
Re-engineering the world with self-assembling systems • Assist. Prof. @UCBerkeley Bio🦠+Chem🧪+Eng📱
Berkeley, CA
Joined October 2016
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1/4 New preprint: DNA origami tubes that carry three gold nanoparticles act as “welding sticks.” An AC field collects them between electrode tips, where the particles leave the DNA and fuse into gold nanowires. chemrxiv.org/doi/full/10.264… – at Berkeley, CA
3/4 Fronts grow from the tips and bridge 0.35–2.2 µm gaps. The wires are polycrystalline gold: 13 of 17 conduct, with linear I–V curves and 60–360 Ω that does not depend on length. – at Berkeley, CA
4/4 Why no length dependence? After bridging, ~40 mA flows, and Joule heating melts any constriction dropping more than ~0.4 V. A circuit model suggests the drive circuit, not the gap, sets where growth stops. With @BareaBorja, Yifeng Shi, René Hübner and Artur Erbe. – at Berkeley, CA
Greg Tikhomirov retweeted
We 'll be hiring very actively at Berkeley!
Assistant/ Associate/ Full Professor – Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences (Deadline: Dec. 7, 2026 at 11:59 pm Pacific Time). Apply here: aprecruit.berkeley.edu/JPF05…
Assistant Professor – AI for Biology – Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences and Center for Computational Biology (Deadline: Nov. 9, 2026 at 11:59 pm Pacific Time) Apply here: aprecruit.berkeley.edu/JPF05…
Assistant Professor – Intersection of Statistics and CS – Departments of Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences and Statistics (Deadline: Nov. 10, 2026 at 11:59 pm Pacific Time). Apply here: aprecruit.berkeley.edu/JPF05…
Assistant/ Associate/ Full Professor – Computational Biomedicine - Center for Computational Biology (Deadline: Nov. 18 2026 at 11:59 pm Pacific Time). Apply here: aprecruit.berkeley.edu/JPF05…
Assistant / Associate Professor – Electronic, Functional, and Quantum Materials – Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences and Materials Science & Engineering (Deadline: Dec. 7, 2026 at 11:59 pm Pacific Time). Apply here: aprecruit.berkeley.edu/JPF05…
Coming Soon! Assistant/ Associate/ Full Professor - AI and the Physical Sciences -Bakar Institute of Digital Materials for the Planet (BIDMaP) and home department(s) to be determined. (Deadline: Dec. 7, 2026 at 11:59 pm Pacific Time) Apply here: aprecruit.berkeley.edu/JPF05…
Coming Soon! Assistant/ Associate/ Full Professor-in-Residence - Gladstone Institute of Data Science and Biotechnology and home department(s) to be (Deadline: TBD at 11:59 pm Pacific Time) Apply here: aprecruit.berkeley.edu/JPF05…
Greg Tikhomirov retweeted
1/ We discovered something totally unexpected about the neural structure of consciousness that overturns decades of thinking on its biological basis and brings us significantly closer to the recipe for generating conscious awareness.
New preprint: biorxiv.org/content/10.64898… (led by @HesseJanis, with @FrankLanfranchi, @_conor_mcgrory, @Yuelin_Shi, and @EngelTatiana)
Greg Tikhomirov retweeted
We have 15 open positions at Astera Neuro! We're hiring experimental and computational neuroscientists and engineers to build a large-scale research effort aimed at understanding consciousness = the brain's internal model of world and self.
astera.org/careers/#box=neur…
We're looking for:
• Experimental Neuroscientists
• Computational Neuroscientists
• Optical Engineers
• Hardware Engineers
• Software Engineers
• Probe Engineers
• and more!
I'll share much more about our scientific vision soon. For now: I know we could never have built this in academia. The confluence of talent across different domains, the purposive design of the org structure and open science approach, and the deep, long-term support, all aimed at cracking the brain's internal model, is unprecedented.
