Earth Systems Science

A UC Merced professor is one of five finalists in an international challenge that could win him a $50,000 research grant and free access to a record-setting, ocean-going robot.

Professor Michael Beman, with the School of Natural Sciences, entered the PacX Challenge, a competition designed to encourage scientists and students to make use of data gathered by autonomous wave glider that just completed a 9,000-nautical-mile journey across the Pacific Ocean.

Professor Carolin Frank is concerned with the inner lives of trees.

She looks inside them to see whether microbes are part of – and perhaps even critical to – life functions such as growth.

MERCED, Calif. — California isn’t going to face a superstorm like Hurricane Sandy because the Pacific Ocean is too cold to feed that kind of weather system.

But that doesn’t mean California won’t see extreme weather, say researchers from the University of California, Merced.

MERCED, Calif. — A $1.9 million grant from the National Science Foundation will support a five-year investigation by University of California, Merced, researchers into environmental changes in marine lakes, including why some species adapt while others go extinct.

The grant also is helping spread UC Merced’s research and reputation across the Pacific.

“This research is an outstanding example of our faculty efforts to understand the links between the physical and the biological world,” said Sam Traina, UC Merced’s vice chancellor for research.

Shrubs blooming in a specific area of Africa might hold the answers to feeding millions of people on that continent, and possibly others.

California's Central Valley environment is getting healthier, but not fast enough. Its air quality is still among the worst in the nation, according to a report released today. 

The Sierra Nevada Research Institute at the University of California, Merced, and The Great Valley Center jointly produced "The State of the Great Central Valley: Assessing the Region Via Indicators — The Environment 2006-2011."

The report tracks a variety of environmental indicators within the Central Valley and shows mixed results.

UC Merced senior Jesse Anaya answered his phone one day to hear an unfamiliar voice ask, “Are you ready to change the world?”

“Yes,” he replied. “Now, who is this?”

Mónica Medina, a professor in the School of Natural Sciences at the University of California, Merced, has been awarded a Fulbright Scholar grant to conduct research at the Observatoire Océanologique de Banyuls research station in France during the 2012-13 academic year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06VNtISfSycClimate change is leading to higher temperatures around the world, forcing plants, trees and animals to adapt to new conditions or relocate, often to higher elevations. But the process is gradual, and the effects of climate warming can usually only be observed over the course of years and decades.

Peter Kirchner may have been born in California’s San Fernando Valley, but his heart and mind have always been close to the mountains.