Biological Sciences

Students Awarded Prestigious NSF Graduate Research Fellowship

June 4, 2025

Two UC Merced graduate students wearing blue

Two UC Merced graduate students and an alum from the School of Natural Sciences were recently awarded fellowships from the highly competitive National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program. This year, NSF awarded 1,000 GRFP fellowships compared to about 2,000 in previous years...

Students Discover Cannibal Lizards on Remote Aegean Island

It reads like a mashup of Greek mythology and H.G. Wells. “The Odyssey of Doctor Moreau,” perhaps. Explorers find their way to a remote Aegean island and discover it’s inhabited by...

About 1,200 admitted students and their family members visited campus on Bobcat Day, and many accepted their UC Merced admittance offers on the spot.

Campus’ Spring Open House Draws Record Attendance

More than 3,700 individuals visited UC Merced last Saturday during the campus’s annual Bobcat Day — a 26 percent increase over 2017 and more than any previous year. About 1,200...

Researchers Examine Barriers to Organ Donation and Possible Remedies

Every 10 minutes, someone is added to the national organ transplant waiting list, and about once every hour, someone on the list is removed — either because they died while waiting or grew too...

Student-athlete and leader Abbie-Leigh Meneses is preparing to graduate in May with a bachelor’s degree in biological sciences with an emphasis human biology and a minor in anthropology.

Women’s Soccer Star, Campus Leader Wraps Four Fulfilling Years

When prospective student-athletes visit UC Merced, soccer standout Abbie-Leigh Meneses is among the first people they meet. Not long ago, Meneses was a recruit herself, touring the University of...

Multi-well dish with pink liquid inside.

Study: Drug-Resistant Cancer Cleverer Than Imagined

Precision medicine offers hope after a life-changing cancer diagnosis. But some cancers that initially respond to targeted chemotherapy become treatment-resistant — and the tumor itself is the...

Graduate programs in the natural sciences are among the many UC Merced graduate programs included in the newest U.S. News rankings of Best Graduate Schools.

Grad Programs Make U.S. News Rankings Debut

For the first time, UC Merced’s doctoral programs in the sciences have been ranked among the best in the nation, according to U.S. News & World Report’s 2019 edition of Best Graduate...

A Fruit Fly Walks Into a Bar ...

Editor’s note: Every year UC Merced shines a spotlight on the cutting-edge research underway at the university. Research Week is an opportunity for the public to explore the...

Alum Wins Opportunity to Pitch at Venture Summit

UC Merced alumnus Michael Urner is one of five finalists in the University of California new “I am a UC Entrepreneur” contest. Urner was selected from a pool of 169 contestants...

AAAS Fellow Brings Groundbreaking Genetics Research to Campus

Professor Chris Amemiya is new to UC Merced, but he’s a veteran scientist with a long list of breakthroughs to his name. Amemiya’s discoveries have changed the way scientists understand...