Science
-
Pluto’s hazy skies are making the dwarf planet even colder, James Webb Space Telescope finds
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has discovered that a hazy sky over frozen Pluto is helping to cool the dwarf planet’s atmosphere. The discovery of the haze was predicted back in 2017 by planetary scientist Xi Zhang of the University of California, Santa Cruz, to explain why Pluto’s thin atmosphere is so leaky. Additional…
-
A fog-free San Francisco? Scientists ponder California’s climate future
Peter Weiss, a faculty researcher and lecturer at the UC-Santa Cruz department of environmental sciences, said that despite a growing narrative of waning fog along the California coast, the data to support it is “very spotty,’’ with few academic studies in the last decade. Also in the Salinas California.
-
Wake Up, America. Cutting Health and Science Funding Costs Lives
Nobel Laureate and UC Santa Cruz Distinguished Professor Carol Greider coauthored an opinion article explaining why billions of dollars in NIH funding is worth the price. The article calls on senators to demand that the Trump administration reverse devastating cuts to the NIH that will cause unnecessary deaths, cost billions in economic activity, and have…
-
Webb confirms Pluto’s atmosphere cools with haze
After New Horizons’ Pluto flyby, UC Santa Cruz‘s Xi Zhang proposed in 2017 that Pluto’s atmosphere is dominated by haze particles, making it unlike any other in the solar system. He suggested that these particles heat up and cool down, controlling Pluto’s entire energy balance.
-
Genome BC backs DNA-based environmental monitoring in rural and Indigenous communities
This project, led by Caren Helbing (University of Victoria) and Rachel Meyer (University of California Santa Cruz), adapts a U.S.-based tool for Canadian use. The platform allows users to view and share biodiversity data from eDNA samples. It builds on previous work from the iTrackDNA initiative, which helped establish Canada’s national eDNA standards.
-
This seagull took an 80-mile truck ride twice to find food
“It was surprising and comical, so much so that we wanted to look closely into this one individual’s behavior to understand how this happened,” Megan Cimino, a researcher at the Institute of Marine Sciences at UC Santa Cruz and lead author of the study, told Axios. Additional coverage by SFGate and Smithsonian Magazine.
-
New exhibit combines art and climate science, Monterey courts international visitors
The Institute of Arts and Sciences at UC Santa Cruz recently opened a new exhibition, Weather and the Whale. It uses art as a medium to explain how weather patterns affect the aquatic mammals and the environment.
-
‘Science is a human endeavor’: astrophysicist uses art to connect Black and brown kids to the STEM fields
So begins a chapter about our closest star in Painting the Cosmos, a recent book by UC Santa Cruz astrophysicist Dr. Nia Imara. The book blends science and art in an ode to the diversity of the cosmos. While touching on astronomical tidbits, such as the fact that scientists measure the rate of the sun’s…
-
Trump’s new ‘gold standard’ rule will destroy American science as we know it
UC Santa Cruz Nobel laureate Carol Grieder co-authored this opinion piece stating that the administration’s new executive order will allow political appointees to undermine research they oppose, paving the way for state-controlled science.
-
Singularities in Space-Time Prove Hard to Kill
The world of Bousso’s new theorem still departs from our universe in notable ways. For mathematical convenience, he assumed that there’s an unlimited variety of particles — an unrealistic assumption that makes some physicists wonder whether this third layer matches reality (with its 17 or so known particles) any better than the second layer does.…
-
San Jose City Hall falcon brings rat back to nest, raising poisoning fears for chicks
“They were fighting over it,” said Zeka Glucs, director of the UC Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group, which works with the City of San Jose to monitor and study the City Hall falcons. But peregrines rarely catch rats, raising fears that the rodent had been poisoned and the young falcons may have ingested toxic…
-
Santa Cruz wharf collapse: Plans take shape for rebuilding as summer beach season begins
The wharf has more than 4,400 wooden pilings, made of Douglas Fir. They are pounded roughly 20 feet into the ocean bottom, and city crews replace several dozen each year. But piers come and go. There have been five others back to the mid-1800s in that area, noted Gary Griggs, a distinguished professor of Earth…