Community College Participants and Projects: 2016
Undergraduate Researcher: Jimi Cao
Intended Major: Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Home Institution: Pasadena City College
Research Project: Telepresence System For Real-Time Communication During Emergencies
Faculty Advisor: Prof. Ruzena Bajcsy
Postdoctoral Mentor: Dr. David Anton Saez
UC Berkeley Department: Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Project Abstract: Nowadays, communication between doctors and first responders during emergency situations is limited to the voice and video conferencing. This limits the amount of critical information that a doctor can interpret , which can mean the difference between life and death of a patient. Our goal is to increase the efficiency of communication between them. We propose an augmented reality (AR) station for the first responders and a virtual reality (VR) station for the doctors. The first responders’ station will scan and send 3D data to the doctors in real-time and the VR station will create a 3D reconstruction so doctors may interact with it. Any feedback provided by the doctors will be sent in real-time to the first responders. With the proposed framework, the efficiency of the communication between first responders and doctors will drastically improve. Project poster
Undergraduate Researcher: Liam Dougherty
Intended Major: Electrical Engineering
Home Institution: Cabrillo College
Research Project: Improving Energy Efficieny in NEM Relays Through Self-Assembled Monolayer Coating
Faculty Advisor: Prof. Tsu-Jae King Liu
Graduate Student Mentor: Benjamin Osoba
UC Berkeley Department: Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Undergraduate Researcher: Michael Fernandez
Intended Major: Bioengineering
Home Institution: East Los Angeles College
Research Project: Simvascular: Optimizing 3D and Comparing 3D Models
Research Advisor: Prof. Shawn Shadden
Graduate Student Mentor: Adam Updegrove
UC Berkeley Department: Mechanical Engineering
Project Abstract: Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death worldwide. Typically, cardiovascular disease is caused or enhanced by disruptions of blood flow in the arteries. Patient-specific blood flow modeling was pioneered in the late 1990’s to investigate and predict the progression of cardiovascular disease, and in recent years, has proven to be a powerful tool in clinical research [1]. In the 2000’s, researchers needed to purchase very expensive and robust specialized commercial tools for arterial model construction and blood flow simulation. Recently, a team of researchers at Stanford and UC Berkeley has promoted research in this area by creating an open source software pipeline called SimVascular. SimVascular provides a framework to reconstruct an arterial model from MRI or CT data, and then perform blood flow simulations on the reconstructed model. Despite being the leading computational tool for arterial modeling and blood flow simulation, it still takes an experienced user multiple hours to create an arterial geometry in SimVascular. Discussed are our efforts to: (1) Lead the development of open source one-click conversion of image data into accurate 3D arterial models, (2) compare the open source models to previously created commercial models, and (3) make available a large number of open source arterial models that are ready for blood flow simulation and disease investigation. Through these efforts the group successfully created 15 open source models, a point based metric for comparing open source and commercial models, and an automatic model smoothing function decreasing the model creation time by 20 percent. Project poster
Undergraduate Researcher: Alam Figueroa Aguilar
Intended Major: Electrical Engineering
Home Institution: Cabrillo College
Research Project: Optimization of UV Stabilization Processes for Critical Dry Etch Applications
Faculty Advisor and Mentor: Dr. Jeffrey Clarkson
UC Berkeley Department: Marvell Nanofabrication Laboratory
Project Abstract: Project Abstract: Stabilization of thin films of photoresist is a crucial upstream process directly related to the quality of features defined during dry etch. Traditional stabilization techniques involve thermal treatments by way of standard baking in a conventional box oven. This process has evolved to include incident UV light during the thermal treatment. In this study, we investigate the quality of stabilized films of resist by comparing newly developed UV stabilization processes to that of a traditional box oven hard bake. Quality metrics include sidewall profile, aspect ratio, and etch selectivity. Our results indicate that these metrics are highly related to process input parameters including stabilization temperature, time, and intensity of UV light. A review of our newly optimized UV stabilization recipes and how input parameters affect quality metrics will be presented. Lastly, we will report dry etch robustness of stabilized films wProject poster selectivity was found to be similar across all stabilization processes Project poster
