Research

Ocean Chemistry Now Substantially Shaped by Humans

March 16, 2026

A sign on a southern California beach indicates it is unsafe to swim because of human-caused contamination.

Although the oceans are the least explored places on the planet, even their depths are not untouched by humans. Drawing on more than 2,300 seawater samples collected across the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian Oceans, researchers found that hundreds of synthetic chemicals — many of them rarely...

Chemist to Lobby for NSF Funding at Washington Event

Chemistry Professor Hrant Hratchian is part of a delegation of academics at the Coalition for National Science Funding’s (CNSF) advocacy day in Washington, D.C., today. Hratchian will show his lab’s...

Mapping Genomes of Pine Bacteria Yields Unexpected Results

UC Merced Professor Carolin Frank is helping figure out how a certain bacteria helps promote healthy tree growth by studying the bacteria’s genome sequence. In the new paper, published in the open-...

Grad Student Uses Math to Study Deadly Diseases

Graduate student Jason Davis doesn’t use a traditional lab to study prion diseases. Instead, he relies on computer modeling and applied mathematics. Working with Suzanne Sindi, a professor of applied...

Grad Student Examines Use of Social Media in Health Care

The use of images and direct questions by health communicators on Facebook tends to increase user engagement, though linking to external websites and videos does not. Posts conveying positive...

Campus Celebrates UC Natural Reserve System on Protected Lands

Research, teaching and public outreach were all on display today at UC Merced’s celebration of the University of California Natural Reserve System’s 50th anniversary. The inaugural celebration of the...

Study: Real-World Negotiators Bargain More Fairly

Experienced policymakers are more likely to make fair offers in bargaining than the average person, and less likely to accept low offers — even if it means both sides get nothing. Such were the...

Journalist to Speak on Immigration at Campus Conference

Journalist Roberto Lovato will give the keynote address this week at “Blurring the Border: Deporting Denizens in the 21st Century,” an interdisciplinary conference on immigration, deportation and...

Two Grad Students Earn Prestigious NSF Fellowships

UC Merced graduate students Theo Crouch II and Lauren Edwards recently were awarded fellowships from the National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP). Jessica Ross...

Three Students Chosen to Further Carbon Neutrality Efforts

Three UC Merced undergraduates are the recipients of a new fellowship under University of California President Janet Napolitano’s Carbon Neutrality Initiative. Through the President’s Sustainability...