Funding Programs

PI: Juan Pablo Pardo-Guerra, Professor, Sociology; Director, International Institute; Director, Latin American Studies

Co-PI: Elana Zilberg, Associate Professor, Communications

Summary: The International Institute will nurture existing collaborations and foster new ones that ground our understanding of diverse, border-crossing cultures, languages, and perspectives and how these things impact how we think and act. The initial faculty groups, ‘borderlands’, ‘South Asia,’ and ‘the Arab World,’ contain distinct UC San Diego research strength. Our objective initially within each working group and then beyond is to bring together scholars from across Schools to identify common research and teaching themes as well as key languages that can lead to successful, large-scale, globally oriented research collaborations.

PI: Rebecca Fielding-Miller, Associate Professor, Public Health 

Co-PI : Abigail Andrews, Professor, Urban Studies and Planning; Director of Center for Comparative Immigration Studies

Summary: The project will develop best practices for community engaged partnerships and establish a cross-campus database of community-engaged research (CEnR) faculty at UCSD. Through four convenings over 12 months, multidisciplinary faculty and community stakeholders will collaboratively map processes and practices that support respectful, impactful research engagements. These convenings will build a shared understanding of best practices, streamline partnership opportunities, and support community members in engaging UCSD expertise. Anticipated outcomes include a white paper on recommended practices, a multilingual summary for community distribution, and an accessible online resource hub. This initiative will leverage UCSD’s infrastructure and existing partnerships, advancing UCSD’s regional, national, and global leadership in equitable, respectful community-centered research.

PI: Melody Schiaffino, Associate Professor in Residence, Radiation Medicine and Applied Sciences 

Co-PI: Michael Hogarth, Professor, Medicine

Summary: Southern California, specifically San Diego and Imperial counties are home to the largest land-border crossings in the U.S. and top 5 in the world. In California, we can track and understand cancer risk factors across U.S. populations but are constrained by the lack of data across the border, while cancer risk, disease, and mortality do not experience this constraint. Contrary to care delivery and individual clinics, to our knowledge little has been done to understand research and policy perspectives, challenges, and opportunities along the U.S./Mexico border. For example, tissue samples cannot be transferred across the border, but laboratory capacity and policies on both sides are currently unknown. Just as COVID19 infections did not cease when the border closed, so should our efforts to conduct research beyond borders. Through joint efforts with UCSD, UABC-Mexicali, SDSU, and SDSU IV we aim to gather diverse stakeholders focused on cancer research to share best practices, define common terms, and co-develop a shared vision for binational training and translational research.

PI: Lilly Irani, Associate Professor, Communication 

Co-PI: Satomi Rash-Zeigler, Executive Director, UC San Diego Labor Center 

Summary: Artificial Intelligence has the potential to transform work and services, and workers' knowledge and experiences have the potential to revolutionize AI. This convening brings together collaborators from unions, worker organizations, public policy, and AI and robotics scholars to create a contextual portrait of worker needs and a roadmap for responsive policy and research. Convene and Influence funding supports the production of a white paper on AI impacts on work in San Diego and Imperial Counties and a research and policy roadmap. The white paper will be based on both the proceedings of the December 2024 Good Tech for Good Jobs convening as well as a set of focus groups and surveys with workers from across key sectors — including health, public services, entertainment, retail, education, and infrastructure. This resource will be a vital tool in prioritizing AI research and regulation that reflects the needs of industry, consumers, and workers. These efforts will launch the UC San Diego AI and Automation Initiative —a hub for education and knowledge production thats multiple stakeholders, mitigates inequality shapes the technologies defining the future of work.

PI: Cinnamon Bloss, Director, Center for Empathy and Technology 

Co-PI: Melissa Karnaze, Assistant Project Scientist, Public Health 

Summary: Through attention to national-level updates and strategic engagement of various UC San Diego experts, the Working Group will create a white paper that is a primer, accessible to the general public, on timely and strategic research on human-facing, empathic LLMs that are used for increasing wellness or social support, in order to quickly detect and mitigate risks and use cross-benefits assessments for research to influence policy and practice. It will outline a research agenda and priority areas, which will be featured and refined through a speaker workshop series. At the same time, the workshops will educate the public, in addition to the UC San Diego community, on both promises and perils of people using generative AI with the intention of improving wellness or receiving social support. 

PI: Amy Lerner, Associate Teaching Professor, Urban Studies & Planning

Co-PI: Mike Ferry, Director of Energy Storage and Systems, Center for Energy Research 

Summary: This project aims to elevate the role of social sciences as a vital force in addressing the climate crisis. The team will convene diverse stakeholders to address climate impacts, adaptation, mitigation, and justice, while also preparing undergraduate students to engage with climate challenges beyond college. The Climate Action Lab in the School of Social Sciences will host three events focused on climate solutions and careers and develop widely accessible resources. These efforts will help students explore and navigate interdisciplinary opportunities across campus that support their pursuit of climate-related careers —ultimately strengthening UC San Diego’s role as a regional leader and talent pipeline in the climate space.

PI: Benjamin Bergen, Professor, Cognitive Science 

Co-PI: Margaret Roberts, Professor, Political Science

Summary: Artificial Intelligence touches virtually every aspect of human experience. Risks such as bias, disinformation, economic impacts, surveillance and loss of privacy make it clear that ensuring a peaceful, healthful, prosperous human future depends on placing humans at the center of AI research. The Societal Impacts of Artificial Intelligence initiative at UC San Diego will convene campus experts and external collaborators to document the breadth of societal consequences of AI and develop and test new solutions, including technical approaches, communication strategies, and policy recommendations to address these risks. The initiative aims to advance human centered technology development that enhances digital work, life, and education while preventing harm and promoting equitable access to AI. This effort will define research questions to address the societal impacts of AI through the interdisciplinary lens of social scientists and aligned domain and technical experts. It will also facilitate problem-centered workshops to establish common ground and develop emergent concepts for white papers or external funding proposals.