News

The race to perfect the quantum computer is on — and researchers across the University of California campuses are helping position the nation at the front of the pack.

For UC Noyce Initiative researchers Brittany Dugger, Ph.D. and Chen-Nee Chuah, Ph.D., their passion for Alzheimer’s research is deeply personal. 

In her late teens, Dugger watched as both her grandmothers— Grandma Morenski and Grandma Dugger—suffered from the devastating effects of the disease. Despite sharing the same diagnosis, their symptoms were strikingly different. That inconsistency left her with lingering questions: 

How could two people experience the same disease in such different ways? 

Vice Chancellor of Research at UC Irvine, Pramod Khargonekar, Ph.D. has played a key role in shaping the UC Noyce Initiative since its founding having served on the executive leadership committee since 2019 and then as chair from 2023-2025. Now, as he prepares to step down from both his role with UCNI and his position as vice chancellor in June 2025, he shares his thoughts on what the Initiative has accomplished and his hopes for the future.

The dim glow of the hospital room cast flickering shadows as Soheil Ghiasi, Ph.D., gripped his wife’s hand. The rhythmic beeping of the fetal monitor filled the air, punctuated by the quiet murmur of nurses and the occasional contraction-induced groan. He had spent his career solving complex engineering problems, but none of that prepared him for this moment—the birth of his first child.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is poised to revolutionize healthcare, assisting doctors in diagnosing diseases, analyzing test results and predicting health risks. However, most AI systems focus on just one type of data at a time, limiting their ability to provide a comprehensive medical assessment. Unlike AI, doctors consider multiple factors—symptoms, medical history, lab results, and imaging scans—when making a diagnosis, leading to more accurate and informed decisions. 

For decades, neuroscience has overlooked a fundamental aspect of human biology: the female brain. 

The intricate relationships between brain function and hormonal shifts—throughout menstrual cycles, pregnancy, perimenopause, and beyond—have largely remained uncharted. 

For example, how is it that nearly 70 percent of Alzheimer’s patients are women, yet less than 0.5 percent of neuroimaging studies in the past 30 years have considered female-specific biological factors? 

A child’s sledding accident. A bad football tackle. A wartime explosion near a service member. These are just a few of the ways traumatic brain injuries can occur, upending a person’s life in an instant. 

The UC Noyce Initiative is pleased to announce the appointment of Bryan Kerner as its executive director, effective May 1. Kerner is the first person to hold this position since the Initiative's public launch on December 12, 2023.

UC Noyce Initiative-funded researcher Gene Tsudik was recently (April 11) awarded a 2024 Guggenheim Fellowship. He joins 186 other American and Canadian scientists and scholars receiving this highly competitive honor this year.

Tsudik is a Distinguished Professor of Computer Science at UC Irvine. His research interests include many topics in computer security, privacy and applied cryptography. Some of his recent work is focused on security (especially, malware-resistance) for the burgeoning global ecosystem of so-called Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices.

UC Noyce Initiative researcher Chen-Nee Chuah was recently (April 18) selected to be a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, or AAAS, the world's largest multidisciplinary scientific society. The prestigious honor is a lifetime achievement and is reserved for researchers who have made significant advancements to science or its applications.