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Research at UCSB

Index:

The Office of Research

Open a new browser window http://research.ucsb.edu  to see the Ofice of Research web site.

The Office of Research is the research arm of UCSB. This office administers approximately 1500 active contract and grant awards and facilitates more than 1000 new awards totaling $95.2 Million.

The Office of Research is headed by the Vice Chancellor for Research, who is the principal campus officer in matters of research policy and administration, and is an advocate for research and its value in an educational setting. The Office of Research:

National Research Centers

UC Santa Barbara is home to a number of national research centers. All centers offer specialized research opportunities and a multidisciplinary environment for study at the under- graduate, graduate, and postdoctoral levels.

Center for Quantized Electronic Structures (QUEST)

QUEST, one of the first of the National Science Foundation Science and Technology Centers to be established in 1989, has as its focus a frontier field in microelectronics: the formation and study of "quantum structures." Quantum structures generally have sizes sufficiently small that novel electronic, optical and magnetic behavior emerges, which in turn can provide the basis for entirely new device technologies. QUEST integrates the research efforts of a multidisciplinary faculty from the departments of chemistry, chemical engineering, electrical and computer engineering, physics and materials. The work of QUEST spans the full range of growth and synthesis of quantum structures, characterization of their basic properties, and utilization of quantum structures in novel device schemes. World-class laboratory facilities support this research, including unique crystal growth and materials synthesis capabilities, a 3,500 square-foot clean room with a Class 100 lithographic capability, and state-of-the-art fabrication processes, laboratories for low temperature, optical, high speed and magnetic measurements. QUEST researchers also have access to sophisticated surface science labs, and make use of the Free Electron Laser at UCSB.

QUEST also seeks to integrate research with education, supporting a broad range of educational programs that span K-12, undergraduates, graduate students, and science teachers. QUEST workshops and Visiting Lecturer programs focus the broad, international scope of research in quantum structures onto the UCSB campus.

Institute for Theoretical Physics

The National Science Foundation's Institute for Theoretical Physics, initiated in 1979 on the UCSB campus, brings together physicists from all over the world to collaborate on cross-disciplinary problems. Areas of study include elementary particles and nuclei, condensed-matter physics, astrophysics, and cosmology. Approximately 50 researchers are in residence at the institute at any given time. One of the major centers of theoretical physics in the world, the institute is housed in its own unique building near the east entrance to the campus. Telephone: (805) 893-4111.

Materials Research Laboratory (MRL)

The Materials Research Laboratory at the University of California, Santa Barbara, was established in September, 1992 and currently involves 35 faculty from eight departments plus 60 research students and postdocs. A new 14,000 square foot MRL building houses our central facilities, seminar rooms, research office space and the MRL administration. The scientific activities of the UCSB-MRL are focused around four interdisciplinary research groups (IRGs), as outlined below, together with seed projects, central facilities, an educational outreach program, and a technology outreach program.

Complex Fluids (IRG 1), Group Leader: Philip Pincus. IRG1, which focuses primarily on the biomolecular materials area, is examining the creation and control of biomolecular materials whose microstructure can be patterned during processing on various length scales which vary from nanometers to submacroscopic:

Solution Synthesis of Inorganics at Molecular and Atomic Interfaces (IRG 2), Group Leader: Fred Lange. The focus of IRG2 is on the chemical and physical basis of the low temperature synthesis of materials from solutions using either molecular or atomic interfaces. The research aims to understand the basic mechanisms of these processes and to explore the synthesis of new materials with applications in electro-optics, catalysis/gas separation, and biotechnology: Heterogeneous Polymeric Structures (IRG3), Group Leader: Edward Kramer. This IRG concentrates on the science and engineering of multiphase polymeric systems where performance of a material and its applications are intimately connected to the assembly of precise heterogeneous structures. These structures may be spatially periodic, such as those produced by self-assembly in block copolymers, or may possess only short-ranged order, as in foams or interpenetrating networks. We are particularly interested in formulating composite plastic, determining how precise control over the scale and geometry of the heterogeneity can impact performance, and designing new processing strategies to manufacture improved structures. Current projects include: Strongly Nonequilibrium Phenomena in Complex Materials (IRG4), Group Leader: James Langer. This IRG has a strong theoretical component, but includes several experimental projects. It is firmly focused on important materials phenomena that share the common themes of nonlinearity and strong departures from mechanical and thermal equilibrium:

National Nanofabrication Users Network (Nanotech at UCSB)

Nanotech is the UCSB branch of the National Science Foundation's National Nanofabrication Users Network (NNUN). The goal of the NNUN is to provide a geographically and technologically extensive capability to facilitate research breakthroughs across a broad spectrum of fields, including physics, electronics, optoelectronics, biology, and mechanics. Nanotech, with the resources of a 3500 square-foot clean room, including a Class 100 optical lithography capability, electron beam lithography, and a full range of fabrication processes, can leverage the fabrication expertise developed through work at UCSB and make it available to a broader community, receiving in turn, a large diversity of fabrication challenges and applications.

National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS)

Open a new browser window http://www.nceas.ucsb.edu  to see the NCEAS web site.

The National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS) was established by the National Science Foundation with additional support from the State of California and UCSB. The Center sponsors group activities, sabbatical fellows and postdoctoral associates focusing on the integration of existing ecological information. NCEAS also is involved in the development of informatics activities that serve the ecological community.

The Center provides facilities, services, and high end computing capabilities to visiting scientists. Recent research topics have included ecological economics, restoration ecology, variability in community dynamics, complex population dynamics, new directions for ecosystem science in the private sector, global changes and terrestrial ecosystems, deep sea biodiversity, and an analysis of the relationship between productivity and diversity.

The Center maintains contacts with a variety of campus entities through collaborative efforts and the involvement of faculty from several departments. Graduate and undergraduate interns are also supported.

In addition to ecological research, the Center supports several outreach activities, and is developing programs to involve K-12 education activities.

Optoelectronics Technology Center (OTC)

The Optoelectronics Technology Center (OTC) at Santa Barbara is the lead member of a multi-campus university research consortium-The Heterogeneous Optoelectronics Technology Center (HOTC)-which was established in 1997 after a national competition by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). HOTC is composed of investigators from UCSB, Cornell, UCSD, UCLA, USC and UT-Austin who are teamed to provide advanced capabilities for real-time information access systems. A main aspect of the Center's charter is to encourage collaboration between academia and U.S. industry in order to accelerate the realization of practical, manufacturable technologies in the area of optical interconnects and memory.

As a part of this consortium, OTC at Santa Barbara concentrates on the formation of advanced vertical-cavity laser and photodetector arrays as well as their combination with integrated circuits using new heterogeneous integration technologies. This technology should provide new device and materials capabilities for the next generation of parallel computer interconnects and data communications.

Southern California Earthquake Center

Termed a center without walls, the Southern California Earthquake Center is a partnership of researchers at several universities who are studying earthquake risks and hazards in Southern California. Established by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Geological Survey, the center is charged with coordinating the efforts of the various university research groups to broaden and integrate earthquake-related data gathered in the last 30 years into a form that will prove accessible and useful to a wide body of public and private organizations interested in earthquake safety. In addition to UC Santa Barbara, the other institutions involved are: the University of Southern California, the California Institute of Technology, UCLA, UC San Diego's Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory in New York and the USGS office in Pasadena.

Organized Research Units

Organized research units (ORUs) provide unusual opportunities for students and faculty to do basic and applied research in a variety of disciplines. The following ORUs operate outside of the established academic teaching departments at UCSB.

Note: Neither courses of instruction nor degree programs are offered through the organized research units. Additional information about the units is available from the Office of Research, Cheadle Hall 3227. Telephone: (805) 893-4188.

