Alumni News
- March 12, 2025
Forum captures urgency to use ecosystems now to keep people safe from looming natural disasters
The National Practice Forum on Nature-Based Solutions was held in Irvine on February 4 and 5, and sponsored by UC Santa Cruz’s Center for Coastal Climate Resilience (CCCR). The forum drew over 500 attendees from around the country to discuss how our ecosystems can protect us from natural disasters.
- March 12, 2025
Research Corporation for Science Advancement honors Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz
Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz has been named a recipient of the Research Corporation for Science Advancement’s (RCSA) Robert Holland Jr. Award, which honors outstanding contributions to research, leadership, and mentorship in the sciences.
- March 11, 2025
Whale waste helps health of oceans by funneling nutrients to the tropics, new study shows
New research shows that whales move nutrients thousands of miles—in their pee and poop—from as far as Alaska to Hawaii, supporting the health of tropical ecosystems and fish. UC Santa Cruz professors Dan Costa and Ari Friedlaender contributed their marine-mammal expertise to the study, which was published on March 10 in the journal Nature Communications.
- March 11, 2025
New eye-tracking VR experience, Face Jumping, debuts at SXSW
The independent art and creative studio Tender Claws, co-led by Assistant Teaching Professor of Computational Media Samantha Gorman, will debut Face Jumping at the 2025 South by Southwest (SXSW) XR Experience Exhibition running March 9-11 in Austin, Texas.
- March 10, 2025
Biologist Erika Zavaleta receives Science Division’s Outstanding Faculty Award
The Science Division has announced that Erika Zavaleta, a professor in the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department, has won its 2023-24 Outstanding Faculty Award. The annual prize is the division's highest honor for faculty achievement, recognizing combined excellence in research, teaching, and service.
- March 06, 2025
Student-built app slashes weeks off brain mapping to speed up neuroscience research
UC Santa Cruz neuroscientists aiming to better understand how specific brain connectivity contributes to perception, thoughts, and behavior are leveraging artificial intelligence to enhance their study of brain function. By integrating AI, they are streamlining the process of aligning thin slices of mouse brain tissue with a reference atlas, helping to identify key details such as the brain region of origin more efficiently.
- March 05, 2025
Explaining how our biological clocks work and how to better regulate our circadian rhythms
As anticipation builds for the longer days that follow this weekend’s switch to daylight savings time, the moment seemed ideal to turn to one of the nation’s leading circadian-rhythms researchers, UC Santa Cruz’s Carrie Partch.
- March 05, 2025
AI chatbots perpetuate biases when performing empathy, study finds
A new study explores how GPT-4o, the latest model from OpenAI, evaluates and performs empathy compared to humans, and finds major gaps exist.
- March 03, 2025
Clinical pediatric cancer lab at UC Santa Cruz is cleared to accept and test patient samples
The UC Santa Cruz Colligan Clinical Diagnostic Laboratory has received its CLIA certificate of registration from the California Department of Public Health, which clears the way for it to begin accepting patient samples.
- February 26, 2025
Newest Genome Browser features highlight the power of generative AI and machine learning for biology
The UCSC Genome Browser has added two new datasets that leverage the power of generative AI and machine learning to interpret information about genetic variants and more rapidly assess which ones might be harmful to human health
- February 26, 2025
A legacy of hope and healing
Barrios Unidos Founder and UCSC alumnus Daniel “Nane” Alejandrez is a pillar of activism and champion of nonviolence in Santa Cruz County
- February 24, 2025
UC Santa Cruz astrophysicist explores the interconnectedness of art and science in 'Painting the Cosmos'
A new book by UC Santa Cruz astrophysicist and visual artist Nia Imara debuts tomorrow that explains the universe and traces how art has blended with science throughout human history.
- February 24, 2025
Commitment to the UC Santa Cruz community
I write today acknowledging the uncertainty and anxiety that many members of our community are experiencing from the federal actions over these past weeks. I share these feelings and I want to reaffirm our commitment to our mission.
- February 21, 2025
UC Santa Cruz students and SUBA partner to bring East Salinas businesses online
In East Salinas, where family-owned businesses are the backbone of the community, a collaboration is helping them build an online presence and reach more customers. Crown College’s GetVirtual program at UC Santa Cruz and the Salinas United Business Association (SUBA) have joined forces, with students leading the way.
- February 18, 2025
Cosmic radiation from supernova altered virus evolution in Africa, study proposes
A new study led by recent undergraduate student Caitlyn Nojiri and co-authored by astronomy and astrophysics professor Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz and postdoctoral fellow Noémie Globus examined iron isotopes to identify a 2.5 million-year-old supernova. The researchers connected this stellar explosion to a surge of radiation that pummeled Earth around the same time, and they assert that the blast was powerful enough to break the DNA of living creatures.