Undergraduate Researcher: Karen Ho
Intended Major: Molecular Cell Biology
Home Institution: Pasadena City College
Research Project: Nitrite Reducing Bacteria Isolated from Groundwater and Sediment from the Oak Ridge Field Research Center
Faculty Advisor: Dr. Romy Chakraborty
Postdoctoral Mentor: Dr. Alexander Aaring
UC Berkeley Department: Earth Science Division, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory
Project Abstract: Microbes’ and microbial communities’ impact on their ecosystems are not well understood. We work to isolate novel strains of bacteria from their environments and study their physiology. In this research, nitrite respiring bacteria are isolated from core sediment through enrichment for carbon utilization under anaerobic conditions. Furthermore, three naturally co-existing strains of Pseudomonas fluorescens that were previously isolated from groundwater were cultivated in mono-cultures and co-cultures under denitrifying conditions to study their growth and explore their tolerance and sensitivity to nitrite. These cultures were exposed to d ifferent concentrations of nitrite in 48 well plates and their growth was monitored by optical density (600 nm). We studied the effects of nitrite on the system because it is the first intermediate in the pathway for nitrate reduction and is also known to be toxic to bacteria. These results have implications for future research on how microbes interact under other conditions or in different environments. Project poster
Undergraduate Researcher: Alexander Kern
Intended Major: Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Home Institution: Consumnes River College
Research Project: Maximizing Capacity of Urban Networks
Faculty Advisor: Prof. Roberto Horowitz
Graduate Student Mentor: Cheng-Ju Wu
UC Berkeley Organization: Mechanical Engineering
Project Abstract: A network within a traffic system is assumed to have the same users from day to day. Given an origin-destination (OD) on any day a driver will swap routes the next day to a perceived cheaper route [1]. Combining this with the P0 timing plan it has been shown the system converges to an equilibrium [2]. Given a set cycle time and swapping red times based on the pressure of each stage the system will maximize capacity of a given network. The algorithm in this paper treated route swaps combined with the P0 green swaps [3] independently. It uses a scalable link node system, with one route being an arterial of the network. This paper shows the capacity of the network is maximized on a 3 by 3 node example including 1 arterial route. Project poster
Undergraduate Researcher: Celia Kitchell
Intended Major: Environmental Engineering
Home Institution: City College of San Francisco
Research Project: Isolation and Characterization of Nitrogen Fixing Bishop Pine Bacteria
Faculty Advisor: Dr. Romy Chakraborty
Postdoctoral Mentor: Dr. Robert Walker
UC Berkeley Department: Earth Science Division, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory
Project Abstract: Endophytes form a mutualistic association with conifers, providing them with labile nitrogen through biological nitrogen fixation (BNF). This has important implications for agriculture as BNF is viewed as a sustainable alternative to anthropogenic fertilizers and for understanding forest nitrogen budgets. To investigate what species of endophytes are responsible for nitrogen fixation in lodgepole pine, we used pine needle samples collected from the Ecological Staircase at Mendocino tested positive for nitrogenase activity. Strains were identified using 16S rRNA gene analyses and sequencing for the nifH gene was used to identify the ability to encode nitrogenase. We isolated more than ten strains closely related to Paraburkholderia sordidicola. Further study is needed to determine whether these are nitrogen fixers. Project poster
Undergraduate Researcher: Bryan Manuele
Intended Major: Mechanical Engineering
Home Institution: Foothill Community College
Research Project: Dry Transfer and Characterization of 9-atom wide Graphene Nanoribbons using Atomic Force Microscopy
Research Advisor: Dr. Jeffrey Bokor