If you want to understand consciousness, if you sense a huge gap between our internal experience of the world and our scientific understanding of it, if you believe systems neuroscience needs a fundamentally different, collaborative, and scaled up approach, we are building the ideal research environment for you.
I've never been more excited in my life. Across Astera Neuro, Astera AI, and Astera Simplex, we're creating a whole new discipline around one question: how does the brain build a world model: a symbolic system that perceives the real world from flickering sensory input streams and can think, plan, and experience? Everyone here is converging on this question from a different direction. The degree of conceptual focus combined with tactical breadth is thrilling.
If this sounds like you, come join us.
astera.org/careers/#box=neur…
Greg Tikhomirov retweeted
We're hiring!
I am very lucky to have possibly the coolest job in the world and this new junior team member will too. 🙃🚀
If you want to:
- do long-term evolution
- run functional genomics experiments
- working with extremophiles for Mars
APPLY
We're looking to add a junior team member to help engineer microbes for Mars. You'd run evolution and functional genomics experiments in non-model microbes. Full-time, in person in Emeryville, CA.
We review applications as they arrive. Priority deadline August 26; applications close September 15.
Apply: jobs.gusto.com/postings/pion…
Our blog: blog.pioneer-labs.org/
Papers and press: pioneer-labs.org/news
Excited to see Jared present at #DNA32 Monday.
250+ multivalent DNA origami interfaces, varying bond number, spacing, and sequence. The result: clustering beats spreading, more bonds have diminishing returns, and a 3-parameter model predicts it all
dna32.sciencesconf.org – at Berkeley, CA
Greg Tikhomirov retweeted
I am thrilled to share that UC Berkeley and UCSF have launched a joint initiative in Computational Biomedicine!
cdss.berkeley.edu/news/uc-be…
We will soon be recruiting new faculty and postdoctoral fellows. Please repost to help spread the word.
🏗📝🫡 – at Millbrae, CA
Replying to @pronounced_kyle
On the design principles of self-assembling and -replicating universally programmable matter.
I enjoyed using em dashes for years — to nest a thought inside a thought — long before AI assistants showed up. Now I have to delete them to prove I'm human? – at Berkeley, CA
Greg Tikhomirov retweeted
Today is "Big Give", Berkeley's 24-hour online fundraiser
Last year @Berkeley_EECS graduated 1,029 Computer Science majors. Next year it will be ~350. Enrollments were slashed primarily due to the high cost of instruction, with undergrad teaching assistants now costing the department $73-82/hr (equivalent pre-tax comp. rate ~$89-103/hr; see tinyurl.com/ugradtas)
If you want to help us maintain our excellence in this world of high costs, you can donate to the Berkeley EECS Excellence Fund at givingday.berkeley.edu/amb/s…
New microscope (#4 in the lab, Echo revolve) – at Berkeley, CA
Accepted version. Open access.
pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs… – at Berkeley, CA
Grateful for this angel investment supporting our work on nanobots for gene delivery – at Berkeley, CA
Congratulations to UC faculty recipients of the CITRIS-CDSS Innovation Fellowship program & AIC Awards!
Learn about their work: bit.ly/49I5SZ0
@UofCalifornia @Berkeley_EECS @Cal_Engineer @BerkeleyMSE @UCBerkeley @ucdavis @UCDavisCOE @ucsc @citrisnews #UCResearch
$600M+ to study what it means to be human!!!
And maybe even unlock new levels of consciousness!
Doris is one lucky scientist!
Yet she is the best in the world to lead this ambitious effort. – at Berkeley, CA
I am deeply excited to share that I will be joining @AsteraInstitute to start a new effort to understand how the brain generates consciousness and intelligence.
Behold our spiffy @Berkeley_EECS colleagues casually reinventing transistors in the ’90s and jump-starting the era of portable electronics, including the phone in your hand – at Berkeley, CA
Video featuring @Berkeley_EECS faculty Chenming Hu (also former CTO of TSMC), Tsu-Jae King Liu (current President of @theNAEng), and Jeff Bokor.



















