Their community college experiences occurred hundreds of miles apart, but Kim Arellano Carmona and John Wilson each found the support and inspiration that would propel them to Ph.D. candidate studies at UC Merced.

Now they both have a golden opportunity to give back as awardees of a fellowship program that has them shadowing community college mentors and, in the spring semester, teaching classes at Bakersfield College.

Human waste isn’t a topic most people want to talk about.

But environmental systems Professor Rebecca Ryals embraces the subject, especially when it comes to mitigating climate change, improving public health and creating sustainable food systems.

Gov. Gavin Newsom, speaking at UC Merced on Monday, announced that the state will support the building of the university’s new medical education building.

The Health, Behavioral Sciences and Medical Education Building will support a B.S.-to-M.D. joint degree program with UCSF-Fresno, starting in 2023, along with public health and psychological sciences faculty and students.

“We hope that students stay in the Valley and serve the people who made their education possible. To develop the talent, it takes time. But this is the beginning,” Newsom said.

An HIV-inhibiting silk film designed to advance prevention and help end the AIDS epidemic in countries in Africa, developed by UC Merced Professor Patti LiWang, has met recent success at the California National Primate Research Center at UC Davis.

“They show complete protection,” LiWang said. “The films worked perfectly on the macaques at Davis.”

Distinguished UC Merced Director of Medical Education and public health Professor Dr. Thelma Hurd has been appointed the inaugural Thondapu Family Endowed Chair in Medical Education.

“I am both gratified and honored,” said Hurd. “It is truly an important step in establishing a long-term medical education program on the campus and for the community.”

It's no surprise that a good night's rest is one of the most important factors for a person's well-being, but not everyone can say they have the luxury of being able to sleep for eight hours a night. New research from UC Merced is shedding light on the problems this can cause, specifically for the mental health of Latina teen mothers.

The over the counter, “safe,” organic-compliant insecticides people purchase at home-improvement stores could be causing a problem that goes far beyond the vegetable garden or farm field — antibiotic resistance.

With a new $20 million federal grant, UC Merced becomes part of a multi-institutional research collaborative to develop artificial intelligence — or AI — solutions to tackle some of agriculture’s biggest challenges related to water management, climate change and integration of new technology into farming.

While many are preparing to head off to college after an unprecedented year, a handful of students are already on UC Merced’s campus and working away in research labs. They’re part of the inaugural FACTS Bridge Program, a way for first-year and transfer students to get a head start on research and more.

COVID-19 upended life as we know it, especially among the science community. While some scientists rushed to develop a vaccine, others sought a better understanding of the virus, hoping to predict where the next outbreak might be in order to better contain it. At UC Merced, this included testing the campus’s wastewater.

UC Merced’s campus has many buildings, but just one pipe through which wastewater leaves the campus. This turned out to be helpful to discern whether there would be forthcoming positive COVID-19 test results.