Latest News

• share
• favorite_border

Irvine, Calif., Jan. 5, 2017 – Last year, as media coverage of Flint, Michigan’s lead-in-water crisis developed, a cautionary tale emerged about the repercussions of cost-saving infrastructure changes and lax governmental oversight, and their disproportionate effect on impoverished communities.It began in April 2014 when the city of Flint canceled its contract with the Detroit Water and Sewage Department and began buying water from the Flint River as an interim supply, with the ultimate goal of sourcing water from Lake Huron through the Karegnondi Water Authority.

• share
• favorite_border

Irvine, Calif., January 5, 2017– Climate researchers and weather forecasters get their rain data from a network of precipitation-sensing satellites that orbit Earth. iRain, a new mobile phone app developed by engineers at the University of California, Irvine puts the same precision rainfall information into the pockets of the public.

• share
• favorite_border

Using a novel approach involving a key enzyme that helps regulate global nitrogen, University of California, Irvine molecular biologists have discovered an effective way to convert carbon dioxide (CO2) to carbon monoxide (CO) that can be adapted for commercial applications like biofuel synthesis.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

Irvine, Calif., Dec. 13, 2016 — With the support of a major National Institutes of Health initiative, University of California, Irvine pediatric researchers will lead an effort to study the molecular changes that occur in the body in response to exercise training in order to advance our understanding of how physical activity improves and preserves health in children.

• share
• favorite_border

Irvine, Calif., Dec. 12, 2016 — Building upon its strengths and reputation in critical theory and Korean studies, the University of California, Irvine is launching a Center for Critical Korean Studies. Funded by a 1 billion-won grant (about $850,000) from the Academy of Korean Studies and led by principal investigator Kyung Hyun Kim, UCI professor of East Asian languages & literatures, the unit will be administered by UCI’s Humanities Commons.

• share
• favorite_border

Irvine, Calif., Dec. 6, 2016 — University of California, Irvine engineers have successfully implemented the first power-to-gas hydrogen pipeline injection project in the United States, demonstrating the use of excess clean electricity that would otherwise go to waste.P2G is a technique for converting surplus sustainable energy from solar panels or wind farms into hydrogen, which can be blended with natural gas and utilized in everything from home appliances to power plants.

• share
• favorite_border

Even if aliens had human-like eyes or ears, they wouldn’t interpret images and sounds the same way we do.

• share
• favorite_border

Nine University of California, Irvine researchers in areas ranging from anthropology and psychology to computer science and biology have been named fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the world’s largest general scientific society.

• share
• favorite_border

Cement manufacturing is among the most carbon-intensive industrial processes, but an international team of researchers has found that over time, the widely used building material reabsorbs much of the CO2 emitted when it was made.

• share
• favorite_border

– Elizabeth Loftus, Distinguished Professor of psychology & social behavior and criminology, law & society at the University of California, Irvine, was awarded the international John Maddox Prize for Standing up for Science today in London. Best known for her groundbreaking work on the “misinformation effect” – in which the memories of eyewitnesses are altered by exposure to incorrect information about events – she was also honored for her pioneering research on the creation and nature of false memories.

• share
• favorite_border

University of California, Irvine health policy researchers have been awarded $1.2 million by the California Initiative to Advance Precision Medicine to develop more effective ways for prostate cancer patients and their physicians to customize treatment.

• share
• favorite_border

University of California, Irvine and MIT researchers have developed a new strategy to immunize against microbes that invade the gastrointestinal tract, including Salmonella, which causes more foodborne illness in the United States than any other bacteria.

• share
• favorite_border

Few treatments exist for bacteria-caused intestinal inflammation that leads to diarrhea, fever and abdominal cramps. But University of California, Irvine microbiologists have demonstrated a new approach that may lead to more effective remedies.

• share
• favorite_border

Irvine, Calif., Nov. 2, 2016 – Employing a novel sensor made of graphene – a one-atom-thin layer of carbon – University of California, Irvine researchers have gained new insight into the process of programmed cell death in mitochondria, possibly opening the door to new ways of forcing cancer cells to self-destruct. They also hit a scientific jackpot of sorts by finding that an accepted paradigm of how cells create energy is only half-right.

• share
• favorite_border

Irvine, Calif., Nov. 2, 2016 – Shane Ardo, assistant professor of chemistry at the University of California, Irvine, has been named a Moore Inventor Fellow by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and will receive $825,000 over three years to fund the development of solar-powered desalination technologies to help solve water scarcity problems for nearly a billion people worldwide.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers with the UCI Susan Samueli Center for Integrative Medicine have found that regular electroacupunture treatment can lower hypertension by increasing the release of a kind of opioid in the brainstem region that controls blood pressure.

