National Achievements

The tenth campus, and newest of the University of California system, UC Merced has proven itself as a leading STEM research university. Founded in 2005, the campus was unanimously approved by the ARCS Foundation Board of Directors for scholar award funding. Three departments were approved by ARCS – Environmental Systems, Physics...

To say ARCS Scholar Samuel Buckner is passionate about aerospace engineering is an understatement.

As a boy, he was fascinated by space. But his professional pursuit grew exponentially when private companies, such as SpaceX and Blue Origin, began building their own vehicles with the intent of strengthening America’s space program...

With a click of a button, ARCS Scholar Nick Heller is helping radiologists identify and analyze kidney tumors within a patient’s body.

Heller is a PhD student conducting computer science research at University of Minnesota. His research focuses on using computer technology to enhance medical imaging, like a CT scan...

David Dixon, PhD and renowned computational chemist, is a Porsche enthusiast. It comes as no surprise then that as he tells the story of how he helped to save the stratospheric ozone layer, he talked about how to stay cool in a car in the summer in Alabama.   

“Chlorofluorocarbons were developed...

Not all software is created the same—nor is it easily adaptable for professionals studying and working in academic fields.

According to ARCS Scholar Samuel Grayson, modern science uses custom-built software, which is written and produced by trained engineers to ensure a specific set of outcomes and incentives are achieved. These products...

Becoming a mother in the mid-1980’s was an exciting time for Dr. Nancy Haigwood. But the time also highlighted a huge health crisis—infants born HIV positive from mothers who knowingly or unknowingly carried the virus.

A scientist with a PhD in Microbiology and Immunology from the University of North Carolina, Chapel...

A bicycle country road tour in France was an opportunity for ARCS member Sheila Grinell to practice her French, a language learned decades earlier while she taught in Toulon on a Fulbright grant.  More than that, the trip and the 125 miles she pedaled in five days were about “celebrating everything...

In July 2021, the US National Science Foundation (NSF) announced funding to create eleven new National Artificial Intelligence Research Institutes, building on the first round of seven institutes funded in 2020. It is a combined investment of $220 million.

Led by NSF, and in partnership with the US Department of...

The first time Randall Kelley, PhD, learned about Artificial Intelligence (AI) was as a Post-Doctorate Fellow at Harvard University in 2009. Kelley used machine learning science in a project—and never looked back.

Thirteen years later, ARCS Alumnus Randall Kelley is the Director of Machine Learning at Manifold, an AI engineering...

The compelling aspects and technologies of Artificial Intelligence that drew Noelle Brown to receive a masters in machine learning, are the same pieces of information that now push her to place ethical checkpoints in place for those creating it.  

Brown, a first-year PhD student, is studying societal computing, also known...