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2023 Awards and Honors

November 29, 2023
2023 list of most highly cited researchers includes 18 UC Santa Cruz scientists and engineers
In a notable recognition of scholarly achievement, 18 scientists and engineers from UC Santa Cruz have earned a spot on the 2023 Highly Cited Researchers list, recently unveiled by Clarivate.
November 21, 2023
UC Santa Cruz faculty member elected president of Sociologists for Women in Society
Associate Professor of Latin American and Latino Studies (LALS) Sylvanna Falcón was recently elected president of Sociologists for Women in Society (SWS). Falcón’s term in the position will start at the beginning of 2024.
November 21, 2023
Environmental toxicologist Don Smith receives Outstanding Faculty Award
Don Smith, distinguished professor of microbiology and environmental toxicology, has been awarded the 2022-2023 Outstanding Faculty Award from the Division of Physical and Biological Sciences. The annual award is the division’s highest honor for faculty achievement, recognizing combined excellence in research, teaching, and service.
November 17, 2023
François Monard honored with Calderón Prize for inverse problems work
University of California, Santa Cruz professor of mathematics François Monard has received the prestigious Calderón Prize for his work in the field of inverse problems.
November 07, 2023
Communication, connection and inclusion are priorities for 2023 Outstanding Staff Awardee
Monique Leduc has been a valued member of the UC Santa Cruz community for 34 years, starting as an assistant analyst in the Financial Aid office in 1989. Six years later, she moved to the office that became Financial Affairs and has worked there ever since.
September 25, 2023
Alumna Kathryn Sullivan enshrined in the National Aviation Hall of Fame
Kathryn Sullivan (Cowell ’73, Earth sciences) was the first American woman to walk in space, the first woman to reach the deepest point of the ocean floor, and the only person to ever do both. On Sept. 22, she was enshrined in the National Aviation Hall of Fame in Washington, DC.
September 20, 2023
Celebrating UCSC’s 2023 Alumni Award Recipients
Seven UCSC alumni will be presented with awards for demonstrating outstanding professional achievements, making distinct contributions to society, providing impactful contributions to UC Santa Cruz, and embodying the values and spirit of the university.
September 20, 2023
National Postdoc Appreciation Week: Featuring Priya Crosby and Will DeRocco
National Postdoc Appreciation Week, organized by the National Postdoc Association (NPA) since 2009, takes place this year from September 18-22. This year, the UC Santa Cruz Science Division is highlighting the work of two outstanding postdocs: Priya Crosby and Will DeRocco.
September 19, 2023
Eric Palkovacs is awarded the 2023 Excellence in Fisheries Education Award
Eric Palkovacs has been awarded the 2023 Excellence in Fisheries Education Award by the American Fisheries Society, the organization announced. This award is presented to an individual to recognize excellence in organized teaching and advising in some aspect of fisheries education.
September 13, 2023
Valère Lambert is the 2023 Keiiti Aki Early Career Award Recipient
Valère Lambert was announced as AGU’s 2023 Keiiti Aki Early Career Award recipient. The Aki Award is among the highest honors made to an early career seismologist.
September 11, 2023
2023 ARCS Foundation scholarships support UCSC graduate students in the sciences and engineering
Sixteen UC Santa Cruz graduate students have received scholarships worth a total of $175,000 from the Achievement Rewards for College Scientists (ARCS) Foundation for the 2023-24 academic year.
September 07, 2023
New long-term NIH grant supports breast cancer research
Cancers are easier to treat if caught early on in their development. Once the cancer cells metastasize and spread around the body, the disease becomes more difficult to target. Shaheen Sikandar, an assistant professor of MCD Biology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, was recently awarded up to seven years of funding from the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institute of Health (NIH), to study the process of metastasis in breast cancer.
September 07, 2023
Alumnus Kevin Lunzalu wins major award for his work in plastics pollution reduction around the world
UCSC alumnus Kevin Lunzalu received an award from the Global Environment Facility (GEF). This award is one of just 23 awarded to individuals and nonprofits across the globe from the first-ever inclusive GEF Assembly Challenge Program.
