Mind & Body

Vaping Produces a Chemical that Destroys Human Tissue, Research Shows

August 7, 2025

In addition to being used recreationally, marijuana and cannabidiol, or CBD, one of the cannabinoids produced by the marijuana plant, are thought to have medical benefits such as helping with chemotherapy-induced nausea, treating epilepsy, relieving pain and helping with a variety of mental health...

Rosa Manzo is heading up an asthma intervention project in the Valley.

Asthma Intervention Project Gets Green Light from Genentech

A new community health project addressing asthma issues in the San Joaquin Valley is underway thanks to a collaboration between UC Merced, UCSF and Camarena Health, supported by a grant from...

Bioengineer’s Infectious-Cells Research Earns an NSF CAREER Award

Bioengineering Professor Arvind Gopinath received a CAREER award for his research that seeks to understand how living biological materials such as bacterial swarms and fungal biofilms colonize...

Prestigious Biennial Grant Program Includes Funding for Ag-labor and Wildfire Research

Two new projects designed and led by UC Merced researchers will address challenges facing many Californians — wildfire recovery and agricultural labor — but will also have global reach...

Chemistry Professor Tao Ye and his students gathered on campus.

Chemical Biology Lab Creating DNA-based Nanomachines that can Self Assemble

Professor Tao Ye and colleagues have received a $1.18 million grant from the Department of Energy to study how DNA molecules can arrange themselves into nanostructures that could form the basis of...

Breast Milk Shows Promise for Treating COVID-19 and Protecting Babies

Health psychology Professor Jennifer Hahn-Holbrook and incoming grad student Jessica Marino have a new study suggesting that the breastmilk of mothers who have recovered from COVID-19 contains...

Physicist Liu Receives NSF CAREER Award to Create ‘Bacteria Treadmill’

Physics Professor Bin Liu has received a CAREER award for his research into a new micromanipulation technique to virtually hold freely moving microorganisms, essentially creating a “bacterial...

Pandemic Inspires Chemist to Open New Avenues of Research

Professor Michael Thompson doesn’t usually work in immunology or drug development. But his use of X-ray crystallography — research that visualizes the structures of protein molecules to...

Researcher Examining CBD Effects on Metabolic Syndrome

About 35 percent of Americans have metabolic syndrome, a group of risk factors that raises the risk of cardiovascular disease — the leading cause of death in the United States. If you have...

Connection Between COVID-19 and Loss of Smell Uncovered by Research Team

About 70 percent of people with COVID-19 suddenly lose their sense of smell, although fewer of them seem to realize it, according to a new “living analysis” by a research team that...

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