Dozens of high school students stepped off buses at UC Merced on a toasty Monday last summer, coming from Stockton, Modesto and Merced to spend a few days exploring college opportunities.
They were part of a special program, the 1300 Campaign, which aims to increase the number of young men of color attending University of California and California State universities by 2025 and 2026.
A three-site exhibit is celebrating Chicano art in a collaboration between a university and a community - the culmination of a professor's nine years of effort.
"Alma, Corazón, y Vida: Latino Art Legends from the Mike 'Surrito' Echeverría Collection" will be exhibited starting next month at the UC Merced Art Gallery, La Galería and the Merced Multicultural Arts Center (MAC).
It is a serious understatement to say Carlos Diaz Alvarenga had a big year: He graduated from UC Merced, successfully defended his Ph.D. thesis and landed a position as an assistant professor at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo.
Oh, and he got married.
"Yeah, those are all big life events and I did them all in one year," Diaz Alvarenga said, laughing. "It's been super difficult, but it's been worth it."
As California lawmakers consider a package of bills aimed at increasing the production of clean energy, a major question arises: How would we store all this new power?
A diverse group of students participated in a stem cell training pilot program at UC Merced this summer.
It was the second summer for the Training Undergrads in Stem Cell Engineering and Biology (TUSCEB) program, funded through the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM). It's a collaborative effort between the schools of Natural Sciences and Engineering led by professors Kara McCloskey and Jennifer Manilay and serviced through the university's Health Sciences Research Institute (HSRI).
"I like research on the Internet of Things because it solves problems in people's lives," said Shijia Pan , a professor of computer science and engineering at UC Merced and a principal investigator at the Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society and the Banatao Institute (CITRIS). "You can ask - 'What do I wish to have to make our lives easier?' - and you can build one yourself."
California's agriculture faces challenges from a highly variable climate with temperatures that will increase over the next several decades. Droughts are worsening and the Sierra snowpack, integral to the water supply, is volatile.
However, there are a number of ways to mitigate those changes, as outlined in a new paper coauthored by a group of UC faculty.
California's agriculture faces challenges from a highly variable climate with temperatures that will increase over the next several decades. Droughts are worsening and the Sierra snowpack, integral to the water supply, is volatile.
However, there are a number of ways to mitigate those changes, as outlined in a new paper coauthored by a group of UC faculty.
Cattle are a fairly regular sight around the UC Merced campus. They graze along the 6,500-acre Merced Vernal Pools and Grassland Reserve and the 40-acre Experimental Smart Farm, and an annual student-run spring event is even named "Cowtopia."
But cattle, as effective as they are, can't get everywhere to graze, so this summer the campus has received a visit from their smaller, more nimble colleagues: goats.
Hundreds of goats are grazing large swaths of land on the northeast side of the campus.
Construction has begun on a pilot project to install solar panels above two sections of Central Valley canals. This innovative initiative, which studies significant power and water issues, has already garnered recognition.
Project Nexus, a partnership between the Turlock Irrigation District (TID), the California Department of Water Resources (DWR), Bay Area development firm Solar AquaGrid, and UC Merced, received the Edmund G. "Pat" Brown Award from the California Council for Environmental and Economic Balance (CCEEB).