Center for Chicano Studies

The Center for Chicano Studies supports and conducts interdisciplinary basic and applied research on the history, culture, and socioeconomic status of Chicanos/Latinos in the United States. Researchers from the social and behavioral sciences, humanities, and education engage a wide range of contemporary and historical social issues including identifying key barriers to employment, recovering systems of cultural production, examining community empowerment, analyzing immigration and settlement, oral traditions and legal disclosure. Each year the Center sponsors faculty work groups, collaborative research projects, lectures, symposium and publications that reflect this set of concerns.

Developing research initiatives that strengthen the recruitment and retention of faculty, graduate students and undergraduates involved in Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies are priorities. The Center, along with the Department of Chicano Studies, supports the unique and prestigious Luis Leal Endowed Chair in Chicano Studies. In addition, each year the Center recruits and supports a Visiting Research Scholar involved in cutting-edge research in Chicana/o Studies. Moreover, the Undergraduate Student Internship Program enhances the research skills of undergraduates interested in Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies by providing stipends to work on faculty projects.

As the only organized research unit devoted to the study of Chicana/o and Latina/o populations, the Center is a resource to local community agencies, community leaders, state and national entities as well as to the local campus community. Thus, public service forms an integral part of the Center's educational mission.

Institute for Computational Earth Systems Science (ICESS)

The Institute for Computational Earth System Science (ICESS) provides an environment in which Earth system scientists can closely collaborate and perform computations not possible in many other research facilities. Our focus is on research and research education in Earth system science, with an emphasis on processes governing the interactions of radiation and Earth.

Advances during the past decade in computer and satellite technology, and our ability to model complex systems, have opened unprecedented opportunities to increase understanding of the Earth as an integrated system. ICESS is on the leading edge of Earth system science research and related computer technology. We are uniquely positioned to utilize the extensive satellite capabilities that are coming on-line from a variety of agencies and organizations over the next decade. Currently there are few research/instructional units in the country, or indeed the world, with comparable research programs in computational Earth system science.

Our field of research spans the globe and provides unique research opportunities to both undergraduate and graduate students. ICESS facilities consist of state-of-the-art computing resources, an optical calibration laboratory, an electronics laboratory, a satellite receiver dish, a Seaspace TeraScan data acquisition and image processing system, a Bausch & Lomb UV Radiometer with access to nationwide UV data, comprehensive climate radiation data, and a variety of unique field equipment. The satellite receiver is used for the real-time acquisition of satellite data. This capability, in concert with our advanced networking facilities, makes current and historical satellite imagery electronically accessible at UCSB for both research and instruction.

As an Organized Research Unit our mission is to provide: a distributed, interdisciplinary computer environment for the promotion and support of research and research education in Earth system science; an interdisciplinary environment and computer-related services that enhance the excellence and competitive advantage of UCSB global change research; a center of excellence to provide visibility and aid in the attraction of top faculty and students to UCSB; and efficiently-run business operations and administration that support research.

Institute for Crustal Studies

The purpose of the Institute for Crustal Studies is to increase the understanding of the earth's crust and lithosphere, including the portions below the sea floor. New technical approaches to issues involving the earth's crust are being explored through collaborative research projects between the university, government, and industry. The research agenda of Crustal Studies includes tectonics, crustal structure and materials, earthquakes, and hazardous waste disposal. The research activities of the institute include faculty and students from the departments of biological sciences, engineering, geography, geological sciences, mathematics, and physics, and the environmental studies program.

Institute for Polymers and Organic Solids

The Institute for Polymers and Organic Solids is an interdisciplinary effort on the frontier between physics, chemistry, and polymer science. It draws upon expertise from these fields to conduct fundamental research on a new class of materials: conjugated organic polymers with delocalized electronic conductivity, anisotropic linear and nonlinear optical properties, and novel electrochemical properties. To succeed in better understanding these novel materials, the institute has capabilities in experimental physics, synthetic chemistry, and polymer processing and characterization. The institute has become an international focal point for research in this field, with visitors from all over the world. Recent accomplishments of the Institute include important contributions to the chemistry of the fullerenes, the development of efficient light emitting diodes made from conducting polymers, and the demonstration of a unique structure-property relation that leads to high performance nonlinear optical properties of semiconducting polymers. A current focus is directed toward semiconducting polymers as materials for "plastic" lasers.

