News

Address Stigma, Build Strength: UC Merced Co-leads Project to Lower LGBTQ2S+ Use of Nicotine

April 7, 2025

LGBTQ2S+ individuals use tobacco and nicotine products at significantly higher rates than straight and cisgender people, research shows. Reasons can include stress and other health problems brought on by systemic and social prejudice, along with barriers to support for breaking the habit. UC Merced...

UC Merced Pride Week: Lambda Alliance Promotes Belonging and Community

March 31, 2025

UC Merced's Lambda Alliance is continuing its tradition of hosting Pride Week from March 31 to April 4. Held each year in April, the week of events celebrates and advocates for the LGBTQ+ community at UC Merced, in the Central Valley and beyond. "We hope that participants walk away with the...

Wilson Among This Year’s AAAS Fellows, Recognized for Science and Outreach

March 27, 2025

Vice Chancellor for Research, Innovation and Economic Development Gillian Wilson has been named a 2024 Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world’s largest general scientific society and publisher of the Science family of journals. Being elected an AAAS...

Bright Center Student Lightens Lives with Determination, Empathy

March 26, 2025

Sometimes you meet a young person who makes such a powerful impression that you want to vault forward a few decades to see how much they lifted others and elevated our world. Maddison Crump is one of those people. At age 21 she has logged over a dozen years of making a difference. A self-described...

Research Team Focuses on the Next Generations of Scientists

March 4, 2025

The Biology Integration Institute (BII): The Institute for Symbiotic Interactions, Training and Education in the Face of a Changing Climate, or INSITE, stands out because it is supported by $12.5 million from the National Science Foundation, one of the largest NSF grants UC Merced has ever received...

Author Shannon Lee to Discuss Dad Bruce at UC Merced Event

March 4, 2025

Shannon Lee, a New York Times bestselling author and the daughter of martial arts legend Bruce Lee, will share her father's messages of healing and unity Thursday, March 6, at UC Merced. The event, which is free and open to the public, also will feature Indonesian-inspired food prepared by UC...

Stargazing and Lecture Offer Unique Perspectives on Stars and Exoplanets

February 27, 2025

The night sky is filled with countless mysteries and worlds yet to be explored but that someday might be visited by spacecraft. In a free event titled “Celestial Tales: Stars, Exoplanets and the Myths That Connect Us,” on March 6, the campus community and the public will hear from Professor Yosuke...

Center Engages Campus, Community with Africa and its Diaspora

February 27, 2025

This story is part of a series for Black History Month. Read more stories highlighting Black excellence at UC Merced. The brutal deaths of African Americans George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and others at the hands of police officers five years ago catalyzed for Black communities to unite globally and...

Physiological Society Recognizes Rudy Ortiz for Mentoring Underrepresented Students

February 24, 2025

Physiology Professor Rudy M. Ortiz has been named this year's winner of the A. Clifford Barger Underrepresented Minority Mentorship Award by the American Physiological Society. The UC Merced professor was recognized for his leadership, guidance and mentorship of underrepresented minority and...

Founding Faculty Roland Winston Remembered for Pioneering Solar Energy

February 18, 2025

Distinguished Professor Emeritus Roland Winston, a pioneer in solar energy, engineering and physics, died Feb. 8 at the age of 88 at his home in Merced. A founding faculty member in the schools of Natural Sciences and Engineering at UC Merced, Winston also founded and directed the intercampus...