On May 8, 2026, Undergraduate Scholars and Graduate Fellows from 58 unique departments convened to showcase their research at the Discovery Hubs Symposium. The event served as the conclusion to the 2025-26 Discovery Hubs, an initiative designed to connect undergraduates with mentored research opportunities. For each of the 37 projects on display, students had the option to share their findings as an oral, table top, or poster presentation.
Early Access to High-Impact Research
For Smriti Rajan, a poster presentation was the ideal medium. Smriti is a first-year student studying bioengineering and business through Berkeley’s Management, Entrepreneurship, and Technology program. Her research, conducted in partnership with the Molecular Foundry hub, explored how bio-based materials might be programmed to achieve self-healing. Similarly to how cuts heal themselves, biomaterials might be engineered to re-attach to themselves when broken. Such findings would impact efficient biofuel production and open a new avenue in material science.
Because research into regenerative materials remains highly exploratory, Smriti credits the Discovery Hubs for providing early access to the field. “Being at the forefront of cutting-edge research is a huge deal,” she reflects. “It means I get to see what’s happening as it happens.”
Many students echoed this sentiment. Megan Rogers and Gio Donofrio, undergraduates in another Molecular Foundry cluster, investigated how high-entropy materials might be stabilized through transition metal doping. They explained how, down the road, their research might be applied to carbon capture technology, which would reduce greenhouse gas emissions and combat climate change. Both emphasized the novelty of this field and their excitement about the societal impact of this work. They are both eager to continue pursuing this line of study.
For first-generation college students, early access to research is particularly meaningful. An undergraduate scholar from the Kavli ENSI hub described their experience as “monumental,” sharing: “I went from having discounted grad school and giving up on research, to being confident in my own abilities.” They credited the Discovery Hub’s model as particularly helpful because it has “much more choosing-power applied to the grad student. This permits an underserved student like myself to access research via a 1-1 connection, instead of via a resume."
