School of Natural Sciences

UC Merced Sees Strong Gains in U.S. News Grad School Rankings

April 7, 2026

Top 100 Best Graduate Schools ranking, two students in a lab

UC Merced saw broad gains in the U.S. News and World Report 2026 Best Graduate Schools rankings with graduate programs rising in national standing, reflecting the campus’s growing academic and research profile. UC Merced’s School of Engineering broke into the top 100 in the rankings...

Study Builds on Plausible Scenario for Origin of Life on Earth

A relatively simple combination of naturally occurring sugars and amino acids offers a plausible route to the building blocks of life, according to a paper published in Nature Chemistry co-authored...

Summer a Fertile Time for Scientific Research

It's not just faculty and students in the School of Social Sciences, Humanities and Artswho are conducting groundbreaking research this summer. Those in Engineering and Natural Sciences will be busy...

Campus Names New Dean of Natural Sciences

Juan C. Meza, named one of Hispanic Business magazine’s ‘Top 100 Influentials of 2009,’ is head of high-performance computing research at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory MERCED — The...

Sustainability Research Opportunities Abound for 2010 Grad

Andrea Mercado has a knack for finding opportunity. She left her hometown of Lake Arrowhead in Southern California for college in Seattle, but a year later, her horizons opened up in a different ...

Research Week to Celebrate Work of Faculty, Students

Research Week, the annual celebration of faculty and student research at the University of California, Merced, returns this month with a student research poster competition and a number of lectures...

Marine Biologist Awarded Prestigious GuggenheimFellowship

Mónica Medina, a biology professor in the School of Natural Sciences at the University of California, Merced, has been awarded the prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship, the John Simon Guggenheim...

Stem Cell Facility Expands Campus' Research Capabilities

The University of California, Merced, today celebrates the opening of its state-of-the-art Stem Cell Instrumentation Foundry, made possible through the support of the California Institute for...

Physicist Wins Prestigious National Science FoundationAward

UC Merced physicist Sayantani Ghosh has been given a CAREER Award to further her research into the dynamics of 'exotic' magnets Quick Facts Physics Professor Sayantani Ghosh has been awarded the...

Rising Greenhouse Gases Profoundly Impact Microscopic Marine Life

The prolonged, extensive emission of greenhouse gases over the next several decades could have significant impacts on ocean life, according to a study by UC Merced marine biologist Michael Beman....