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Research

UC Merced Breakthrough Could Transform How California Monitors Toxic Algae

July 10, 2025

Photo depicts Brittany Barreto Martinez pouring liquid into a test tube in a lab.
San Luis Reservoir in Merced County - one of California's largest artificial lakes - not only irrigates Central Valley farmland and supplies drinking water across Silicon Valley and the South Bay, but also draws swimmers, boaters and anglers year-round. Yet for months at a time, forest-green...
Photo depicts the blue and gold UCM art installation and professors Chih-Chun Chien, left, and Xiaoyi Lu

UC Merced Directs Program to Train Quantum Science Workforce

A new program led by UC Merced in collaboration with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory aims to train graduate and undergraduate students to work in the rapidly growing industry of quantum...
Cooling center banner in Kern County

UC Merced Project Aims to Strengthen Heat Relief in Kern County

In California’s Kern County, nearly 925,000 people live in oppressive heat 125 days per year. Several types of relief are offered. Residents can get breaks on energy bills bloated by air...
A dust storm rises near Owens Lake. Photo Courtesy of UC San Diego

Dust is a Danger to Central Valley Health and Will Likely Get Worse, Researchers Find

People don't think about dust much until it's time to clean the house, but a new report by UC researchers could raise awareness of the growing threat of dust and dust storms. Dust affects...
Photo depicts a firefighter and flames from the 2020 Apple fire in California.

How Did the COVID-19 Pandemic Fuel Record-Breaking Wildfires in 2020? New Study Explains

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic impacted many facets of life, including health care, schools and the work environment. A new study by UC Merced researchers shows evidence that the pandemic...
Professor Anna Nierenberg

NSF Award Supports Young Faculty Member’s Research into Building Blocks of the Universe

Cosmology Professor Anna Nierenberg has received a CAREER award for a project that will vastly improve the study of the nature of dark matter in the universe. She is the 42nd researcher from UC...
UC Merced sociology graduate students

Sociology Graduate Program Debuts Strongly in U.S. News Rankings

Only 10 years after it began, the Ph.D. program in UC Merced’s Department of Sociology made an impressive debut in U.S. News & World Report’s latest rankings of graduate-level...
An avocet

For the First Time, All Avian Evolutionary Relationships Revealed Through Collaboration

Professor Emily Jane McTavish and colleagues at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology have mapped the evolution of every known bird species. They created a complete evolutionary tree of bird species by...
Two Zachary Silva photos

UC Merced Student’s Photography Joins Exhibit of Young Valley Talent

Zachary Silva’s camera escorts us to extraordinary places. We see UC Merced from high above, the land around the campus warped by a fisheye lens. We look straight down a pole at a fluttering U....
Flames, the beach and the ocean are depicted in a scene from the January 2025 Palisades fire.

Researchers Look Ahead to Fire Season 2025

Pictures accompanying Professor John Abatzoglou's presentation on the 2025 fire season were blurry. That was intentional, he said, because so much about wildfire is unpredictable. "There...

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