UCSC in the News

November

  • Mercury News
    November 27, 2023 - Mercury News

    UC Santa Cruz researchers build AI to prevent drownings

    Professor of Computer Science Alex Pang's research on using AI to monitor beach conditions was featured in the Santa Cruz Sentinel and the Mercury News.  
  • Grist
    November 20, 2023 - Grist

    The UAW ratifies a contract — and labor’s road ahead in the EV transition

    Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies Mijin Cha told Grist that labor organizing efforts within the renewable energy transition must not be framed as obstacles to progress on climate change. “The greed of the fossil fuel industry is what’s stopping the energy transition, not the fact that people want to make a decent wage,” she said.  
  • Financial Express
    November 16, 2023 - Financial Express

    India and the APEC

    Nirvikar Singh, distinguished professor of economics at UC Santa Cruz, argues in an op-ed that, if India can obtain an APEC membership, it would help improve flows of knowledge, capital, and goods within the region through better coordination of policies.
  • The Mercury News
    November 14, 2023 - The Mercury News

    Predator protector

    Environmental Studies Professor Chris Wilmers was interviewed by The Mercury News for a story about mountain lion researchers. 
  • New Scientist
    November 13, 2023 - New Scientist

    Just leaving trees to grow could store a third of our carbon emissions

    Environmental Studies Professor Karen Holl urged caution in interpreting the findings of a new study by other researchers. Holl says the global analysis might miss complicated social and ecological dynamics that determine whether protection or restoration of forests is possible at a local level.
  • Los Angeles Times
    November 13, 2023 - Los Angeles Times

    ‘We’re not going to quit’: Why a California community is boycotting carrots

    Professor Emeritus of Agroecology Steve Gliessman spoke with the Los Angeles Times about water management issues that have led to a boycott of carrots in the Cuyama Valley.
  • The State Press
    November 09, 2023 - The State Press

    Panel discussing desalination in Mexico fails to include environmental impact, Mexican voices

    The State Press criticized the methods of an Arizona State University panel on desalination and pointed to UCSC Environmental Studies Professor Brent Haddad's work on the Salton Sea Long Term Planning Project as offering a better model.
  • Reuters
    November 15, 2023 - Reuters

    Scientists discern internal structure of mysterious dwarf planet Eris

    "We already knew that Eris is more rock-rich than Pluto, but what we didn't know was whether Eris had separated the rock from the ice," said University of California Santa Cruz planetary scientist Francis Nimmo, lead author of the study. Additional coverage in Voice of America and EarthSky.
  • Monterey Herald
    November 01, 2023 - Monterey Herald

    Monterey Bay Economic Partnership State of the Region to focus on key issues

    Monterey Herald covered the Monterey Bay Economic Partnership (MBEP) State of the Region event, where Chris Benner, director of the UCSC Institute for Social Transformation, gave a keynote speech sharing findings from a report he produced with MBEP on regional economic equity indicators.
  • KTVU
    November 14, 2023 - KTVU

    APEC University and SF startup CEO look at ways to help sustainability policies

    The APEC University Leaders Forum drew more than 130 university presidents, professors, researchers, and politicians from APEC's 21 member economies to San Francisco for a day of speeches and panel discussions on the topic "Investing in Tomorrow's Biodiversity." Eric Palkovacs, one of the forum organizers and a professor at UC Santa Cruz, says it was exciting to hear people discuss a wide range of environmental issues. Additional overage in AOL and CCTV.
  • Art Daily
    November 13, 2023 - Art Daily

    Smithsonian American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery acquire film installation by Isaac Julien

    The Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art Museum have jointly purchased the tour de force "Lessons of the Hour" (2019) by artist and filmmaker Sir Isaac Julien. Julien is the Distinguished Professor of the Arts at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
  • New York Times
    November 07, 2023 - New York Times

    Gazing Into the Past and Future at Historic Observatories

    The New York Times Travel section explored the history of Lick Observatory. UC Santa Cruz Staff Astronomer Elinor Gates said, "You might look at a galaxy and it’s 25 million light-years away. It’s taken 25 million years for that light to get from that galaxy, come through the telescope to the eyepiece, to your eyeball. It’s a different experience than just looking at a pretty picture on a computer screen or in a book.”
  • Lookout Santa Cruz
    November 02, 2023 - Lookout Santa Cruz