Graduate Student Mentor: Juan Pablo Llinas
UC Berkeley Department: Electrical Engineering
Project Abstract: Bottom up synthesized graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) with atomically precise armchair edges and widths of less than 2 nm have desirable unique electrical properties that make them potentially promising for applications in ultra-scaled transistor technology1. We were able to image the graphene nanoribbons by using an atomic force microscope, by using a wet transfer method to place the ribbons onto a hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) / sapphire heterosubstrate. We utilized a dry transfer method to create the h-BN / sapphire substrate, and a wet transfer method to deposit the GNRs onto the substrate. Our results confirm that the ribbons retain their structure and atomically smooth edges when transferred onto any arbitrary substrate. Project poster
Undergraduate Researcher: Huy Vuong
Intended Major: Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Home Institution: Pasadena City College
Research Project: Physical Vapor Deposition of Tungesten Diselenide (WSe2) Thin Films
Faculty Advisor: Prof. Alex Zettl
Graduate Student Mentor: Thang Toan Pham
UC Berkeley Department: Physics
Project Abstract: Monolayer Tungsten Diselenide (WSe2), along with those of other transitional metal dichalcogens (TMDCs), stands out to be promising semiconductors for creating highly specialized electronic devices such as LEDs, phototransistors, optoelectronics because of its direct band gaps. Finding a systematized way to synthesize high-quality monolayer WSe2 at a larger scale plays a critical role in further study of such material. The Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD) method is utilized to grow the thin films from coarse WSe2 powder, and optical microscope and Raman Microscope are used to characterized the result afterwards. Within the same PVD system, how the temperature, time, and the distance between the precursor to the target substrate affect the growth is also well studied by having only one free variable at a time in the experiments in order to find an optimal set of parameters. Overall, the study, if successful, should push the study of monolayer WSe2 forward and broaden the opportunity to apply this two-dimensional (2D) material into new next-generation devices. Project poster
Undergraduate Researcher: Jordan Wilson
Intended Major: Microbiology
Home Institution: Diablo Valley College
Research Project: Regulation of the Splicing Factor SRSF10 by Alternative Splicing of an Ultraconserved Exon
Faculty Advisor and Mentor: Liana Lareau
UC Berkeley Department: Lareau Laboratory
Project Abstract: During RNA processing, cells manipulate gene expression by regulating mRNA isoform abundance via alternative splicing. The SRSF10 gene sequence, a splicing factor linked to proper cell development in the brains of frogs, has an alternative exon that has been highly conserved over the evolution of animals. This region is thought to be of crucial importance to the cell because of its apparent mutation sensitivity. A plasmid construct containing a part of the SRSF10 gene was cloned and transfected into human embryonic kidney (HEK) cells to measure mRNA isoform abundance after gene expression for eight hours. A library of mutagenized plasmids was created to then study the effects of single-point mutations on alternative splicing of the SRSF10 reporter to better understand this regulatory mechanism. Project poster
Undergraduate Researcher: Jingwei Zhang
Intended Major: Electrical Engineering
Home Institution: College of San Mateo
Research Project: Optimization of Hexagonal Boron Nitride Synthesis
Faculty Advisor: Prof. Alex Zettl
Postdoctoral Mentor: Dr. Matt Gilbert
UC Berkeley Department: Physics
Project Abstract: Two-dimensional (2D) materials have been studied extensively for their role in next-generation electronics beyond silicon. Hexagonal Boron Nitride (hBN), a 2D insulator, has been identified as a promising substrate that improves graphene and other 2D material based devices. By interfacing hBN with other 2D materials, it can be used to truly enable 2D nanodevices. Although hBN has been successfully synthesized by chemical vapor deposition (CVD), the mechanism of boron nitride synthesis can still be optimized. This study investigates the role of hydrogen in synthesis of hexagonal boron nitride (hBN). Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) is used to characterize the coverage and size of adlayers for multilayer hexagonal boron nitride as the CVD process is varied. Project poster