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Research AT OUR CORE
At UC Merced, some of the world’s foremost scholars team up with students to focus on creating new products and technologies
that will improve our daily lives. They collaborate to solve some of society’s most pressing issues, from disease to global warming,
and everything in between. As an undergraduate, you will have opportunities to take your learning beyond the classroom out into the
field or in a laboratory.
Across All Disciplines
Some examples of recent research conducted by faculty and students:
Research Facilities
> Imaging and Microscopy Facility (IMF)
> Light Microscopy and Crystallography Modeling Center
> Mechanical Test Laboratory
> Merced Nanomaterials Center for Energy and
Sensing (MACES)
> Sierra Nevada Research Institute (SNRI) Environmental
Analytical Laboratory
> Stable Isotope Laboratory
> Stem Cell Instrumentation Foundry (SCIF)
> UC Natural Reserve System
Institutes and Centers
> Center for Computational Biology
> Center of Excellence for the Study of Health Disparities
> Center for Information Technology Research in the
Interest of Society (CITRIS)
> Health Sciences Research Institute
> Resource Center for Community Engaged
Scholarship (ReCCES)
> Sierra Nevada Research Institute (SNRI)
> Small Business Development Center (SBDC)
> University of California Advanced Solar Technologies
Institute (UC Solar)
The Undergraduate Research Opportunities Center (UROC) encourages
and facilitates faculty-mentored undergraduate research projects and creative
activities. The UROC website hosts a database of research opportunities, and
workshops and events are ongoing.
»»Professor and biologist Miriam Barlow helped develop a
method to restore the efficacy of antibiotics and help doc-
tors deal with resistant bacteria.
»»Through the World Heritage program in the School of Social
Sciences, Humanities and Arts, students and faculty involved
in a project titled “Bodie Digital Community - Connect with
Your Past” designed and developed an augmented reality
mobile app that brought to life the town of Bodie, a California
State Historic Park that is at risk of being lost due to wildfires
and lack of funding for conservation.
»»Adjunct Professor Gabriela Loots is studying why certain can-
cers prefer to metastasize to bone. Loots is trying to identify,
characterize and potentially exploit the information pack-
aged in different types of extracellular vesicles to determine
if they can distinguish aggressive forms of breast cancer that
rapidly spread in the body.
»»Three students were selected as fellows for the Global Food
Initiative to work on projects including increasing food re-
covery, advancing food literacy and expanding experiential
learning opportunities in food systems.
»»Professor Danielle Edwards was part of a teamof researchers
that made a discovery about two groups of giant Galapagos
tortoises — they are actually two different species.
»»Undergraduate mechanical engineering student Rebecca
Quinte worked with Professor Andrea Joyce on a project
that aims to shoo away leaf-footed bugs, insects that feed
on the seeds of crops, research that could end up benefitting
farmers in the Central Valley and beyond.
UC Merced was ranked in 2016 among
107 top universities in the country
as a “higher research” institution
by the Carnegie Foundation
I WILLBUILD THE FUTURE
8 9 2017-18 First Year Viewbook UC Merced Office of Admissions