    Ms. Blue is coming down — what happened to Seymour Center's iconic whale skeleton and what's next

    After taking a beating from the elements at UC Santa Cruz’s coastal campus, the structure supporting the blue whale skeleton affectionately known as Ms. Blue has been deemed unsafe. But fear not, says Seymour Marine Discovery Center director Jonathan Hicken — the bones are staying, and the center wants input on the next chapter of the whale’s legacy.
  • New York Times
    November 05, 2023 - New York Times

    A Guide to the James Webb Telescope's View of the Universe

    "We live in this beautiful galaxy, the Milky Way," says Brant Robertson, professor of astronomy and astrophysics at the University of California, Santa Cruz. "We can’t see the Milky Way from inside, and we can’t fly out and see it. But we know that our galaxy developed from other galaxies."
  • Time Magazine
    November 02, 2023 - Time Magazine

    A Blueprint From History for Tackling Homelessness

    Jonathan van Harmelen, a Ph.D. candidate in history at UC Santa Cruz, penned this opinion piece arguing that one of the most pressing issues facing the United States during the 2020s is the issue of homelessness. Based on his academic research, he points out that some of the implemented solutions for homelessness build on the same ideas launched nearly a century ago during the New Deal when the Farm Security Administration sought to tackle acute homelessness during the Great Depression.
  • Quanta Magazine
    November 02, 2023 - Quanta Magazine

    Icy Oceans Exist on Far-Off Moons. Why Aren’t They Frozen Solid?

    For most of humankind’s existence, Earth was the only known ocean-draped world, seemingly unlike any other cosmic isle. But in 1979, NASA’s two Voyager spacecraft flew by Jupiter. Its moon Europa, a frozen realm, was decorated with grooves and fractures — hints that there might be something dynamic beneath its surface. “After Voyager, people suspected that Europa was weird and might have an ocean,” said Francis Nimmo, a planetary scientist at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
  • Scientific American
    November 07, 2023 - Scientific American

    Detecting Cancer Early by Measuring RNA in the Blood

    Scientific American features Assistant Professor of Biomolecular Engineering Daniel Kim's research on using RNA in the bloodstream for an early, non-invasive cancer detection test.

October

  • NPR
    November 22, 2023 - NPR

    NPR Books We Love: We're Safe When We're Alone by Nghiem Tran

    NPR featured second-year Creative Writing/Critical Ph.D. candidate Nghiem Tran's novel We’re Safe When We’re Alone (Coffee House Books) in its 2023 "best of the year" list, describing this work of fiction as "hypnotic" and "richly allusive."
  • Marketplace
    October 30, 2023 - Marketplace

    Your scam stories

    Additional coverage by Marketplace of telemarketing scams that target immigrants included insights from Assistant Professor of Sociology Juan Manuel Pedroza.
  • The Guardian
    October 25, 2023 - The Guardian

    Carrots farms v valley: the battle over a water-depleted California region

    Professor Emeritus of Agroecology Stephen Gliessman spoke with The Guardian about the risks of overdrawing water in the aquifers of California's Central Valley. 
  • The Guardian
    October 25, 2023 - The Guardian

    Food for thought: how TV cooking shows influence the way we eat

    Associate Professor of Sociology Alison Alkon spoke to The Guardian about how cooking shows have the potential to help people expand their culinary horizons.
  • Washington Post
    October 25, 2023 - Washington Post

    Review | Five great sci-fi and fantasy novels to read now

    The latest novel from micha cárdenas, the director of the Critical Realities Studio and assistant professor of art and design at UC Santa Cruz, was reviewed in the Washington Post. The reviewer notes that the novel, Atoms Never Touch, conjures an immersive dystopia, full of facial recognition, augmented-reality lenses and a brutal security state — while still showing the power of community and resistance.
  • Popular Science
    October 24, 2023 - Popular Science

    Is de-extinction only a pipette dream? This startup has a big, expensive plan to find out.

