solve problems,” said #BaskinEngineering Ph.D. student Ash Robbins, who helped train brain organoids to solve a goal-directed task. Via Singularity Hub: bit.ly/4bG9Mm4

These Mini Brains Just Learned to Solve a Classic Engineering Problem

In a step toward biological computing, brain organoids rewired their networks as they learned to balance a digital pole on a cart.

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🎉 A @ucsantacruz.bsky.social team placed 3rd at the '26 Mistral AI Worldwide Hackathon for their #AI cybersecurity platform! 🥉 “We were competing against YC founders, Google DeepMind researchers, Meta product managers, & other AI experts," said student Anthony Lamas. Read on: bit.ly/4bzzY1O

UC Santa Cruz trio takes third at 2026 Mistral AI hackathon with cybersecurity platform

A team of UC Santa Cruz students and an alumnus earned third place at the 2026 Mistral AI Worldwide Hackathon in San Francisco for developing an artificial intelligence-powered cybersecurity solution ...

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"Both of us have recently moved from denial to contemplation that #AI will soon be in a position to replace us," says David Haussler, distinguished prof of biomolecular engineering and J. Xavier Prochaska, prof of astronomy and astrophysics at UCSC. Via @mercurynews.com: bayareane.ws/4sW5j4q

Opinion: We’re scientists. We use AI. And we fear it.

‘Both of us have recently moved from denial to contemplation that AI will soon be in a position to replace us.’

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A team of scientists from #BaskinEngineering successfully trained brain organoids to solve a well-known engineering benchmark — demonstrating the increasing complexity of lab-grown brains. Via Popular Mechanics: bit.ly/4uo8bse

Scientists Are Trying to Train Lab-Grown Brains. The Brains Have Started to Solve Problems.

Scientists trained a brain organoid to solve a well-known engineering task, and its success demonstrates the increasing complexity of lab-grown brains.

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Goodbye single-use plastics!🌱 Wonderfil, a startup by #BaskinEngineering alumna Shiloh Sacks (B.S. ’21, electrical engineering) and co-founder Amelia Eichel, makes it easy to refill soap products with self-serve dispensers. Via @lookoutsantacruz.bsky.social: bit.ly/47qgkCE

Westside startup’s innovative, self-serve soap dispensers aim to reduce single-use plastics

Wonderfil has partnered with UC Santa Cruz, Whole Foods and others to allow customers to refill bottles of soap, detergent and shampoo in their containers of choice in a fully automated process.

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“We’re trying to understand the fundamentals of how neurons can be adaptively tuned to solve problems,” said #BaskinEngineering student Ash Robbins—part of a @ucsantacruz.bsky.social team who taught brain organoids to solve a goal-directed task. Via @discovermag.bsky.social: bit.ly/4uCeatV

For the First Time, Lab‑Grown Brain Organoids Display Ability to Learn

Learn more about the advances in brain organoids and what this science could mean for the future.

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🎉 Congrats to #BaskinEngineering grad student Eren Dogan (Ph.D. ’27, computer science and engineering), who was one of four @uofcalifornia.bsky.social students to receive the inaugural Costas John Spanos Semiconductor Manufacturing Award from CITRIS and the Banatao Institute! bit.ly/4u4oNoO

4 UC students receive CITRIS Spanos Awards for semiconductor research - CITRIS and the Banatao Institute

The awards recognize exceptional graduate student researchers who are advancing the future of semiconductor devices, technology, design and manufacturing.

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🧠 #BaskinEngineering researchers effectively coached organoids, tiny pieces of brain tissue grown in the lab, to solve the “cart-pole” problem—an engineering benchmark to measure how effective systems are at processing information. Via @futurism.com: bit.ly/4b4srGx

Lab-Grown Brains Growing More Powerful

Scientists from the University of California, Santa Cruz have just taken a huge step in the long history of lab-cultured brains.

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🧬 A #pangenome can reveal the spectrum of genome variation within a species. The toolbox for working with pangenomes is filling up, thanks to #BaskinEngineering researchers @khmiga.bsky.social, @benedictpaten.bsky.social, and @russcd.bsky.social. Via @natmethods.nature.com: go.nature.com/4spcbHb

It’s a colorful pangenome world - Nature Methods

A pangenome can reveal the spectrum of genome variation within a species. The toolbox for working with pangenomes is filling up.

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Researchers at UC Santa Cruz have trained brain organoids—tiny pieces of brain tissue grown in the lab—to solve the "inverted pendulum" or "cart-pole" problem, a fundamental benchmark used in robotics, control theory, and #AI. Via National Today: bit.ly/4lahyYj

Brain Organoids Trained to Solve Tasks - Santa Cruz Today

Researchers at the University of California, Santa Cruz, have trained brain organoids, tiny pieces of brain tissue grown in the lab, to solve the "inverted pendulum" or "cart-pole" problem, a fundamen...

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