Environment

In a paper published in Nature Communications, UC Merced Professor Roger Bales, collaborating with an international team, found that the height of neighboring trees strongly influenced whether a given tree survived California's record 2012-15 drought.

Rocks, from ponderous boulders to tiny grains of sand, are subject to the whims of moisture, weather and time as they tumble from surrounding slopes into rivers, pools and lakes.

When Carlos Martinez was growing up in Southern California, his experience outdoors largely consisted of the irrigated lawns and tidy trees of his local park. Camping and hiking were not in his family’s recreational repertoire. Meanwhile, high school and work kept him too busy to focus on much else.

Martinez’s diligence paid off with an offer of admission to UC Merced. Like all undergraduate biological sciences majors, he completed more than a few laboratory classes involving pipettes and test tubes.

Distinguished Professor Martin Hagger from the Department of Psychological Sciences has been awarded one of this year’s Clarivate Highly Cited Researcher awards.

As a result of climate change, the Golden State's farms are expected to face a surge in agricultural pests, which poses a threat to California's specialty crops industry.

UC Merced Professor Wan Du has received a CAREER award for his research on energy efficient building management.

He is the 36th researcher from UC Merced to earn a CAREER award from the National Science Foundation (NSF).

A grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) will fund a project led by a UC Merced researcher looking into predicting behavior of wildfires.

Jeanette Cobian-Iñiguez is leading a team from UCs Merced and Irvine awarded $1,179,479 to predict the impact of forest fuel treatments on fire behavior, focusing on an improved understanding of the influence of surface-fuel attributes on fire behavior and severity, and ultimately, on forest carbon storage, according to a project summary.

How different species of animals respond to extreme weather events — which are increasing because of climate change — appears to be related to body size and habitat preference, a new study shows.

When extreme weather causes widespread flooding, smaller species and those living in low-elevation areas are most at risk. Being able to develop models that forecast the effects of natural disaster on terrestrial animals could help guide efforts to protect vulnerable species and habitats.

A team from UC Merced has been selected to participate in the Department of Energy (DOE) "BattChallenge," a three-year competition to develop a battery for an electric vehicle.

Understanding and conserving biodiversity, or the variety of life in ecosystems, is key to sustaining life on Earth.

A research project funded by NASA that is launching this week in South Africa, co-led by UC Merced environmental engineering Professor Erin Hestir, is aimed at better understanding the biodiversity of the region and providing new mapping tools that could be used on a global scale.