    Beth Shapiro, who co-directs the Paleogenomics Lab at the University of California, Santa Cruz and has studied the flightless bird’s genome for almost two decades, advises Colossal’s avian genomics work.
  • Miami Herald
    October 24, 2023 - Miami Herald

    Can UM-led team create a ‘perfect’ reef? Why the U.S. military is banking on it

    The nation’s military has been working on a new weapon: Creating a ‘perfect,’ self-healing coral reef that can withstand disease, warming temperatures and sea rise.The reef design is made up of three stacked layers. The bottom layer is a concrete chamber called the “sea hive” after its honeycomb shape. As waves hit the bottom row of sea hives, turbulence is reduced from underneath. “We are trying everything we can do to move the water over, under and through,” said Borja G. Reguero, a researcher at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
  • Scientific American
    October 25, 2023 - Scientific American

    Depleted Groundwater Could Be Refilled by Borrowing a Trick from Solar Power

    Researchers measure the water that flows off the hillside and into the basin. To calculate how much water seeps underground, they use stream and pressure gauges, as well as thermal probes inserted into the shallow soil at the bottom of the basin. “The infiltrating water carries heat,” says Andrew Fisher, a hydrogeologist at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and co-founder of the project. “By measuring the amount of heat carried downward, we can determine the flow rate.”
  • Wired
    October 16, 2023 - Wired

    None of Your Photos Are Real

    The aesthetics of online socializing reaffirmed old racial imbalances around beauty but also opened up a space for women of color, especially, to have representational agency, says Derek Conrad Murray, a professor at UC Santa Cruz who specializes in the history of art and visual culture. “Self-representation and social media enabled many women of color to challenge culture industries that prop up beauty standards that have traditionally ignored and demeaned them,” he says.
  • CBS Bay Area
    October 12, 2023 - CBS Bay Area

    Researchers fortifying California salt marshes from effects of climate change

    Between the land and the sea, salt marshes are the true guardians of our coastline. Evolutionary biologist Kerstin Wasson runs the Wasson Research Lab at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and is a member of the team behind the project. "What we've done here at Hester Marsh is build tomorrow's marsh," Wasson said. Additional coverage in KION.
  • AP News
    October 13, 2023 - AP News

    Factory fishing in Antarctica for krill targets the cornerstone of a fragile ecosystem

    While the end of commercial whaling has allowed populations to rebound, a new study by the University of California, Santa Cruz found that pregnancy rates among humpback whales in Antarctica have been falling sharply — possibly due to a lack of krill, their main prey. Chinstrap penguins and fur seals face similar stresses. “The marine foragers are there for the same reason the boats are: because there’s lots of krill,” said Ari Friedlaender, a University of California, Santa Cruz biologist who has spent 25 years researching whales in Antarctica. AP News wrote an additional story on this topic, highlighting the takeaways of this report.
  • Marketplace
    October 20, 2023 - Marketplace

    Inside the world of immigration scams

    Assistant Professor of Sociology Juan Manuel Pedroza joined Marketplace to discuss one of his areas of research: scams that target immigrants. Pedroza described the problem and some interventions that might help bring justice. 
  • E&E News
    October 18, 2023 - E&E News

    Why the UAW wants inside the battery factory

    Sociology and Environmental Studies Professor Chris Benner told E&E News that the move to electric vehicles "could be a major turning point in labor,” if current organizing efforts are successful in securing favorable wages and working conditions.  
  • Financial Express
    October 17, 2023 - Financial Express

    China now has a huge debt overhang

    Distinguished Professor of Economics Nirvikar Singh wrote an op-ed arguing that money in China was invested in ways that do not generate the funds to pay back the lenders or investors.
  • Santa Cruz Sentinel
    October 14, 2023 - Santa Cruz Sentinel

    Conference examines affordable housing crisis

    The Santa Cruz Sentinel covered a conference on the local housing crisis, where Professor of Sociology Miriam Greenberg presented about how future development must take care not displace current low-income residents. Santa Cruz Local also covered this conference.  
  • The Hill
    October 13, 2023 - The Hill

    GM concession bolsters EV proponents amid auto strike

    Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies Mijin Cha spoke with The Hill about the UAW union's efforts to unionize battery plants. “[F]ighting for EV battery manufacturing to be union is really important to show that green jobs can be good jobs and that there is no conflict between addressing climate change and supporting workers,” she said.  
  • Santa Cruz Sentinel
    October 16, 2023 - Santa Cruz Sentinel

