Climate Change

From Soil to Climate Solutions: Berhe Leads Sierra Nevada Research Institute into its Next Chapter

September 11, 2025

When Professor Asmeret Asefaw Berhe arrived at UC Merced in 2009, she and her husband, Professor Teamrat Ghezzehei, were leaving major research institutions to join a brand-new campus in California’s Central Valley. It was a leap of faith — one made easier by the Sierra Nevada Research...

Climate Change Influencing Freshwater Mountain Runoff, Research Shows

As the climate warms, sources of the water so critical to life everywhere on Earth are drying up. By the end of this century, communities dependent on freshwater from mountain-fed rivers could see...

UC Cooperative Extension Positions to Connect Research, Community

Two UC Cooperative Extension specialists are being deployed to UC Merced to take advantage of its location at the center of California agriculture and build on ongoing research into agriculturally...

New Center Seeks Better Ways to Communicate Climate Issues

Climate change is creating two problems. One is understanding and addressing its impact on the world. The other is convincing large swaths of the public that it is, in fact, a reality. In an effort...

NSF Early Career Award Honors Professor’s Research and Potential

The National Science Foundation is honoring UC Merced Professor Asmeret Asefaw Berhe with a Faculty Early Career Development Award to support her examination of how soil helps regulate the climate....

Professor’s Passion for Monkey Flower Leads to Genetic Discoveries

The environment affects the way genetic populations move, and similar environments likely play a bigger role in how a species develops than does geographic distance. Those are just two of the...

Researchers Melt Snow to See Climate Change Impacts

In a megadrought like the one California is experiencing, people tend to look at how much rainfall has come along. But it also matters when the snowmelt releases its cache, because the snowpack is...

Professor’s Paper in Nature Communications Indicates Deep Sea Changes

Large, naturally occurring low-oxygen zones in the Pacific appear to be expanding, and there is a sharp change in the number of bacteria that produce and consume different forms of toxic sulfur,...

Center Makes Maps Come to Life

Like many children on long car trips, Erin Mutch often asked “Where are we?” But instead of telling her, Mutch’s parents gave her a map to figure it out. Mutch’s knack for using maps to tell bigger...

Natural Reserve Earns Regents’ Approval

The protected land adjoining the northeast corner of campus is officially part of the UC Natural Reserve System now that the UC Board of Regents gave the proposed reserve final approval today at its...