URAP

Yan Gong - Professor, Plant and Microbial Biology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 9-11 hrs     Location: On Campus

Floral nectar attracts pollinators as a sugary reward, thereby promoting plant reproductive success. Nectar is produced by a specialized multicellular structure termed the nectary. Across angiosperms, nectaries have evolved independently more than 100 times, resulting in striking diversity in their structures and positions. However, our understanding of nectary development is...

Heather Gray - Professor, Physics

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 9-11 hrs     Location: Off Campus

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the most powerful particle accelerator ever built and researchers use its data to study what the universe was like shortly after the big bang. Researchers at Berkeley and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) play a key role in all aspects of the ATLAS...

Karsten Gronert - Professor, Optometry

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 12 or more hours     Location: On Campus

Our lab is looking for a motivated, organized undergraduate student to help manage our daily operations and assist with mouse research projects. This is a fantastic opportunity to get hands-on experience in a biomedical research environment...

Karsten Gronert - Professor, Optometry

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 12 or more hours     Location: On Campus

Assist in the preparation of biological samples, carry out solid phase extractions for isolation of bioactive lipids. Learn, assist and eventually run an HPLC-mass spectrometry system. The position requires a high degree of motivation and organizational skill as well as the ability to operate complex and state-of-the...

Karsten Gronert - Professor, Optometry

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 12 or more hours     Location: On Campus

We are focused on elucidating the role and molecular mechanisms of neuroprotective lipid mediators essential for inhibiting the death of retinal ganglion cells in glaucoma. We use wide range of techniques in lab including single-cell transcriptomics, morphOMICs, and lipidomics as a tool to investigate and understand the protective mechanisms...

Yangnan Gu - Professor, Plant and Microbial Biology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: On Campus

Plant's responses to external stimuli are highly dependent on the shuttling of intracellular signals to the nucleus, where the genome is reprogrammed to drive transcriptome changes to combat stress. A fundamentally important aspect of this process is the nuclear transport of stress-related signaling cargos mediated by nuclear transport receptors...

Junko Habu - Professor, Anthropology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: On Campus

At our East Asian Archaeology Laboratory, we are analyzing artifacts and faunal/floral remains excavated from Jomon period sites in Japan. Jomon is the name of a prehistoric hunter-gatherer culture in Japan, which lasted from approximately 13000 to 2300 years ago. Unlike many other hunter-gatherer cultures, the Jomon...

Richard Harland - Professor, Molecular and Cell Biology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 12 or more hours     Location: On Campus

The focus of the lab is to understand development; that is, the molecular mechanisms that orchestrate how a single cell (the egg) transforms into an adult animal with a multitude of functioning organs, following a specific body plan. The first milestone in the establishment of the body plan is to...

John Harte - Professor, Energy and Resources

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 6-8 hrs     Location: On Campus

Students will work with Prof. Harte to formulate and explore mathematical models describing ecosystems that are far from steady state as a consequence of human and/or natural disturbance. Testing of model predictions with available data sets will also be carried...

Christine Hastorf - Professor, Anthropology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: On Campus

This project uses contemporary botanical and biogeographical information (recorded in Spanish) from herbarium specimens to characterize the ecological niches and associations of wetland plants. Herbaria, repositories of preserved botanical specimens, act as “plant libraries” that allow researchers to closely examine the characteristics of plant species and communities over space and...

Lin He - Professor, Molecular and Cell Biology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 12 or more hours     Location: On Campus

Transposable elements (TEs) are DNA sequences capable of “moving” (transpose) within a genome. RNA transposons (retrotransposon) use RNA intermediate and a “copy and paste” mechanism to transpose. Retrotransposons, with their “copy and paste” mechanism, have accumulated and become abundant in our genome, comprising ~38% of the human and mouse genome...

Peng He - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: Off Campus

This project provides a hands-on introduction to benchmarking or advancing state-of-the-art computational tools used in single-cell and spatial transcriptomics analysis. With the rapid growth of available software and datasets, there is a pressing need to evaluate, compare, and optimize tools across a wide range of...