    UC Santa Cruz Center for Monster Studies holds Monsters Ball Costume Party

    The Santa Cruz Sentinel ran a brief story and photo highlighting the UC Santa Cruz Center for Monster Studies and the Monsters Ball Costume Party that was held at the Institute of the Arts and Sciences as part of the 2023 Festival of Monsters.
  • CNN
    October 13, 2020 - CNN

    Japanese American prisoner art depicts life in WWII detention camps

    A CNN.com feature story about the art of Japanese-American internees during World War II included an interview with Alice Yang, chair of the history department at the University of California Santa Cruz, who has extensively researched the legacy of Japanese American detention and the subsequent struggle for reparations.
  • Quanta
    October 10, 2023 - Quanta

    In Our Cellular Clocks, She’s Found a Lifetime of Discoveries

    “We are linked to this day in ways that I think people just push off,” says UC Santa Cruz biochemist Carrie Partch. If we understand the clock better, she has argued, we might be able to reset it. With that information, we might shape the treatment of diseases, from diabetes to cancer.
  • BBC
    October 05, 2023 - BBC

    Asteroid 16 Psyche - facts and stats about the metal-rich spacerock

    In 2019, Francis Nimmo and Jacob Abrahams of the University of California Santa Cruz proposed the theory of (ancient) ferro-volcanism. This is a process you might expect when a newly formed, molten body is cooling down from the outside in.
  • Forbes
    October 06, 2023 - Forbes

    Nearby Exoplanets Could Harbor 8-Billion-Year-Old Microbial Life

    In his new paper, Piero Madau, a distinguished professor of astrophysics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, puts forth a practical roadmap to statistically frame how near we can expect to find microbial life on earthlike planets circling G and K spectral type stars. Additional coverage in Earth.
  • Inside Higher Education
    October 11, 2023 - Inside Higher Education

    New on the Job: Jody Greene, University of California, Santa Cruz

    As the inaugural associate campus provost for academic success, Jody Greene is responsible for faculty development, support and retention to promote student success in the classroom and beyond. Greene was the subject of a feature story in Inside Higher Education this week. 
  • Grist
    October 11, 2023 - Grist

    Cooking oil has a deforestation problem. A startup says it has a solution.

    Professor Julie Guthman, a social scientist who studies food systems, spoke with Grist about the challenges of assessing sustainability claims in new food products that don't disclose full information about their supply chains and processes. 
  • Good Times
    October 05, 2023 - Good Times

    “Voices Of Pajaro” Brings South County Reality To UCSC

    Good Times magazine covered an event organized by UCSC's Center for Reimagining Leadership that shared stories and experiences from the Pajaro levee breach and encouraged students to get involved. Astronomy and Astrophysics Professor Enrico Ramirez‑Ruiz is the center's director, and Environmental Studies Professor Sikina Jinnah is associate director.
  • KTVZ
    October 04, 2023 - KTVZ

    How farmers used California's floods to revive underground aquifers

    Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies Hannah Waterhouse discussed aquifer water management with KTVZ News Channel 21. 
  • Santa Cruz Sentinel
    October 07, 2023 - Santa Cruz Sentinel

    UC Santa Cruz climate justice forum discusses Pajaro Valley flood, encourages student action

    The Santa Cruz Sentinel covered an event organized by UCSC's new Center for Reimagining Leadership that gathered community leaders to teach students about injustices in the response to the Pajaro levee breach and what they can do to get involved in the community.
  • Forbes
    October 10, 2022 - Forbes

    Get Your Monster On In Time For Halloween At University Of California, Santa Cruz

    Forbes Magazine ran a detailed feature story about UC Santa Cruz's Festival Of Monsters, which kicks off on Friday the 13th this month. The magazine described UCSC's Center for Monster Studies as "a scholarly center devoted to investigating the many definitions of monsters and monstrosity throughout history and culture."
  • Ms. Magazine
    October 03, 2023 - Ms. Magazine

    Teaching Patriarchy Post-'Barbie'