- February 13, 2025
Foraging seals enable scientists to measure fish abundance across the vast Pacific Ocean
A new study led by UC Santa Cruz marine biologist Roxanne Beltran to be published as the February 14 cover story for Science concludes that seals can essentially act as “smart sensors” for monitoring fish populations in the ocean’s eerily dim “twilight zone.”
- February 13, 2025
In Memoriam: Professor David Lee Cuthbert, Performance, Play and Design
David Lee Cuthbert, Professor of Performance, Play and Design (PPD), passed away unexpectedly on February 11, 2025. Cuthbert was a dedicated educator and designer, serving as part of the Theater Arts faculty for 25 years. His passing is a profound loss for the Arts Division and for UC Santa Cruz.
- February 10, 2025
Recent UCSC alumni take over the SF MOMA
Several University of California, Santa Cruz Arts and Engineering students and alumni worked together on two separate projects which are part of the same exhibition at the SFMOMA. Annalivia Martin-Straw (Porter ‘23, Art) worked with her collaborator to create an immersive racing game, which up to five visitors can play at a time.
- February 04, 2025
UC Santa Cruz scientists slither into the history books with first complete genome of a banana slug
Not only is the banana slug the endearing mascot for UC Santa Cruz — making the project fitting for campus researchers — but the slugs’ unique slime was a particularly challenging undertaking for UCSC’s experts in genomics.
- February 03, 2025
Resources for undocumented members of our campus community
We write today to reaffirm our support and care for undocumented members of the UC Santa Cruz community.
- January 31, 2025
New grant funds effort to uncover therapeutic targets for neuropsychiatric disorders
A $10.3 million grant from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), the state’s stem cell agency, will fund a multi-UC effort to better understand neuropsychiatric disorders.
- January 31, 2025
Explorer society honors Roxanne Beltran for advancing scientific field research, education equity
Roxanne Beltran, assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at UC Santa Cruz, is among 50 people from around the world being honored this year for “doing remarkable work to promote science and exploration.”
- January 30, 2025
Innovative techniques aim for climate-safe restoration of Ms. Blue
A new project is underway to give Ms. Blue another life, this time enabling her to teach the community about the power of climate-safe innovation
- January 28, 2025
UC Santa Cruz AgTech Alliance launches to support interdisciplinary collaboration
Building on the long history of innovation in agriculture at the campus, the AgTech Alliance will support research, education, events, and workforce development related to advancing agricultural technology in order to create more formalized opportunities for collaboration within the university and beyond.
- January 27, 2025
UC Santa Cruz Innovation Catalyst Grant program propels research into real-world solutions
UC Santa Cruz has announced the Innovation Catalyst Grant proof-of-concept program awardees, showcasing the campus’s commitment to fostering transformative research with significant societal benefits.
- January 24, 2025
Long read sequencing reveals more genetic information while cutting time and cost of rare disease diagnoses
A new study shows that long-read sequencing has the potential to improve the rate of diagnosis while reducing the time to diagnosis from years to days — in a single test and at a much lower cost.
- January 17, 2025
Hubble Telescope images combined into giant mosaic of neighboring Andromeda Galaxy
Astronomers are celebrating the completion of a 2.5-billion-pixel panoramic picture of the entire Andromeda Galaxy. The team includes several UC Santa Cruz researchers who made significant contributions to the enormous photomosaic that combines some 600 snapshots taken by the Hubble Space Telescope over more than a decade and 1,000 orbits.
- January 17, 2025
American Astronomical Society honors four UC Santa Cruz affiliates at national meeting
At this week's AAS national meeting, the society named UC Observatories Director Bruce Macintosh and two alumni, Laura Lopez and Mark Phillips, among the 24 new fellows chosen for 2025.
- January 17, 2025
Embedding equity in the financial sector
UC Santa Cruz alumna Alina I’vette Fernandez has built a career helping America’s largest banks operationalize their values and environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals. Her work helps C-suite leaders understand the implications of their decisions for both employees and the communities they serve.
- January 15, 2025
Coral-reef restoration can be cost-effective for saving lives, money
A new study co-led by the Center for Coastal Climate Resilience (CCCR) at UC Santa Cruz shows coral reef restoration in Florida and Puerto Rico could save thousands of lives and prevent hundreds of millions of dollars in damage and economic interruption each year.
- January 08, 2025
Basketball great, mental health champion to headline MLK Convocation
WNBA Hall of Famer Chamique Holdsclaw, an Olympic gold medalist and mental health advocate, will address the 41st annual Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Convocation on January 30.
- January 08, 2025
Researchers to develop technology for improving berry monitoring, harvesting, shipment
To investigate innovative methods to support the berry growing and harvesting process, UC Santa Cruz Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering Ricardo Sanfelice is launching a new agricultural technology project.
