Research

Amazon Funds Research into Making AI More Efficient

March 1, 2026

Depicted are the letters "Ai" on a green graphic background
Two UC Merced computer science and engineering professors will delve deep into artificial intelligence in projects with Amazon. Dong Li and Xiaoyi Lu earned Amazon Research Awards, the technology giant announced recently. Amazon Research Awards provide unrestricted funds and Amazon Web...
husband and pregnant wife

A Husband’s Self-esteem Could Protect Against Preterm Births, Study Finds

A husband’s optimism and confidence might play a crucial, if often unseen, role in helping babies arrive healthy and on time. A new study from UC Merced psychology researchers found...
Illustration of worker threatened by robot

People Don’t Worry About Losing Jobs to AI, Even When Told It Could Happen Soon

As debates rage about artificial intelligence's impact on jobs, new research suggests that even warnings that AI could disrupt workers' employment soon do little to shake their...
Professor Roger Bales

Professor and Environmental Champion Bales Retires, But Research and Advocacy Continue

Professors Roger Bales and Martha Conklin arrived in Merced in 2003, the first non-administrative faculty members at UC Merced. They came with a vision: to create a research university that would...
Professor Henrik Larsson

UC Merced Chemist Wins DOE Award to Simulate Electron Motion at Quantum Speeds

Chemistry Professor Henrik Larsson has received a prestigious Early Career Award from the U.S. Department of Energy, becoming the first faculty member from UC Merced’s School of Natural...
Photo depicts trees that survived a fire, surrounded by ash on the ground.

Thinning, Burning Forests Provide Multiple Benefits, Some of Them Surprising

Wildfires are growing more frequent and severe across the western United States, and California's Sierra Nevada is ground zero. Decades of fire suppression have left these forests overstocked and...
Professor Oviedo

Unraveling Cancer’s Neural Connections: NIH-Funded Study Investigates How Stem Cell Regulation Influences Tissue Renewal, Cancer Development

The same cellular renewal that keeps our bodies healthy might also fuel the growth of cancer. A UC Merced biologist has found that the brain could hold the key to stopping it. Professor Néstor...
An example showing a chiral molecule and 'handedness.'

UC Merced Leads National Effort to Unlock Quantum Secrets of Twisty Molecules

A team of scientists led by UC Merced is embarking on a project to understand how the twisted shapes of specific molecules can influence the spin of electrons — a phenomenon that could...
UC Merced Children's Opera performance

Three-year Grant Lifts Joy Provided by UC Merced Children’s Opera

UC Merced Children’s Opera, a performance that delights and enlightens thousands of schoolchildren a year while giving Bobcat students experience in theater, has received support from a...
Photo depicts Professor Erin Hestir boarding a plane with a NASA logo on it in South Africa.

Multinational Effort to Map South Africa’s Biodiversity from the Air Earns NASA Award

BioSCape, a multinational research project co-led by UC Merced, the University at Buffalo and the University of Cape Town, which monitored Earth’s biodiversity from the air, has received a...

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