School of Natural Sciences

Professor Dives with Crocs, Displays Megalodon Expertise During Shark Week

July 17, 2025

Professor Sora Kim swam with a Nile crocodile for this year's Shark Week special, which focuses of sharks versus prehistoric reptiles. Photo courtesy of Kruger National Park, South Africa.

Shark Week starts Sunday and Professor Sora Kim will be featured again this year in a special airing at 9 p.m. Monday, titled “Jaws vs. Mega Croc,” and the filming allowed her to swim with a Nile crocodile. “I flew to Florida and learned about crocodiles – their evolution...

Antibiotic Resistance Found in Insecticides Commonly Used in California

The over the counter, “safe,” organic-compliant insecticides people purchase at home-improvement stores could be causing a problem that goes far beyond the vegetable garden or farm field...

Edwards Eager to Expand Father of Evolution’s Work

It has been 186 years since Charles Darwin collected the samples of the Galapagos Islands species that led to his explanation of how the diversity of life on Earth has evolved and forever changed the...

UC Merced Faculty Land Three UC-HBCU Grants, Most in System

The University of California Office of the President awarded three out of only seven UC-Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) Initiative grants to UC Merced faculty members. The...

Quantitative and Systems Biology Ph.D. alumna Kinsey Brock

Recent Ph.D. Grads Receive NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship

Quantitative Systems Biology Graduate Program alumni Kinsey Brock and Robert Boria were awarded Postdoctoral Research Fellowships in Biology (PRFB) from the National Science Foundation (NSF)....

A machine developed in Professor Reza Ehsani's lab improves almond harvests by reducing the amount of dust stirred up as the nuts are gathered from the ground.

New AI Institute Expands UC Merced’s Smart, Sustainable Agriculture Effort

With a new $20 million federal grant, UC Merced becomes part of a multi-institutional research collaborative to develop artificial intelligence — or AI — solutions to tackle some of...

Postdoc Earns Prestigious NIH Fellowship to Expand Prion Disease Research

Postdoctoral Scholar Mikahl Banwarth-Kuhn was awarded a $205,140 National Institutes of Health Ruth L. Kirschstein Postdoctoral Individual National Research Service Award (NIH-F32) to be distributed...

Professor’s Drive to Help the Community Gets Underway for 13th Year

To help Merced people in need, Professor Patti LiWang has been leading a diaper and toilet paper drive for the past 12 years. “When we moved here, the recession hit. It was hard for us, a...

Professor Marc Beutel waits to collect a wastewater sample as a facilities employee helps to remove the manhole covering on campus.

Campus Wastewater Testing Offers COVID-19 Early Warning System, Establishes Protocols for the Future

COVID-19 upended life as we know it, especially among the science community. While some scientists rushed to develop a vaccine, others sought a better understanding of the virus, hoping to predict...

Ph.D. Student Named Underrepresented Chemist of Color by Merck

Chemistry and Chemical Biology graduate student Ali Abou Taka is one of 12 students to receive the inaugural Merck Research Award for Underrepresented Chemists of Color. Abou Taka, a Ph.D....