July 21, 2023
Celebrating the success of a human-centered approach to supporting emerging scientists
Graduate school admissions, NSF Graduate Research Fellowship awards, and American Astronomical Society honors mark a banner year for UCSC's Lamat Institute.
July 10, 2023
Volunteer who helped keep the Seymour Center open is honored
Dale Bieser, one of the Seymour Marine Discovery Center's long-time volunteers, was recognized with the Be the Difference Award - Individual Honoree by the Volunteer Center of Santa Cruz County. Over the past 12 years, she has become a vital member of their team.
June 20, 2023
Recognizing excellence in Humanities award ceremonies
This month, UC Santa Cruz’s Humanities Division once again marked the end of the school year with the Spring Awards and Graduate Student Awards, in ceremonies that celebrated the achievements of students, instructors, and alumni.
June 06, 2023
Annual awards recognize outstanding students in the Social Sciences Division
The Division of Social Sciences’ annual Student Awards Luncheon was held on June 2 at College Nine’s Namaste Lounge.
May 31, 2023
Judit Moschkovich joins two national leadership programs for mathematics education
Moschkovich is now a member of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine's U.S. National Commission on Mathematics Instruction and a co chair of the National Academy of Education's Equity in Math Education Research Grants (EMERG) Program.
May 30, 2023
Associate Teaching Professor Alegra Eroy-Reveles receives Distinguished Teaching Award
Alegra Eroy-Reveles, an associate teaching professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, was honored for the positive impact she has had on her students, colleagues, and department.
May 18, 2023
Karen Miga named 2023 Searle Scholar to study uncharted regions of the human genome
Karen Miga, assistant professor of biomolecular engineering at UC Santa Cruz, has been named a 2023 Searle Scholar.
May 16, 2023
Excellence in Action: Celebrating UCSC’s 2023 Distinguished Graduate Alumni Award Recipients
Now in its seventh year, the Distinguished Graduate Alumni Award welcomes its 2023 cohort.
May 16, 2023
Physical and Biological Sciences Division honors three prominent alumni
The Division of Physical and Biological Sciences is honoring three stellar alumni—atmospheric scientist Cora E. Randall, pediatrician Ramon Resa, and marine scientist Colleen Reichmuth—with the 2023 Distinguished Alumni Awards.
May 16, 2023
Mark Fathi Massoud awarded Berlin Prize
Massoud's Berlin Prize fellowship will allow him to focus on research about perceptions and experiences of shari‘a in the United States.
May 11, 2023
Dickson Emeriti Professorships awarded to faculty in music, theater arts, and biology
Three UCSC faculty members—Kathy Foley, Edward Houghton, and Susan Strome—have been honored with Edward A. Dickson Emeritus Professorship Awards for the 2023–24 academic year.
May 03, 2023
Geoscientist Emily Brodsky elected to the National Academy of Sciences
Emily Brodsky, professor of Earth and planetary sciences, has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences in recognition of her distinguished and continuing achievements in original research.
April 24, 2023
Peter Bratt announced as 2023 Social Sciences Distinguished Alumni Award recipient
Rockefeller Fellow, Peabody Award winner, Emmy-nominated film producer, writer, director, community organizer, and social justice activist Peter Bratt is UC Santa Cruz’s 2023 Social Sciences Distinguished Alumni Award recipient.
April 24, 2023
Electrical engineer wins award to support improvement of efficient, low-cost agricultural soil sensor systems
UC Santa Cruz Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering Colleen Josephson is a recipient of the Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research’s (FFAR) 2022 New Innovator in Food & Agriculture Research Award.
April 19, 2023
Biologist Beth Shapiro elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Beth Shapiro, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at UC Santa Cruz, has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of the nation’s oldest and most prestigious honorary societies.