Peng He - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: Off Campus

The map of cells in our body is far from being complete. This project is a computational and conceptual exploration of human biology through the lens of integrated single-cell atlases. Students will collect and reanalyze published single-cell and single-nucleus RNA-seq datasets to discover rare or underappreciated...

Peng He - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: Off Campus

This project investigates how cells behave and interact in their native environments by analyzing spatial gene expression data. Interns will use Visium and Xenium spatial transcriptomics datasets to identify tissue microenvironments, reconstruct 3D spatial maps, and apply computational tools like NicheFormer, and contribute to research articles by generating publication-grade...

Peng He - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 9-11 hrs     Location: On Campus

This project focuses on the discovery, optimization, and interpretation of gene signatures in massive single-cell and spatial transcriptomics datasets. Students will contribute to the development of scalable computational methods to extract meaningful biological patterns across thousands of samples and millions of cells. The research involves both algorithm development and...

Todd Hickey - Professor, Ancient Greek and Roman Studies

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: On Campus

The Center for the Tebtunis Papyri is seeking assistance with a cataloging project in 2026/27. This will mainly involve inventorying, measuring, describing, and foldering papyrus fragments from the collection. Updating the Center’s database of papyri will also be part of this project...

Julian Hong - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: Off Campus

The Hong lab is part of the UCSF Department of Radiation Oncology and Bakar Computational Health Sciences Institute. We focus on combining clinical domain knowledge with data science to generate insights from real world data, develop actionable computational tools, and evaluate the benefit of these advances for personalized cancer care...

Guo Huang - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 12 or more hours     Location: On Campus

As shown in our recent publication (Hirose*, Payumo*, et al Science 2019), we aim to understand the divergent regenerative potential in ontogeny and phylogeny. For example, heart regeneration is remarkably robust in adult zebrafish and newborn mice while very limited in adult mammals. We use the heart as a model...

Guo Huang - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 12 or more hours     Location: On Campus

We aim to study whether there are extreme physiological phenomena among identical twins that can not be explained by any known biological mechanism. We will exploit classical and non-classical model systems to explore this uncharted area. If you have identical twin brother/sister, your prior personal experiences would be...

Guo Huang - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 12 or more hours     Location: On Campus

Current studies of mouse heart regeneration are largely limited to postmortem analysis of heart tissue to explore cellular activity and molecular mechanisms. We aim to combine a novel imaging window system designed and surgically implanted on the mouse chest by the Huang Lab at UCSF with the free-space angular...

Guo Huang - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 12 or more hours     Location: Off Campus

There are emerging AI-trained models that integrate tremendous genomic, genetic and gene expression datasets to successfully predict complex gene networks and functional outcomes after in silico gene perturbation. Now we are exploring these models to understand organ physiology and pathology from developmental and evolutionary perspectives. ------------------------- Publications from previous URAP...

Sa-kiera Hudson - Professor, Business, Haas School

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: On Campus

Have you ever laughed when someone tripped, felt joy when someone faced the consequences of their actions, or celebrated when a rival sports team or political party lost? When people think about the role of emotions in intergroup relations, they tend to think of empathy, commonly defined as the sensitivity...

Sa-kiera Hudson - Professor, Business, Haas School

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: On Campus

Social psychology researchers have long theorized how social identity influences perception, treatment, and experience, but until recently, researchers have almost exclusively studied social identity in isolation. Recognizing these gaps, social psychologists have increasingly adopted intersectionality as an analytical tool to inform theory, hypotheses, and methodology. At the Haas Intersectionality, Group...

Sa-kiera Hudson - Professor, Business, Haas School

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: On Campus

From recent bans on queer and feminist literature in public school systems, to restrictions on gender-affirming healthcare, to reduced access to reproductive healthcare, gender identity and sexuality is increasingly at the center of political and ideological discourse in the U.S. As a research laboratory studying social identity and hierarchy...

