Conducting research can be daunting.
UC Merced, like its sister University of California campuses, prides itself on the opportunities it provides its students to conduct research as part of their educational experiences. But the idea of looking into a concept and producing new results can seem intimidating. Where do you even start?
Annaliza Perez Torres has already accomplished plenty.
A 2019 graduate of UC Merced, Perez was named the School of Engineering's Outstanding Student in Materials Science and Engineering and earned Research Excellence recognition from the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Center.
Now Perez, an engineer with Lockheed Martin, has received a Rising Technical Contributor Award from the Society of Women Engineers.
A grant from National Institutes of Health will fund research into using stem cell-derived cells to grow new blood vessels in areas that might have blockages.
The $416,741 grant will fund work by chemical and materials engineering Professor Kara McCloskey, working with co-principal investigator Ngan Huang, a professor in the department of cardiothoracic surgery at Stanford University and principal investigator at the Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System.
"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."
Much of the work Yue (Jessica) Wang does at UC Merced sounds like science fiction: She creates flexible material that gets stronger the more you hit it. And it conducts electricity.
Science, yes. Fiction, no.
This work is happening. It was featured in a presentation materials scientist Di Wu from the Wang lab delivered this spring at the American Chemical Society meeting in New Orleans.
Sometimes public service at UC Merced looks like finding ways to grow crops with a changing water supply. Or delving into how children translate for their non-English-speaking parents.
And sometimes it looks like picking up a paintbrush and refurbishing park benches and curbs at Lake Yosemite.
The world of energy is changing so quickly that the processes used for planning can’t keep up.
UC Merced electrical engineering Professor Sarah Kurtz took part in a study that showed how swiftly the needs and resources for electricity are shifting. The study, “How Demand-Side Management Can Shape Electricity Generation Capacity Planning,” was published last week.
Inflammation is the process by which the human immune system responds to injury and stimulates tissue repair and healing. But it can become a chronic condition, leading to health concerns such as heart disease, diabetes, cancer and arthritis.
Water is among the most precious resources on the planet. Some areas don't get enough; some get too much. And climate change is driving both of those circumstances to ever-growing extremes.
University of California researchers from the USDA-funded Secure Water Future project recently found that increases in crop water demand explain half of the cumulative deficits of the agricultural water balance since 1980, exacerbating water reliance on depleting groundwater supplies and fluctuating surface water imports.