    Lindsay Knisely, a lecturer in the Humanities Division, penned this opinion piece. She notes that this summer’s Barbie film has moviegoers around the world talking about the patriarchy. Now that we have the language to describe our predicament, it’s critically important to keep talking about the patriarchy, and to keep going down the path that Barbie takes us on to investigate the way our daily lives are impacted by patriarchal constructs.
  • Axios
    October 02, 2023 - Axios

    AI: Trust & Responsibility

    Last week, Axios hosted an Expert Voices roundtable discussion in San Francisco featuring local leaders across government, the tech industry and AI startups. One of the featured experts was Linda MacDonald Glenn, founding director & faculty, UC Santa Cruz Center for Applied Values and Ethics in Advanced Technologies.
  • The Scientist
    September 26, 2023 - The Scientist

    Smart Gateways into the Lab of the Future

    Professor of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology Sofie Salama and Distinguished Professor of Biomolecular Engineering David Haussler spoke about the smart technology behind growing brain organoids in their Braingeneers lab on the Scientist Speaks podcast.

September

  • The Fish Site
    September 29, 2023 - The Fish Site

    Could power plants fuel alternative aquafeeds?

    Aquaculture news organization The Fish Site covered new research by Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies Pallab Sarker that will study whether microalgae grown using power plant emissions could be an effective ingredient in feed for trout. Additional coverage in All About Feed.
  • Financial Express
    September 26, 2023 - Financial Express

    Moonshots and mind games

    Distinguished Professor of Economics Nirvikar Singh wrote an op-ed for Financial Express about how India can achieve world-class excellence with its domestic institutions and resources.
  • GBH
    September 25, 2023 - GBH

    Why people leave prison 'more broken' than when they entered

    GBH interviewed distinguished Professor of Psychology Craig Haney about the challenges that formerly incarcerated people experience when reentering society. 
  • The Boston Globe
    September 22, 2023 - The Boston Globe

    Democrats flock to picket lines where workers worry about their electric vehicle push

    Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies Mijin Cha spoke with The Boston Globe about how electric vehicles relate to the United Auto Workers strike. “It’s really important that we don’t say it’s workers versus the environment,” she said. “They’re not against an electric vehicle transition; they just don’t want to be left behind.”
  • Los Angeles Times
    September 29, 2023 - Los Angeles Times

    As heat waves warm the Pacific Ocean, effects on marine life remain murky

    Heather Welch, a marine spatial ecologist at UC Santa Cruz, and other researchers have created statistical models designed to predict where animals will go when things heat up. “So one of the tricky things with heat wave impacts is you have to be lucky and actually have direct observations during the events,” she said. 
  • Financial Times
    September 26, 2023 - Financial Times

    Joe Biden and Donald Trump plan rival Michigan trips in scrap for union votes

    Labour historian Dana Frank, a professor emerita at University of California, Santa Cruz, said it was significant that Biden had intervened in this dispute, particularly given he stayed neutral in strikes by writers and actors and also undercut a planned strike by railway workers last year. "He didn’t choose to intervene in any of the Los Angeles strikes, which he could have, and he chose to throw the [railway workers] to the wolves," she said. "His hand is being forced by Trump, and Trump’s ability to weasel his way into the mind of white, working-class men in the Midwest."
  • The Hill
    September 22, 2023 - The Hill

    Six months later, our call to slow AI development is more crucial than ever

    Anthony Aguirre, the executive director and secretary of the board at the Future of Life Institute and the Faggin Presidential Professor for the Physics of Information at the University of California, Santa Cruz, penned this op-ed warning of the dangers of unchecked artificial intelligence.
  • San Francisco Chronicle
    September 19, 2023 - San Francisco Chronicle

    Review: In-depth look at California's rising sea levels finds grim threats and glimmers of hope

    The author of this book speaks with UC Santa Cruz’s Gary Griggs, who laments that much of the problem is that in California, “everybody wants to live on the sand.”
  • Voice of America
    September 18, 2023 - Voice of America

    In Costa Rica, Natural Farms Provide Refuge for Birds

    Natalia Ocampo-Penuela is a University of California, Santa Cruz environmental scientist who was not involved in the study. She said the findings may seem to make sense without research. But she added that it is very rare to have detailed data over a long time from tropical areas to show that diversified farming can support some forest bird populations.
  • Ars Technica
    September 14, 2023 - Ars Technica

