Science & Technology

UC Davis assistant professor and graduate students help identify a new type of supernova  By AARYA GUPTA — science@theaggie.org   UC Davis assistant professor of physics and astronomy Stefano Valenti and graduate students from the Department of Physics, Azalee Bostroem and Yize Dong, were part of a team of international astronomers that recently discovered supernova 2018zd, […]

Increased frequency of open-note exams due to virtual classes results in mixed opinions among students Is it B or C? B or C? The multiple-choice answers toggle back-and-forth in your mind as you glance up at the clock to see that there are only two minutes remaining. This exam is worth 60% of your grade, […]

Engineers and neurologists collaborate to create a device that could help brain injury and stroke patients   Cerebral blood flow (CBF) is essential to human brain functioning, and yet current imaging techniques are costly and usually do not provide continuous measurements for physicians. Recognizing this problem, Vivek Srinivasan, an adjunct associate professor of biochemical engineering at […]

Chaparral shrublands, found all throughout the state, are facing increasingly frequent wildfires that may threaten the native lichen communities A collaborative study that looked at the impact of wildfires on chaparral ecosystems and long-term lichen recolonization in California was published in the journal Diversity and Distributions on May 10. The paper was co-authored by Alexandra […]

Enrollment is open for participants ages 12-17 in the Novavax COVID-19 clinical trial UC Davis Health is taking the next step in the fight against COVID-19 by beginning to enroll children ages 12-17 in a clinical trial to test the Novavax COVID-19 vaccine. The trial is currently in Phase 3 clinical trials with the National […]

A discovery regarding T cells can help the creators of a future vaccine know how to produce the best immune response     Research at the Center for Immunology and Infectious Disease at UC Davis found that tissue-resident immune cells are not necessary for secondary protection in the female reproductive tract, suggesting that a vaccine can […]

Gene discovery could potentially improve growth and fitness in plants in stressful conditions After 10 years of embarking on a “very, bold risky project,” UC Davis researchers recently published a paper in Cell, according to Shiobhan Brady, a professor of plant biology and lead author of the study, via email.  For the first time, researchers […]

The SeaDoc Society, a donor-funded program of the UC Davis Karen C. Drayer Wildlife Health Center, presents a collaborative project aimed to help save the wild southern resident killer whale population from extinction “Free Willy,” which came out in 1993, portrayed killer whales as beloved and personable animals rather than killers—quite different from public perception […]

The flowers of UC Davis and their impact on the local organisms and communities A great place to find wildflowers in Davis is the UC Davis Arboretum and Public Garden. The Arboretum is made up of 100 acres of land and includes demonstration gardens, scientific collections and the Putah Creek Riparian Reserve. Their mission is, […]

Landscape architect’s recent sheep project explores the use of sheep in maintaining landscapes Imagine if all lawn mowers on campus were replaced with grazing sheep who worked shifts to maintain our lawns. This idea is one that Haven Kiers, an assistant professor of landscape architecture in the Department of Human Ecology, is exploring through her […]

Lactoferrin, a sialic acid glycoprotein, can promote neurodevelopment or neuroprotection in a concentration-dependent manner The first two years of a newborn baby’s life are critical: Any changes the rapidly-developing brain experiences in response to environmental factors and any nutrients absorbed become irreversible later on in life. Human milk, the primary source of nutrients for a […]

E. wallecei and Eriophyllum mohavense in the Mojave Desert studied by an associate UC Davis professor, among others Researchers from UC Santa Cruz and UC Davis—including assistant professor of land, air and water resources Rebecca Hernandez—analyzed the population dynamics of rare native annual plant Eriophyllum mohavense and its closely related common native annual plant E. […]