Sa-kiera Hudson - Professor, Business, Haas School

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: On Campus

This work considers how individual differences can affect the way people perceive organizational diversity and inclusion efforts. We will primarily consider what factors influence the moral judgements of organizations. For example, one line of work examines workplace gossip. Workplace gossip is largely perceived as an anti-social and immoral act...

Susan Ivey - Professor, Public Health

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: On Campus

This is a qualitative study of views of residents/parents/elders in Butte County (Hmong population) and Alameda County (parents of children with asthma) regarding their knowledge and views of air pollution and health. Research includes interviews and surveys in Hmong, English, or Spanish. We will also adapt project tools...

Cesunica Ivey, Civil and Environmental Engineering

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 9-11 hrs     Location: On Campus

Healthy Martinez is a grassroots community group created to hold Martinez Refining Company (MRC), their parent company (PBF Energy) and other refineries in our area accountable for fires, flaring, and daily emissions that are polluting our air, water and soil. Apprentices will support personal measurements of speciated PM2.5 and time...

Cesunica Ivey, Civil and Environmental Engineering

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 9-11 hrs     Location: On Campus

Marin City Climate Resilience is dedicated to safeguarding the environment and promoting sustainability. We focus on implementing strategies to enhance climate resilience and mitigate environmental risks in Marin City, CA. By engaging with the community and advocating for sustainable practices, we aim to create a more resilient and environmentally conscious...

Richard Ivry - Professor, Psychology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 9-11 hrs     Location: On Campus

Research in our laboratory addresses how people learn new motor skills. We study this topic using behavioral and computational methods with healthy and neurologically impaired humans. The neurological studies examine the contribution of different brain structures, especially the cerebellum and basal ganglia, in motor learning to develop functional hypotheses regarding...

Richard Ivry - Professor, Psychology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 9-11 hrs     Location: On Campus

Complex cognition requires the integrated activity of many parts of the brain. Research on this problem has tended to focus on areas of the cerebral cortex such as the frontal lobe. However, evidence from neuroimaging studies in healthy individuals as well as patients with neurodegenerative disorders indicate that major subcortical...

Shannon Jackson - Professor, Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 6-8 hrs     Location: On Campus

Through the Cities of Awe Lab we advance the understanding of awe in public life and make it actionable. We do this by studying the relationship between awe and public life across diverse cultural contexts and urban environments. We explore where and how awe appears in cities, how it can...

Amin Jazaeri - Director of Instructional Support, Mechanical Engineering

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: On Campus

Students will design experiments that can be controlled remotely through the internet...

Rosemary Joyce - Professor, Anthropology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: On Campus

Building on an existing WordPress website, this project will provide a digital portal for Honduran archaeology. This will contribute to education, professional training, and museum interpretation in Honduras as well as sharing of sometimes hard to find knowledge with European, North American, and Latin American archaeologists. Past entries to the...

Rosemary Joyce - Professor, Anthropology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: On Campus

This project will contribute to completion of reports on archaeological field projects conducted in Honduras between 1980 and 2009 and preparation of original data for digital archiving in the US and Honduras. For 2026-2027 the focus is on zooarchaeology: the study of animals...

Yehuda Kalay - Professor, Architecture

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 9-11 hrs     Location: Off Campus

How can AI help save lives during high-rise building fires? High-rise residential buildings present unique fire-safety challenges because of their high occupant density, complex evacuation conditions, and extended egress times. In 2023, San Francisco adopted a Fire Code amendment requiring automatic sprinkler retrofits in all residential high...

Jerome Karabel - Professor, Sociology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 9-11 hrs     Location: On Campus

Outlier Nation: The Roots and Consequences of American Exceptionalism The United States has always been exceptional – both for better and for worse. Its distinctive form of democratic capitalism has made the United States the world leader in scientific and technological innovation, the world's leading economy, and home to (by some...

Kourtney Kawano - Professor, Education

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: Off Campus

This project is a systematic review of AA&PI teachers and how they are discussed across peer-reviewed scholarship to date. The project's goals are to 1) map the field of research on AA&PI K–12 educators by identifying peer-reviewed sources published to date, 2) examine thematic trends...

