Faculty

Dust is a Danger to Central Valley Health and Will Likely Get Worse, Researchers Find

May 12, 2025

A dust storm rises near Owens Lake. Photo Courtesy of UC San Diego

People don't think about dust much until it's time to clean the house, but a new report by UC researchers could raise awareness of the growing threat of dust and dust storms. Dust affects everything from cardiovascular and brain health to traffic collisions and agricultural yield....

Professor Discovers Key Elements for Biofilm Spreading

A biology professor at the University of California, Merced, discovered mechanisms that allow a potentially fatal biofilm to spread and resist drugs. The research was published last month in mBio, an...

Facilities Management Seeks Campus’s Help in Attaining Sustainable Certifications

UC Merced is one of the greenest campuses in the nation, with 100 percent of its new construction having earned LEED certification from the U.S. Green Building Council. Those certifications have been...

Big-Data Project Nets Professor a Big Award

Professor Florin Rusu’s passion for analyzing voluminous amounts of data has won him a prestigious early-career award from the federal Department of Energy, making him the fifth of the nine eligible...

Book Explores Tea Party's Rise, Dynamics

There’s a tendency for researchers to only study leftist movements, but a new book co-edited by UC Merced sociology Professor Nella Van Dyke analyzes the Tea Party movement. “We need to understand...

Project to Bring Attention to Overlooked American Artists

For the past several years, art history Professor ShiPu Wang has been on a detective mission to find every work produced by a group of overlooked artists from the early 20th century. Wang has...

Class of 2014 Bids Farewell, Begins Next Chapter

At two weekend ceremonies, UC Merced conferred degrees on more than 1,000 commencement candidates who said goodbye to the campus they called home for the past four or more years of their lives....

New Center Seeks Better Ways to Communicate Climate Issues

Climate change is creating two problems. One is understanding and addressing its impact on the world. The other is convincing large swaths of the public that it is, in fact, a reality. In an effort...

Innovate to Grow Competition Highlights Student Creativity

MERCED, Calif. — From disposable drones mapping wildfire perimeters to increasing the number of young students interested in science, technology, engineering and math studies, this year’s engineering...

NSF Early Career Award Honors Professor’s Research and Potential

The National Science Foundation is honoring UC Merced Professor Asmeret Asefaw Berhe with a Faculty Early Career Development Award to support her examination of how soil helps regulate the climate....