Applied Science and Technology, UC Berkeley

Introduction to Applied Science & Technology

Introduction to Applied Science & Technology

As defined by the Graduate Division at Berkeley, “graduate group” has specific meaning. It is an academic unit, comprised of a core faculty from two (2) or more existing departments, that offers a doctoral degree in a new method of inquiry or new field of study that has been approved by the Graduate Council of the Berkeley campus and the University of California’s full systemwide Academic Senate. Applied Science & Technology is a graduate group at Berkeley.

Graduate Group in Applied Science & Technology

The Graduate Group in Applied Science and Technology (AS&T) was founded on the Berkeley campus in 1993. It features the application of physical and mathematical techniques to fundamental investigations, and/or emerging areas with potential applications, in the physical and life sciences. Prominent areas of scholarship include applied physics, engineering sciences, mathematical sciences, and life sciences. Due to its standing as a graduate group, AS&T is strictly a doctoral degree program; however, students may also earn a Master of Science (Plan II) degree by completing the necessary requirements during their pursuit of a doctorate. Moreover, AS&T offers students the option of crossing disciplinary boundaries to develop unique and individually personalized programs of graduate study. With the guidance of their faculty research advisors and their faculty graduate advisors, students select courses from a variety of departments to advance the scholarship of their dissertation topics and to complement their research concentration with more diverse topics of minor technical concentration. Students may also work with faculty to develop research subjects that straddle multiple disciplines. The AS&T Graduate Group currently has some eighty (80) faculty members from the departments of Mechanical Engineering, Materials Science & Engineering, Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences, Bioengineering, Nuclear Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Chemistry, Physics, Mathematics, and Molecular & Cell Biology, representing three (3) different colleges.

Applied Science & Technology Office

The Graduate Group in Applied Science & Technology is very competently and most generously served by our AS&T Advisor, ast_program@berkeley.edu, who resides in 210 Hearst Memorial Mining Building. All official correspondence with the Graduate Division must be submitted through this office, including all official forms and petitions. It is strongly recommended that AS&T students always bring their campus forms to the AS&T Office for forwarding to the Graduate Division or to the Office of the Registrar (the main campus administration building). The AS&T Office retains current information on campus policies and procedures, time-saving strategies, locations of key campus offices, links to the most important resources on campus, copies of all correspondence for follow-up action, and valuable updates on all matters of importance at Berkeley.

During their academic careers at Berkeley, AS&T students conduct research in several labs across campus, “up the hill” at the nearby Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and at other campuses and national labs. Some AS&T students are co-advised by faculty members from very different departments, while others are mentored by a single member of the faculty with an academic home in a single department on campus. In every instance, AS&T students share both the responsibilities and the rewards that come to other graduate students with traditional Departmental affiliations. It would therefore be wise for AS&T students to declare their presence on one or more traditional departmental mailing lists (those of the students’ faculty advisors), to keep abreast of campus updates regarding fellowships, financial assistance, housing, and potential job opportunities.

Chair and Executive Committee

The Graduate Group is administered by the AS&T Executive Committee, including a Chair, and seven (7) additional faculty members. The Executive Committee reviews and implements Graduate Division policies on admissions, preliminary and qualifying examinations, curricula, and advising. The Executive Committee also reviews unique academic matters, as well as approves requests for block grant funding in support of travel or need-based supplements. All members of the Executive Committee are elected by the faculty-at-large to a two (2) year term.

AS&T Faculty

Faculty in AS&T currently come from three different colleges: the College of Engineering, the College of Letters and Science, and the College of Chemistry. Their departmental units include Bioengineering, Chemical Engineering, Chemistry, Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences, Materials Science & Engineering, Mathematics, Mechanical Engineering, Molecular & Cell Biology, Nuclear Engineering, Physics, and Statistics.