Every day is a good day to learn more about UC San Diego, but we've chosen a particular one to spread knowledge with our new feature called "Triton Tuesday." Each Tuesday, get the inside scoop with fun facts about Triton athletics, the UC San Diego campus and community, and our beautiful home of San Diego, California, in a Did You Know? format.
 
Founded in 1960 and occupying over 2,000 acres of land above the Pacific Ocean in La Jolla, the University of California San Diego has established itself as a world-renowned public research institution.

UC San Diego offers four academic divisions (Arts and Humanities, Biological Sciences, Physical Sciences, and Social Sciences) as well as seven graduate and professional schools (Jacobs School of Engineering, Rady School of Management, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, School of Global Policy and Strategy, School of Medicine, Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, and Wertheim School of Public Health and Human Longevity). In addition, UC San Diego Health is the region's only academic health system. 

With so many top-notch academic programs and faculty, its beautiful location, and an undergraduate population of over 40,000, it's no wonder why UC San Diego turns out so many notable graduates.  

For this week's Triton Tuesday, we take a look at just a small sample of successful Tritons that attended and/or graduated from UC San Diego.

Athletics
• Mark Allen '80 - Six-time Ironman Triathlon World Champion
• Billy Beane '85 - Executive vice president and minority owner of the Oakland Athletics, former Major League Baseball player
• Tom Black '96 - Current head women's volleyball coach at Georgia, former assistant coach with the U.S. Women's National Team that won a bronze medal at the 2016 Olympics in Rio
• Bob Natal '87 - Former Major League Baseball player for the Montreal Expos and Florida Marlins
• Robert Pera '02 - Owner of the NBA's Memphis Grizzlies
• Sue Semrau '85 - Current head women's basketball coach at Florida State, four-time ACC Coach of the Year and the programs all-time wins leader
• Julie Swail '95 - Olympic team captain in water polo (silver medal in 2000), Olympic triathlete (19th in 2008) 

Business
• Garrett Gruener '76 - Co-founder of Ask Jeeves
• Greg Papadopoulos '79 - Executive vice president of Sun Microsystems
• Michael Robertson '89 - Founder of MP3.com
• Philip Rosedale '92 - Creator of virtual 3D world Second Life
• Nick Woodman '97 - Founder and CEO of GoPro

Computer Science
• Bill Atkinson '74 - Co-developer of the original Macintosh computer, principal designer of the Apple Lisa graphical user interface
• Guy "Bud" Tribble '75 - Principal architect of the original Macintosh computer

Film and Television
• James Avery '76 - Starred on the Fresh Prince of Bel Air as Philip Banks (uncle Phil)
• Rachel Axler '04 - Emmy Award-winning writer for The Daily Show and Parks and Recreation
• Cara Capuano '95 - Sports anchor for ESPNU
• Benicio del Toro - Academy Award winner, starred in Traffic, Guardians of the Galaxy, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and many more  
• Mike Judge '85 - Creator of Beavis and Butt-Head and King of the Hill, wrote and directed Office Space and Idiocracy
• Kellie Waymire, '93 - Actress best known for Star Trek: Enterprise, Six Feet Under, and One Life to Live

Art and Literature
• Angela Davis '68 - Radical activist and philosopher
• Khaled Hosseini '93 - His 2003 novel The Kite Runner was a #1 New York Times bestseller
• Carrie Mae Weems '84 - Award-winning photographer and multi-medium artist

Music
• Milo Aukerman '92 - Lead singer for punk band Descendants
• Chad Butler '97 - Founder and drummer for alternative rock band Switchfoot
• Jon Foreman - Founder and guitarist for alternative rock band Switchfoot
• Tim Foreman - Founder and bassist for alternative rock band Switchfoot

Public Service
• Kurt M. Campbell '80 - Former Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs
• Dana Shell Smith ''92 - Former United States Ambassador to Qatar

Science, Medicine, and Mathematics
• Margaret Allen '74 - First female heart transplant surgeon
• Chu Ching-wu '90 - U.S. News and World Report's Researcher of the Year
• Brian Druker '77 - Developed a new drug for leukemia treatment
• Eleanor Mariano '77 - Former director of the White House Medical Unit
• Megan McArthur '02 - NASA astronaut that helped repair the Hubble Telescope in 2009
• Jessica Meir '09 - NASA astronaut was part of the first all-female spacewalk in 2020, spending over seven hours outside of the International Space Station
• Walter Munk '47 - Oceanographer and winner of the National Medal of Science and the Kyoto Prize
• Jed E. Rose '78 - Co-inventor of the nicotine patch
• Kate Rubins '99 - NASA astronaut and first person to sequence DNA in space
• Flossie Wong-Staal '72 - Virologist and molecular biologist that was the first to clone HIV and determine the function of its genes

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PRIOR TRITON TUESDAYS
• 1992 Dream Team Finds a Home at Main Gym (Sept. 1)
• UC San Diego Home to Award-Winning Faculty (Sept. 8)
• UC San Diego Athletics Hall of Fame (Sept. 15)
• Exploring Dr. Seuss in San Diego (Sept. 22)
• La Jolla's Wonderful Weather (Sept. 29)
• Academic Excellence on Display by the Tritons (Oct. 6)
• Getting to Know Our Unique College System (Oct. 13)
• La Jolla's Local Beaches (Oct. 20)
• Renowned Surf in San Diego (Oct. 27)
• University Rankings Recap (Nov. 3)

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About UC San Diego Athletics
After two decades as one of the most successful programs in NCAA Division II, the UC San Diego intercollegiate athletics program begins a new era in 2020 as a member of the Big West Conference in NCAA Division I. The 23-sport Tritons earned 30 team and nearly 150 individual national championships during its time in Divisions II and III and helped guide more than 1,400 scholar-athletes to All-America honors. In addition, 83 Tritons have been named Academic All-Americans, while 37 have earned prestigious NCAA Post Graduate Scholarships. UC San Diego scholar-athletes exemplify the academic ideals of one of the world's preeminent institutions, graduating at an average rate of 91 percent, one of the highest rates among institutions at all divisions. For more information on the Tritons, visit UCSDtritons.com or follow UC San Diego Athletics on social media @UCSDtritons.