Institute for Social, Behavioral, and Economic Research (ISBER)

The Institute for Social, Behavioral, and Economic Research (ISBER) conducts interdisciplinary basic and policy research, and offers research development support, on a wide spectrum of problems. ISBER provides an active program of research development in the social sciences and related areas. Investigators are from the social and behavioral sciences, the humanities and those sciences involved with environmental issues. Areas investigated range from the globalization of industry, archaeology in the Americas, how health care data are acquired and used in research, the economics of criminal justice and the linguistics of almost extinct modern languages, to the sociology of religion. A number of centers have been established to focus on specific areas of interest. These include the Center for Global Studies, Center for Chinese and Inner Asian Studies, Center for Communication and Social Policy, Health Data Research Facility, Center for Advanced Study of Individual Differences, Center for Evolutionary Psychology, Center for the Study of Religion, Center for the Study of Discourse, and the MesoAmerican Research Center. One of ISBER's principle objectives is to promote research which is focused on global issues.

Marine Science Institute (MSI)

Open a new browser window http://www.msi.ucsb.edu  to see the MSI web site.

The Marine Science Institute (MSI) is the focus of marine research and program development at UCSB. MSI administers and supports research projects involving faculty and graduate students from 14 disciplines. Much of the research activity focuses on the resources of the California coast, although an increasing amount of effort is being directed toward an understanding of the world's oceans. Marine activities in the biological, physical, and geological sciences presently predominate, but there is increasing involvement of researchers from other disciplines, including chemical oceanography.

Neuroscience Research Institute (NRI)

Open a new browser window http://lifesci.ucsb.edu/nriweb/index.html  to see the NRI web page.

The Neuroscience Research Institute (NRI) is concerned with understanding the cellular and molecular principles underlying function of the nervous system. Its primary purpose is to further basic research of an interdisciplinary nature in cellular and molecular neuroscience. Areas of emphasis include research on vision, neurotrophic molecules and their receptors, the physiology and molecular organization of ion channels, neural development, the response of the central nervous system to injury, neurodegeneration and associated disorders, regenerative capacity of the nervous system, synaptic transmission, and neuropharmacology. The academic disciplines involved include cell biology, molecular biology, biochemistry, physiology, genetics, developmental biology, biopsychology, biophysics, and bioengineering. Two centers have been established within the NRI to focus specific problems : the Center for the Study of Age-related Macular Degeneration, and the Center for Neurodegenerative Disorders. 

Quantum Institute

Open a new browser window http://www.qi.ucsb.edu  to see the Quantum Institute web site.

The Quantum Institute is an interdisciplinary research unit that facilitates research in the fundamental properties of complex systems-systems as diverse as superfluid helium, liquid crystals, magnetic nanostructures and semiconductor superlattice and quantum wells. The Institute embraces the Center for Terahertz Science and Technology (CTST) and the Center for Nonlinear Sciences (CNLS). CTST offers opportunities for research in the biological, chemical, physical, and material sciences, using the unique properties of the UCSB free-electron lasers. CNLS promotes interactions between researchers who share common interest in nonlinear problems and supports undergraduate and graduate education in the nonlinear sciences.

Multicampus Research Units

Institute for Nuclear and Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology (INPAC)

Open a new browser window http://cfpa.berkeley.edu/inpac/home.html  to see the INPAC web site.

The Institute for Nuclear and Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology promotes greater understanding of the origin and structure of the universe and the basic interactions which govern it, through experimental, observational, and theoretical research. Members of the institute are from UC Santa Barbara, Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego, and Santa Cruz, and all three UC-run Department of Energy Laboratories. The aim of the institute is to promote collaboration on basic research in the area of intersection among nuclear and particle astrophysics and cosmology.

