All Stories

UC Merced Aerial Picture
UC Merced: Looking Back on 2020
January 12, 2021
There was an undeniable feeling of optimism and excitement in January 2020, as the calendar turned to a new year at the University of California, Merced. The university would be welcoming its fourth chancellor in the summer, and... Read More
A Year to Remember: UC Merced Made the Most of 2020
January 12, 2021
There was an undeniable feeling of optimism and excitement in January 2020, as the calendar turned to a new year at the University of California, Merced. The university would be welcoming its fourth chancellor in the summer, and... Read More
UC Plans for Fall 2021 In-person Instruction Across Its 10 Campuses
January 11, 2021
The University of California announced today that it is planning for a return to primarily in-person instruction systemwide starting in fall 2021. The announcement is intended to provide prospective and current students and their families... Read More
Chemical Biology Lab Creating DNA-based Nanomachines that can Self Assemble
December 21, 2020
Professor Tao Ye and colleagues have received a $1.18 million grant from the Department of Energy to study how DNA molecules can arrange themselves into nanostructures that could form the basis of nanoelectronic circuits. All living things... Read More
Fellowship Advances Student’s Research into Arab American Smoking Behaviors
December 17, 2020
Public Health doctoral student Sarah Alnahari was awarded a UC Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program (TRDRP) Predoctoral Fellowship to continue her community-driven research examining tobacco use among Arab Americans in the San Joaquin... Read More
Virtual Fall Commencement Customized for Grads
December 17, 2020
UC Merced will host its second virtual ceremony for the Fall 2020 Commencement on Dec. 19, with a host of changes meant to confer upon students the distinct importance of the achievement. New this time: Each of the three schools — Social... Read More
Innovate to Grow Coming to a Zoom Room Near You
December 15, 2020
UC Merced’s premier experiential learning expo, Innovate to Grow (I2G), is providing students, faculty and staff with a new set of experiences to learn from this year, as the event continues in a virtual format to comply with pandemic... Read More
Breast Milk Shows Promise for Treating COVID-19 and Protecting Babies
December 14, 2020
Health psychology Professor Jennifer Hahn-Holbrook and incoming grad student Jessica Marino have a new study suggesting that the breastmilk of mothers who have recovered from COVID-19 contains strong antibodies to the virus. In the fight... Read More
Physicist Liu Receives NSF CAREER Award to Create ‘Bacteria Treadmill’
December 10, 2020
Physics Professor Bin Liu has received a CAREER award for his research into a new micromanipulation technique to virtually hold freely moving microorganisms, essentially creating a “bacterial treadmill” to enable biological and medical... Read More
Q&A: How People Decide Whether to Comply with Public Health Orders
December 9, 2020
How do people decide whether to comply with public health directives around the COVID-19 pandemic, such as wearing masks, social distancing and staying at home? Whether to take such preventative measures is a personal decision based on... Read More
Fall Commencement: UC Merced a ‘Companion’ for Student Speaker
December 8, 2020
For Xiaolong “Harry” Chen, UC Merced is more than a university. “It is a friend and a companion,” he wrote in his application to be student speaker at Fall Commencement. Together, they experienced pre-dawn hours at Lantern Café, early... Read More
Fall Commencement's Alumni Speaker Maps Out Path to Success
December 8, 2020
*/ 5:15 a.m.: Wake up. My phone is my alarm, placed under my bed so I must get up to turn it off. Make my bed. Stretch. Ish Verduzco has a weekday routine. It rarely varies more than 20 to 30 minutes a day. 5:20 a.m.: Listen to an... Read More
Library Acquires Ernest Lowe Photography Collection Documenting 1960s Rural California Communities
December 7, 2020
In the 1960s, Ernest Lowe took his camera into the rural towns of California’s Central Valley, documenting the lives and struggles of farm-working communities. Sixty years later, these photos are available to the public through UC Merced,... Read More
Campus Reaches Carbon Neutrality Ahead of Schedule
December 3, 2020
After a lengthy and rigorous review by independent auditors, UC Merced can proudly announce it is the first public research university in the country to achieve carbon neutrality, two years ahead of its goal. “UC Merced has been on the... Read More
Pandemic Inspires Chemist to Open New Avenues of Research
December 1, 2020
Professor Michael Thompson doesn’t usually work in immunology or drug development. But his use of X-ray crystallography — research that visualizes the structures of protein molecules to better understand how they function — has taken him... Read More
‘Give to UC Merced’ to End 2020 on a High Note
November 30, 2020
High school and college students’ lives have changed in unpredictable ways this year. They’ve missed out on many of the traditions that mark the beginnings and ends of some of life’s most formative chapters and the social interactions that... Read More
Researcher Examining CBD Effects on Metabolic Syndrome
November 24, 2020
About 35 percent of Americans have metabolic syndrome, a group of risk factors that raises the risk of cardiovascular disease — the leading cause of death in the United States. If you have three of these five issues, you have metabolic... Read More
Connection Between COVID-19 and Loss of Smell Uncovered by Research Team
November 18, 2020
About 70 percent of people with COVID-19 suddenly lose their sense of smell, although fewer of them seem to realize it, according to a new “living analysis” by a research team that includes a UC Merced graduate student. Vicente Ramirez,... Read More
UC Merced, Merced College Unveil New Transfer Pipeline for Local Students
November 13, 2020
UC Merced and Merced College are teaming up to make it easier than ever for local students to matriculate through community college and earn bachelor’s degrees from the most respected public university system in the world, all without ever... Read More
Undocumented Bobcats Find Support on Campus and Through One Another
November 12, 2020
Being a university student is stressful on its own. Students who have an uncertain immigration status have an additional layer of worry. The nearly 600 UC Merced students with undocumented status are finding support not only from the... Read More