Berkeley News

A digitized side angle of a human head, surrounded by data center walls, indicating the connection between computers and human sentience.

Research

As chatbots get smarter, humans’ unique language abilities are becoming less special

UC Berkeley researchers say large language models have gained “metalinguistic ability,” a hallmark of human language and cognition no other animal has displayed.

A group of students sits in a large yellow disposal bin that is filled with small twigs and branches. The bin is on a hilly street next to a white house.

Campus & community

Wildfire season is here. UC Berkeley scholars are helping Bay Area communities prepare.

Ezra Klein

Events at Berkeley

Berkeley Talks: Ezra Klein on building the things we need for the future we want (revisiting)

A furry brown bat hangs upside down from a piece of fruit.

Mind & body

UC Berkeley scientists uncover neural mechanisms behind long-term memory

Spotlight: Commencement 2025

Two students hug each other wearing their regalia in the bleachers at UC Berkeley's 2025 campuswide commencement on May 17.

At UC Berkeley’s campuswide commencement, grads were grateful for their personal growth — and four Big Game wins in a row

A young woman holds her graduation cap and smiles. She is wearing a white dress and a gold-and-navy sash

Majoring in gender and women’s studies helped this graduate find her voice

Priyanka D’Souza, pictured sitting on one of the wheeled stools installed as part of her MFA exhibition, before various works created for the exhibition mounted on a shelf viewable at seated height.

This Berkeley MFA exhibition probes how museums and institutions exclude disabled bodies

Research

an embryonic zebrafish colored blue, green and magenta

Mind & body

Repairing the heart: If zebrafish can do it, why not humans?

UC Berkeley and Caltech researchers tracked down genes that help zebrafish regenerate injured heart muscle. Can CRISPR activate this circuit in humans with heart disease?

An illustration shows a ring of small purple particles, representing disease proteins, sitting on a surface. The ring is partially covered by a droplet of liquid containing enlarged cartoons of plasmonic particles.

Research

From COVID to cancer, new at-home test spots disease with startling accuracy

Students point toward poster paper on the wall during an exercise about the ways to better understand chronic absenteeism among students.

Education

With high schoolers’ help, UC Berkeley researchers investigate why so many students are chronically absent

Professor Lining Yao with models created in the Morphing Matter Lab.

Research

Inspired by nature, this engineering professor’s designs fold, move and morph

line drawing of a woman with eerie-looking ghosts coming out the back of her partially missing head

Politics & society

When warnings never cease, can we still trust our instincts?

Arts & culture

A group of seven UC Berkeley scholars stand in front of an art piece during their travel seminar to Senegal

Creative Berkeley scholars traverse the globe to experience international art

A painting by Chiura Obata called Sunset, Watertower, March 10, 1943, was done in ink, color and mica on paper while he was in an internment camp. It shows a vibrant sunset behind a watertower in a desolate landscape. There are telephone lines in front of the tower and mountains in the far distance.

Legacy of Chiura Obata, artist and former UC Berkeley professor, endures on campus

More Arts & culture

Podcasts

rows of packaged junk food in a grocery store

Berkeley Talks: How the tobacco industry drove the rise of ultra-processed foods

illustration of a person leaning against a tree writing in a journal

Science of Happiness: How to feel hope in a time of uncertainty

People

B&W photo of smiling woman standing at chalkboard

Pioneering theoretical physicist Mary K. Gaillard has died at 86

Noah Whiteman

‘The freedom to be fully human’: A Berkeley biology professor’s take on Pride and thriving in academia

Campus & community

Sarah Gold McBride and Christine Palmer face one another at a desk, smiling at each other, conveying their close friendship

This class traces the evolution of American friendship

People visit the Reading Room in The Bancroft Library, with shelves of books lining the halls.

UC Berkeley outlines plans to account for The Bancroft Library’s namesake

More Campus & community