UC Linguistic Minority Research Institute (LMRI)

The UC Linguistic Minority Research Institute (UC LMRI) is a Multicampus Research Unit of the University of California headquartered at UC Santa Barbara. The Institute involves faculty and projects at all nine UC campuses. The LMRI was established to conduct research on the education of language minority students in the K-12 education sector with the long-range goal of improving these students’ access to college. An emphasis is placed on collaborative research with schools and school systems. The major activities of the LMRI include sponsoring research projects; collaborating with schools and educational agencies; conducting annual meetings, research conferences, institutes and lectures; disseminating information on language minorities in various ways including a monthly newsletter, book publications, and an on-line information server with web services; and sponsoring professional development activities, which include coordinating a pre-doctoral fellowship program at UC campuses and hosting visiting scholars from all campuses in the UC system. The Institute is housed in Building 528, Room 4722. Telephone: (805) 893-2250. Facsimile: (805) 893-8673. E-mail: lmri@lmrinet.ucsb.edu.

Affiliated Units

Center for Black Studies

The Center for Black Studies conducts research on the social, historical, political, economic, and cultural meanings that have affected peoples of African heritage throughout the world. The center sponsors a faculty development program (dissertation fellows); organizes and presents seminars, lectures, and symposia; and serves as a liaison between the campus and the Santa Barbara community.

Engineering Research Centers

For information, see College of Engineering.

Interdisciplinary Humanities Center

The Interdisciplinary Humanities Center was established in 1987 as part of the University of California's initiative to encourage humanities education and research in the university curriculum. The center promotes innovative forms of collaborative research and teaching, including projects that overlap traditional disciplines. Participants at the center include UCSB faculty and students, as well as distinguished visiting scholars from around the world. The Center invites members of the Santa Barbara community to participate in its conferences and lectures. It also hosts a monthly symposium in which members of the UCSB public engage in discussion with distinguished members of the UCSB faculty. The Center is housed on the sixth floor of the Humanities and Social Sciences Building. Telephone: (805) 893-3907. Facsimile: (805) 893-4336.

Natural Reserve System

The University of California administers 33 natural reserves throughout the state. The reserves are undisturbed natural areas representative of the ecological diversity of California. The mission of the Natural Reserve System is to contribute to the understanding and wise management of the Earth and its natural systems by supporting university-level teaching, research, and public service as protected natural areas throughout California.

The UCSB campus has responsibility for six of the areas: the Carpinteria Salt Marsh Reserve, the Coal Oil Point Reserve, the Santa Cruz Island Reserve, the Sierra Nevada Aquatic Research Laboratory (SNARL), Valentine Camp, and the Sedgwick Reserve. Available to students and faculty for teaching and research, the reserves provide outdoor laboratories and classrooms for field sciences. The six areas are administered by the Marine Science Institute; inquiries about their use and scheduling may be directed to the Natural Reserve System office. Telephone: (805) 893-4127. E-mail: donnam@msi.ucsb.edu.

Undergraduate Research

Faculty in all colleges at UC Santa Barbara encourage students to work with them on research projects in their area of interest. A variety of scholarships and fellowships assist students in carrying out their research. For detailed information, see the appropriate college office.

Materials Research Laboratory Educational Outreach Program

Director: Dr. Fiona Goodchild
Materials Research Laboratory (MRL) initiates projects to improve science education through: Undergraduate Research
Coordinator: Dr. Dotti Pak

City College Interns in Materials Research (CCIMR)
Approximately 10 students and 2 faculty from Santa Barbara City College participate in MRL research projects for 8 weeks each summer.

Research Interns in Science and Engineering (RISE)
Approximately 20 students from UCSB and other institutions work on research projects with MRL faculty and other UCSB researchers in summer and academic year internships.

K-12 School Partnerships
Coordinator: Dr. Lynne Cavazos
Science Partnership for School Innovation (SPSI)
This collaboration between MRL, QUEST and the Santa Barbara County Education Office involves over 35 science teachers and school administrators who take part in a two week summer institute as well as seminars and workshops throughout the year. The teachers work in teams to introduce innovative science to schools in Lompoc, Santa Barbara, Santa Maria and Santa Ynez.
 

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