Environmental Research

Challenges, Opportunities Presented at Small Farm Tech Expo

December 10, 2025

Photo depicts a vendor demonstrating a drone on the UC Merced campus.

The Small Farm Tech Expo brought researchers, farmers, university students and even a group from a Modesto elementary school to UC Merced to talk about agriculture technology and how it can best help those who grow the world's food. Sponsored by the Community Alliance with Family Farmers,...

UC Merced Researcher, Graduate Student, Contribute to Inventory of All Marine Life

Counting the number of species that live in the Earth’s oceans sounds as impossible as counting the grains of sand on a beach. But a global collaboration involving a UC Merced researcher and a...

Graduate Student Uses Llamas to Continue Research in Yosemite

Graduate student Kaitlin Lubetkin and several sure-footed assistants spent much of the summer in Yosemite National Park. Her frequent hiking companions were Toronado and Bravo — llamas who shouldered...

Inaugural Managers to Lead New Vernal Pool Reserve

MERCED, Calif. — The effort to create a natural reserve out of nearly 6,000 acres adjacent to UC Merced has been jump-started by the hiring of two people to share the management duties. Sierra...

California is Home to Extreme Weather, Too

MERCED, Calif. — California isn’t going to face a superstorm like Hurricane Sandy because the Pacific Ocean is too cold to feed that kind of weather system. But that doesn’t mean California won’t see...

Chemistry Professor Making the Most of his Waste

Chemistry Professor Jason Hein and his students make a lot of compounds in the lab. They also make a lot of chemical waste. But Hein found a way to clean up the waste and reuse it, saving money and...

UC Merced the Focus of Global Sustainable Design Contest

MERCED, Calif. — A global sustainable architecture competition is turning all eyes to the University of California, Merced, the newest campus in the UC system, and the only one to have all its...

National Science Foundation Grant Supports Biodiversity Research

MERCED, Calif. — A $1.9 million grant from the National Science Foundation will support a five-year investigation by University of California, Merced, researchers into environmental changes in marine...

Snowy, Sandy Research Explores Climate Change

From the white, sugary sands of Hawaii to the white, powdery slopes of the Sierra Nevada, Natural Sciences Professor Stephen Hart has his eye on climate change. For the past two years, the professor...

National Science Foundation Funds San Joaquin River Research

MERCED, Calif. — People talk about climate change all the time. But researchers at the University of California, Merced, are working to find out exactly how it will affect the millions of people who...