UC Merced Psychology Professor Sarah Depaoli has been recognized as a Rising Star by the Association for Psychological Science (APS), a nonprofit organization dedicated to the advancement of scientific psychology and its representation at the national and international level. According to the APS

Professor Clarissa J. Nobile of the University of California, Merced, is one of 22 researchers named today as a Pew Biomedical Scholar for her work exploring how communities of microbes conspire to cause disease. Nobile is the first UC Merced researcher to win a Pew scholar award, and she joins the

Doing the things you enjoy can be good for your health, according to a new study by Professor Matthew Zawadzki, a health psychologist with the University of California, Merced. The study, published in the Annals of Behavioral Medicine, shows that leisure activity can provide immediate stress relief

Most archaeologists have to dig in the field, but Professor Holley Moyes digs deeper than most. Her research takes her more than 400 feet into the Belize underground, where ancient Maya caves hold evidence of rituals to appease gods of fertility and rain. That research is the cover story in Discover

The odds were stacked against Ruben Rodriguez. When the 27-year-old UC Merced student was still in high school, he was confronted with a sobering statistic that Hispanics receive only 5 percent of all doctorates awarded. “That’s always stayed with me,” said Rodriguez, who was born in Mexico and came

Note: This story originally appeared in the Fall 2014 issue of UC Merced Magazine. Before it infects humans who breathe it in, the fungus that causes valley fever changes shapes in the environment. Once infected, some people fight it off while others die. If scientists can determine how that shape

Biochemistry Professor Patricia LiWang calls it a stroke of luck that she has become enmeshed in HIV research, but her developments are no accident. The National Institute for Health (NIH) apparently agrees, awarding her more than $2.3 million over the next four years to continue working toward a

Note: This story originally appeared in the Fall 2014 issue of UC Merced Magazine and has been updated in the wake of the Nov. 4 elections. Read the whole issue online. In two small rooms on the University of California’s youngest campus, far removed from the epicenters of American political power

When people get near California’s giant sequoias, they usually look up. But Professor Steve Hart looks down, and what he finds beneath the trees has intrigued him. The trees, some of which could be more than 3,000 years old, appear to influence the soil, increasing the pH and the levels of nitrogen

Professor Masashi Kitazawa wants to figure out if any environmental factors increase the risk for developing Alzheimer’s disease – specifically, whether elevated levels of copper in drinking water play a role. A new $2.6 million, five-year grant from the National Institute of Environmental Health