    Autopsy of a star reveals what was eviscerated by a monster black hole

    “ASASSN-14li is exciting because one of the hardest things with tidal disruptions is being able to measure the mass of the unlucky star, as we have done here,” said astrophysicist Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz of UC Santa Cruz, one of the authors of the study.
  • Essence
    September 07, 2023 - Essence

    'Creating Characters That Look Like Us': The Video Game Company Bringing Type 4 Hair Into Gaming

    Since they were invented, video games have received constant upgrades, be it in graphics, new worlds, or expanded options for play. But one thing has been largely missing: “[o]ptions are still pretty limited for creating characters of color, particularly for creating Black characters. And a huge component is a lack of Black hairstyles and textures,” gaming news site Polygon observes. A.M. Darke, Assistant Professor, UC Santa Cruz, creator of the Open Source Afro Hair Library (OSAHL), which has been under development since pre-2020, collaborates on efforts to bring attention to the problem.
  • Los Angeles Times
    September 08, 2023 - Los Angeles Times

    Opinion: Oceans are heating up. Who will protect the turtles, whales and fish crossing borders into cooler waters?

    Heather Welch, a marine spatial ecologist at UC Santa Cruz who develops climate-ready tools to manage biodiversity and fisheries, penned this op-ed highlighting the dangers and complexities of marine heatwaves.
  • Mercury News
    September 10, 2023 - Mercury News

    $7 million project begins to rebuild historic Northern California wharf wrecked in huge winter storms

    It was arguably the most dramatic image from the powerful storms that battered Northern California’s coastline in January: The Capitola Wharf, an 855-foot-long landmark that dates back to 1857, torn in half by pounding waves. “Maybe it will do fine for 10 or 20 or 30 years,” said Gary Griggs, a professor of Earth sciences at UC Santa Cruz. “But if we have another big winter this year all bets are off.”
  • New York Times
    September 04, 2023 - New York Times

    Architecture's Second Looks, and Second Acts

    Kresge College is included in this list of buildings, sites, streets, design movements and architects that have received updates this year. The 1973 U.C. Santa Cruz dormitory complex by the postmodernist architects Charles Moore and William Turnbull Jr. and the landscape architect Dan Kiley — a self-styled Mediterranean village tucked in a redwood grove — has received an update set to welcome students this month, with final phases finished later in the academic year.
  • USA Today
    September 05, 2023 - USA Today

    New effort aims to revamp calculus to keep students in science, technology, engineering fields

    Math professor Martin Weissman is rethinking how his university teaches calculus. Over the summer, the professor from the University of California at Santa Cruz, spent a week at Harvard to learn how to redesign the mathematics for life sciences courses his institution offers. Called Math 11 A and B, these classes, which students take as freshmen and sophomores, constitute a “leaky pipeline,” Weissman said.
  • Newsweek
    September 05, 2023 - Newsweek

    Here's Which Sea Animals Are Hurt Most by the U.S. Heatwaves

    Heatwaves can have a devastating impact on some marine predators such as sharks but other species can adapt, scientists have discovered. Heather Welch, associate specialist with the Institute of Marine Sciences, noted that, "instead of being a story about winners and losers, this is a story of how variable marine heatwave impacts can be. To understand the full scope of impacts, we need to move beyond single-species, single-heatwave case-studies towards more holistic ecosystem-based investigations."
  • SPACE.com
    September 05, 2023 - SPACE.com

    Star blows giant exoplanet's atmosphere away, leaving massive tail in its wake

    Astronomers have monitored the trailing gas tail of HAT-P-32 b created from helium flowing from its atmosphere with telescopes from Earth. "We have monitored this planet and the host star with long time series spectroscopy, observations made of the star and planet over a couple of nights," research lead author and University of California Santa Cruz, Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics postdoctoral fellow Zhoujian Zhang said. "And what we found is there's a gigantic helium gas tail that is associated with the planet. The tail is large — about 53 times the planet's radius — formed by gas that's escaping from the planet." Additional coverage in Cosmos Magazine.
  • APNews
    September 04, 2023 - APNews