April 12, 2023
Undergrad Samantha Contreras wins prestigious Goldwater Scholarship
Samantha Contreras, a junior majoring in physics at UC Santa Cruz, has been named a 2023 Goldwater Scholar by the Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in Education Foundation.
April 05, 2023
Food system researcher Julie Guthman wins distinguished career award
Professor of sociology and community studies Julie Guthman was recognized with the Distinguished Career Award by the Cultural and Political Ecology speciality group of the American Association of Geographers.
April 03, 2023
Ocean scientist Kenneth Bruland recognized for pioneering research paper
The 2023 John H. Martin Award from the Association for the Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography celebrates an influential 1998 paper on the role of iron in coastal ecosystems.
March 30, 2023
Grad student Huazhi Ge wins postdoctoral fellowship for planetary science research
Huazhi Ge, a doctoral candidate in planetary science at UC Santa Cruz, has won a prestigious 51 Pegasi b Fellowship from the Heising-Simons Foundation to support his postdoctoral research.
March 28, 2023
Dickens Project honored with the 2023 Award of Merit from the California Association of Teachers of English.
The CATE award recognizes the Dickens Project’s long history of outreach and partnerships with high school students and teachers.
March 28, 2023
A scholar in his own community: Kevin Weatherwax
Computational Media Ph.D. student Kevin Weatherwax's research is supported through the Piatt Fellowship, a scholarship for doctoral students from Santa Cruz County.
March 25, 2023
Grant funds Sarker's aquaculture sustainability research
Pallab Sarker received a foundation grant fund from the Cynthia and George Mitchell Foundation, amounting to $170,947 over three years to strengthen his lab’s ecological aquaculture work.
March 25, 2023
Pedroza received Russell Sage Foundation Pipeline Grant
Assistant Professor Juan Manuel Pedroza aims to learn more about these challenges and speak to them, with the help of a recently awarded grant from the Russell Sage Foundation.
March 13, 2023
Winning Grad Slam presentation highlights disease threat to Hawaiian birds
Ecology and evolutionary biology graduate student Christa Seidl will compete in the UC systemwide Grad Slam in May, presenting her research on avian malaria.
March 13, 2023
Planetary scientist Myriam Telus wins NSF CAREER Award
Myriam Telus, assistant professor of Earth and planetary sciences at UC Santa Cruz, has received a Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to support her research on the atmospheres of rocky exoplanets.
March 03, 2023
Astrophysicist Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz wins 2023 AAAS Mentor Award
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has awarded the 2023 AAAS Mentor Award to Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz, professor of astronomy and astrophysics at UC Santa Cruz.
February 21, 2023
Researcher wins inaugural NHGRI award for DEIA Innovation in the Genomics Workforce
Ann Mc Cartney received the National Human Genome Research Institute’s (NHGRI) inaugural Staff Award for DEIA Innovation in the Genomics Workforce.
February 03, 2023
UCSC receives NEH awards that will further research in anthropology and musicology
On January 10, the NEH announced $28.1 million in grants toward 204 humanities projects nationwide. Two of this year’s recipients are part of the Slug family themselves, and their new grants will help to further their research in both anthropology and musicology at UC Santa Cruz.
January 31, 2023
Three UCSC faculty named 2022 AAAS fellows
Three UC Santa Cruz professors received the distinction of 2022 fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the association announced today.
January 31, 2023
UCSC alumna and special advisor to the chancellor earns international recognition for contributions to science, community building
Matlock, a cognitive science professor at UC Merced and special adviser at UC Santa Cruz, studies language use in real world contexts, including climate change, politics, technology, and health.
January 31, 2023
Slug Bike Life builds on bike culture through county-wide partnership
UC Santa Cruz’s Slug Bike Life has been awarded $712,000 for phase II of the bike safety, information and encouragement program.
January 11, 2023
Earth scientist James Zachos honored for climate change research
The BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in the Climate Change category recognizes Zachos and fellow paleoclimatologist Ellen Thomas of Yale University.