"This is the story of a technology that was inspired by work at IBM, was invented and developed at UC Irvine, then got spun off, and now we have instruments on all continents across the world except for Antarctica," says Kumar Wickramasinghe, Henry Samueli Endowed Chair and Distinguished Professor emeritus of electrical engineering and computer science who now holds the title of UC Irvine Distinguished Research Professor. "Almost anywhere serious research is happening, there are people out there who are using PiFM to discover new things.

In a lab at UC Irvine, chemical engineering professor Alon Gorodetsky and his team are making synthetic squid protein using bacteria. The lab is recreating a protein called Reflectin – it's what allows squid to change color and disappear into their surroundings by manipulating light – in the hopes that it could someday be used by the military as part of more effective camouflage.

“Ibuprofen is one of the most consumed pharmaceuticals around the world. It, and probably its transformation products, is found in considerable amounts in wastewater effluents,” said Adeyemi Adeleye, a civil and environmental engineer [assistant professor] at University of California, Irvine who was not involved with this research. “This study emphasizes the need to consider the by-products formed in the environment when assessing the risks of pharmaceuticals and other chemicals,” he said.