Kourtney Kawano - Professor, Education

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: Off Campus

The purpose of this project is to uplift the unique contributions of AA&PI teacher-content creators in relation to perceptions about AA&PI communities and broader educational discourse on equity-focused and race-conscious policies and programs. We aim to identify thematic trends in AA&PI teacher-content creators...

Kourtney Kawano - Professor, Education

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: Off Campus

This project explores California-based Pacific Islander (PI) college students' experiences with identity formation, familial socialization, intergroup relations, and education for social change. Through qualitative research methods, this project aims to uplift collective sensemaking about the decisions that PI families make to perpetuate their linguistic and cultural ways of knowing...

Kourtney Kawano - Professor, Education

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: Off Campus

Although California school districts have been successful in defending students and teachers’ legal right to engage with complex issues and ideas in Ethnic Studies courses, these attacks have implications for educators’ capacities to teach without fear of surveillance and retaliation and potential consequences for Berkeley’s vision of a community in...

Waqas Khalid - Associate Scientist, QB3

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 3-5 hrs     Location: On Campus

Be the first to utilize/use cutting edge nanotechnology developed by Dr. Waqas Khalid, Berkeley Scientist and collaborators to solve problems in healthcare, energy and semiconductor industries. Join Dr. Khalid’s URAP program and learn about nanostructure based devices that have applications in monitoring human health, energy harvesting, energy storage, environmental...

Alexa Koenig - Co-Faculty Director, Human Rights Center

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 6-8 hrs     Location: On Campus

Thank you for your interest in the Investigations Lab. Our application for the Fall 2026 semester will open with the regular URAP cycle. A supplemental, google form application will be posted here when the URAP application cycle opens. The HRC Lab is a collaborative, innovative, student-driven space that conducts...

Yury Kolomensky - Professor, Physics

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 6-8 hrs     Location: On Campus

Mu2e is a medium-scale Particle Physics experiment currently under construction at Fermi National Lab, with UCB and Lawrence Berkeley National Lab as collaborating institutions. Mu2e will search for the ultra-rare process whereby a muon particle converts directly into an electron, without the emission of any neutrinos. Though not...

Yury Kolomensky - Professor, Physics

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 6-8 hrs     Location: On Campus

Superconducting sensors, such as Transition-edge sensors (TESs) coupled with superconducting quantum interference devices (SQUIDs), are used in many applications, from quantum computing to astrophysics to particle physics. For rare-events search experiments, such as neutrinoless double beta decay, a multiplexed readout is necessary for low-temperature experiments which operate...

Michelle Koo - Staff Curator, Museum of Vertebrate Zoology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: On Campus

The world's natural history museums are responsible for documenting over 1.8 billion species known as a result of 300 years of biological exploration of the planet. The information contained in museums include observational and specimen-based data, text, images, sound and video and form the foundation of what we know...

Michelle Koo - Staff Curator, Museum of Vertebrate Zoology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: to be negotiated     Location: On Campus

The Museum of Vertebrate Zoology (MVZ) is a vibrant research and informatics center for the campus and the natural history communities around the world. The world's natural history museums are responsible for documenting over 1.8 billion species known as a result of 300 years of biological exploration of the planet...

Britt Koskella - Professor, Integrative Biology

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 6-8 hrs     Location: On Campus

For the last 10 years the Pear project (fire blight of pear trees) has been seeking to better understand how bacteriophage viruses impact the ability of two bacterial pathogens (Erwinia amylovora and Pseudomonas syringae) to colonize and infect pear trees around the city of Berkeley. We are tracking bacteria-phage...

Renaud La Joie - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Location: Off Campus

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Renaud La Joie - Professor, UC San Francisco

Status: Open     Location: Off Campus

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Marika Landau-Wells - Professor, Political Science

Status: Open     Weekly Hours: 6-8 hrs     Location: On Campus

Threat perception has always played a major role in foreign and domestic policy-making. From Covid to climate change to terrorism, policy-makers have made decisions about which potential threats to address and which to ignore. My book investigates how policy-makers in the U.S. and in other countries determine...