A collaboration between UC researchers and the Japanese construction powerhouse seeks to advance underground sensing and slope disaster modeling for resilient cities.
A cross-Pacific partnership between the Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society and the Banatao Institute (CITRIS), a California Institute for Science & Innovation at the University of California (UC), and Kajima Corp., one of Japan’s largest construction firms, is advancing the future of resilient, data-driven infrastructure.
With support from CITRIS’s corporate partnerships program, researchers are developing smart monitoring systems that combine advanced simulation with cutting-edge fiber optic sensing — tools that could transform the way cities assess risk and respond to disasters.
The joint research effort, launched in 2018 and now in its third phase, is led by Kenichi Soga, the Donald H. McLaughlin Professor in Mineral Engineering and a Distinguished Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at UC Berkeley, in close collaboration with Kajima’s Innovation & Incubation Office and the Kajima Technical Research Institute (KaTRI). Together, the team is tackling challenges in geotechnical infrastructure — systems like tunnels, slopes, embankments, and levees — where current monitoring technologies often fall short.
“This partnership brings together some of the world’s most advanced sensing and simulation tools to address some of the hardest problems in infrastructure engineering,” said Alexandre Bayen, director of CITRIS and the Banatao Institute, Liao-Cho Innovation Endowed Chair and professor of electrical engineering and computer sciences and of civil and environmental engineering at UC Berkeley, and associate provost for the Berkeley Space Center.
Soga noted that the collaboration builds on a decades-long relationship with Kajima that gained new momentum when he joined UC Berkeley in 2016. “Rather than just working one-to-one, I saw CITRIS as a bridge to bring Kajima’s innovation into the Silicon Valley ecosystem through academic collaboration. They already have a presence in Silicon Valley, actively looking for new innovations in the area of construction and infrastructure engineering,” he said. “It’s a way to scale their ideas and connect research with real-world impact.”
Seeing underground, across long distances
One major project uses long-range fiber optic cables to detect subtle vibrations in the ground, providing real-time insights into subsurface conditions. Unlike conventional point-based sensors, this system enables continuous monitoring over distances exceeding 10 kilometers and is ideal for monitoring pavements, long bridges, building foundations, levees, and other large-scale infrastructure.
Field tests at UC Berkeley’s Richmond Field Station and around campus have already demonstrated the technology’s effectiveness, with waveforms that rival traditional instruments like geophones. The collaboration has also mapped subsurface variations in S-wave velocity to detect areas of instability in the ground — a capability with broad implications for disaster preparedness and post-event assessment.
According to Soga, one of the major advantages of fiber optic sensing is its ability to monitor buried infrastructure, such as pipelines or levees, with high resolution and accuracy, helping cities transition from reactive to proactive maintenance. “Underground infrastructure is aging — we’re seeing thousands of pipeline breaks each year,” he said. “Fiber optic sensing allows us to detect subtle changes and respond before failures occur.”
Kajima engineers have already begun deploying the system overseas. “The technology has the potential to revolutionize how we detect risk before and after disasters,” said Yasuhiro Yokota, chief research engineer at Kajima. “We’ve already deployed it along a long river embankment in Japan, and we’re working through CITRIS to scale it for use in the U.S. and beyond.”
Modeling slope failures — and their aftermath
A second project in the CITRIS-Kajima collaboration aims to predict not just whether a slope might fail, but how it will behave once it does. Using the material point method (MPM), a cutting-edge simulation technology developed at UC Berkeley, researchers can model how soil and debris would move during a landslide — allowing for more targeted risk mitigation and faster disaster response.
This level of detail goes far beyond conventional methods and could help planners better understand which homes or roads might be affected in the event of slope failure. It also allows for more informed design of infrastructure that can withstand or avoid damage.
Soga explained that this approach reflects a shift in how engineers think about risk. “We want to move beyond yes-or-no predictions,” he said. “If a landslide occurs, we need to understand how far it will travel, what it will impact and how to prepare. That’s where simulation and sensing come together to guide real decisions.”
From research to real-world impact
CITRIS plays a key role in facilitating this multiyear partnership, providing both strategic support and a bridge between academic research and industrial application.
“We’re proud to support collaborations like this one that exemplify CITRIS’s mission: using IT and engineering to create tangible benefits for society,” said Julie Shapiro, CITRIS’s director of corporate relations.
Previous CITRIS-industry partnerships have funded research to bridge technology gaps in rural communities and electrify bus fleets, cultivated the talents of UC students with hands-on internships and extracurricular competitions, helped to develop the next generation of inventors and engineers through outreach support, and much more.