Research

More than 100 million land mines remain buried around the world, posing a threat in approximately 70 countries and territories, and killing or injuring about 5,000 people, most of them civilians, every year. 

As the world’s geopolitical landscape shifts, nine scientists studying different aspects of warfare ecology from seven countries — Poland, Ukraine, Norway, Spain, the United States, Finland and Croatia — are warning against the growing deployment of land mines as countries bordering Russia withdraw from global conventions restricting their use.

Professor Andy LiWang knows what makes us tick, at least at a cellular level.

His research into the mechanisms of the oldest biological clock known to humankind has led him to understand how proteins — and hence cells — can tell time.

It has also led the UC Merced biochemist to become this year's recipient of the prestigious Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin award, sponsored by the Rigaku Corporation and given by The Protein Society (TPS).

Shark Week starts Sunday and Professor Sora Kim will be featured again this year in a special airing at 9 p.m. Monday, titled “Jaws vs. Mega Croc,” and the filming allowed her to swim with a Nile crocodile.

“I flew to Florida and learned about crocodiles – their evolution, strength, physiology and behavior. More interactions are being recorded between sharks and crocodiles these days, so I also needed to learn about these situations,” she said.

The National Institutes of Health are backing Professor Clarissa Nobile ’s mission to understand the mechanisms by which microbes form biofilms, specifically those that can be hazardous to human health.

At UC Merced's biggest lab, students work from before sunrise to well after dusk. They are operating the university's Experimental Smart Farm, 40 acres of dirt and plants, research and experiments.

They study everything from pollinators to hydroponics, but there are more than just academic endeavors happening: Students say they have plans for community engagement opportunities including a corn maze and pumpkin patch. They also have been planting tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, squash, kale, arugula and melons.

With careful planning and a little luck, researchers found a surprising upside to hurricanes after a Category 4 storm disrupted their expedition off the coast of Mexico.

The team was able to sample the ocean right after the storm passed and found that the storms churn the ocean so powerfully and deeply — up to thousands of meters — that nutrient-rich, cold water is brought to the surface.

An average of more than 1 million acres of idled farmland a year is a significant contributor to a growing dust problem in California that has implications for millions of residents’ health and the state’s climate.

People don't think about dust much until it's time to clean the house, but a new report by UC researchers could raise awareness of the growing threat of dust and dust storms.

Dust affects everything from cardiovascular and brain health to traffic collisions and agricultural yield. “Beyond the Haze: A UC Dust Report on the Causes, Impacts, and Future of Dust Storms in California” details the wide-ranging impacts of dust on health, public safety, the environment and California's economy.

Cosmology Professor Anna Nierenberg has received a CAREER award for a project that will vastly improve the study of the nature of dark matter in the universe.

She is the 42nd researcher from UC Merced to earn a CAREER award from the National Science Foundation (NSF).

Professor Emily Jane McTavish and colleagues at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology have mapped the evolution of every known bird species.

They created a complete evolutionary tree of bird species by combining data on 9,239 species published in nearly 300 studies between 1990 and 2024 and additional curated data on another 1,000 species. The resulting database can easily be shared and updated as additional studies are published.