    Farms with natural landscape features provide sanctuary for some Costa Rica rainforest birds

    Small farms with natural landscape features such as shade trees, hedgerows and tracts of intact forest provide a refuge for some tropical bird populations, according to an 18-year study in Costa Rica. The findings may seem intuitive, but Natalia Ocampo-Penuela, a University of California, Santa Cruz conservation ecologist not involved in the study, said it’s extremely rare to have detailed long-term data from tropical regions to show that varied farming landscapes can sustain some forest bird populations. “With 18 years of data, you can show the species is persisting in that area, not simply passing by,” she said.
  • Inside Higher Ed
    September 21, 2023 - Inside Higher Ed

    Barriers to Tenure and Promotion Persist for Psychology Faculty of Color

    Inside Higher Ed interviewed Psychology Professor Margarita Azmitia about a new report from a committee she co-chaired about barriers to advancement for faculty of color in psychology.
  • Grist
    September 18, 2023 - Grist

    How the shift to electric vehicles is fueling the UAW strike

    Grist interviewed Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies J. Mijin Cha about how working conditions at EV battery factories relate to the current United Auto Workers strike. 
  • VoxDev
    September 06, 2023 - VoxDev

    Targeting health incentives in India

    Assistant Professor of Economics Ariel Zucker joined VoxDev to discuss her research on personalized incentives for exercise among 6,800 adults with diabetes and hypertension in urban India.
  • The New York Times
    September 15, 2023 - The New York Times

    U.A.W. starts strike small, but repercussions could prove far-reaching

    The New York Times interviewed Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies J. Mijin Cha for a story about strikes by the United Auto Workers union and how they relate to electric vehicle production. Additional coverage in In These Times presents a counterpoint to mainstream media narratives around the strikes. 
  • WIRED
    September 13, 2023 - WIRED

    Auto workers prepare to strike for a place in the EV future

    Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies J. Mijin Cha spoke with WIRED about the importance of supporting equity for workers in the process of transitioning away from fossil fuels. Additional coverage in E&E News.
  • WBUR News
    September 15, 2023 - WBUR News

    The expanding universe of Lofi Girl

    WBUR News, Boston's NPR station, spoke with UCSC Ph.D. student of Computational Media Kevin Weatherwax about his research on and personal relationship with Lo-Fi music. 
  • Chemical and Engineering News
    September 18, 2023 - Chemical and Engineering News

    The tricky ethics of AI in the lab

    Assistant Professor of Computer Science and Engineering Leilani Gilpin was quoted in a C&EN story on the pace of development in the field of generative AI and the ethical challenges at play. 
  • NIH Director's Blog
    September 12, 2023 - NIH Director's Blog

    New Approach to ‘Liquid Biopsy’ Relies on Repetitive RNA in the Bloodstream

    The National Insitutes of Health Director's Blog features Assistant Professor of Biomolecular Engineering Daniel Kim's research into liquid biopsy technology for cancer early detection.
  • The Mercury News
    September 10, 2023 - The Mercury News

    This Monterey Bay deep-sea creature is the ‘sister’ that took its own evolutionary path

    The Mercury News reports on research into the earliest moments in animal evolution, quoting UCSC adjunct professor of ecology and evolutionary biology Steven Haddock and citing the work of former biomolecular engineering postdoc  and project leader Darrin Schultz.
  • Science
    September 06, 2023 - Science

    Humans aren’t the only fat primate

    Professor Emerita of Anthropology Adrienne Zihlman commented about a study featured in Science Magazine that offers new insights on how and why different species of primates can become overweight.
  • The New York Times
    September 04, 2023 - The New York Times

    A Strong Job Market Doesn’t Mean the Economy Is Recession-Proof

    An opinion column in The New York Times discusses research by Associate Professor of Economics Pascal Michaillat on how to measure the tightness of the labor market and assess its health and efficiency. 
  • The Washington Post
    September 04, 2023 - The Washington Post

    Farms with natural landscape features provide sanctuary for some Costa Rica rainforest birds

    Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies Natalia Ocampo-Peñuela commented on new research featured in The Washington Post that shows how agricultural areas with natural features can help to sustain birds.  

August

July