• share
• favorite_border

Two new studies by researchers at the University of California, Irvine and NASA have found the fastest ongoing rates of glacier retreat ever observed in West Antarctica and offer an unprecedented look at ice melting on the floating undersides of glaciers. The results highlight how the interaction between ocean conditions and the bedrock beneath a glacier can influence the frozen mass, helping scientists better predict future Antarctica ice loss and global sea level rise.

• share
• favorite_border

Irvine, Calif., Oct. 18, 2016 – If you type on your desktop or laptop computer’s keyboard while participating in a Skype call, you could be vulnerable to electronic eavesdropping, according to researchers at the University of California, Irvine and in Italy.

• share
• favorite_border

Children who have been in the U.S. foster care system are at a significantly higher risk of mental and physical health problems – ranging from learning disabilities, developmental delays and depression to behavioral issues, asthma and obesity – than children who haven’t been in foster care, according to a University of California, Irvine sociologist.

• share
• favorite_border

Irvine, Calif., Oct. 13, 2016 — University of California, Irvine epidemiologist Dr. Hoda Anton-Culver will help lead an ambitious and far-reaching statewide effort to recruit tens of thousands of patients for President Barack Obama’s million-person health study, part of his Precision Medicine Initiative.The California Precision Medicine Consortium – a partnership among UCI, UC San Diego, UC Davis, UC San Francisco and UC Health, along with Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, the San Diego Blood Bank and the University of Southern California – is one of four regional groups chosen today by the National Institutes of Health to take part in a national network of healthcare provider organizations building the Precision Medicine Initiative’s research participant group, or cohort.

• share
• favorite_border

Will astronauts traveling to Mars remember much of it? That’s the question concerning University of California, Irvine scientists probing a phenomenon called “space brain.” UCI’s Charles Limoli and colleagues found that exposure to highly energetic charged particles – much like those found in the galactic cosmic rays that will bombard astronauts during extended spaceflights – causes significant long-term brain damage in test rodents, resulting in cognitive impairments and dementia.

• share
• favorite_border

Irvine, Calif., Oct. 4, 2016 – Reading e-books enhanced with sound, animation and games not related to story content may reduce learning in children between the ages of 3 and 5, according to University of California, Irvine researchers.“With the widespread adoption of tablets, youngsters’ use of e-books continues to increase,” said lead investigator Stephanie Reich, UCI associate professor of education.

• share
• favorite_border

The University of California, Irvine’s Development, Health & Disease Research Program has been selected to take part in a $157 million federal initiative to understand how environmental influences from conception through early childhood can affect the health of youngsters and adolescents.

• share
• favorite_border

Guilt-ridden busy moms and dads take heart: Mothers – and fathers – across most Western countries are spending more time with their children than parents did in the mid-’60s, according to a University of California, Irvine study. And time spent with kids is highest among better-educated parents – a finding that somewhat surprised study co-author Judith Treas, UCI Chancellor’s Professor of sociology.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

By adding highly accurate radiocarbon dating of soil to standard Earth system models, environmental scientists from the University of California, Irvine and other institutions have learned a dirty little secret: The ground will absorb far less atmospheric carbon dioxide this century than previously thought.

• share
• favorite_border

Neuroscientists at University of California, Irvine have discovered a molecular signaling mechanism that translates visual impairments into functional changes in brain circuit connections. The discovery may help to develop novel therapeutic drugs to treat the childhood visual disorder amblyopia and other neurodevelopment disorders

• share
• favorite_border

University of California, Irvine and SUNY Downstate Medical Center researchers have created a model illustrating how economic globalization may create stressful employment factors in high-income countries contributing to the worldwide epidemic of cardiovascular disease.

• share
• favorite_border

The grand opening of UC Irvine’s eSports arena – the first at a public university – will feature top-ranked players on UCI’s new League of Legends team. With 80 custom PCs from iBUYPOWER and a live webcasting studio to broadcast to millions of viewers, the arena will be a Southern California epicenter for competitive and casual gamers. More than 1,000 people are expected to attend the opening.

• share
• favorite_border

oot extracts from the flowering herbal plant Corydalis yanhusuo, or YHS, has widely used for centuries as a pain treatment. Yet few studies have investigated how it works on different forms of pain, and little is known about its molecular mechanisms. In a new study, Olivier Civelli, professor and chair of pharmacology at the University of California, Irvine, and colleagues show how YHS effectively treats different forms of pain.

• share
• favorite_border

Regularly snapping selfies with your smartphone and sharing photos with your friends can help make you a happier person, according to computer scientists at the University of California, Irvine. In a first-of-its-kind study published just before back-to-school season, the authors found that students can combat the blues with some simple, deliberate actions on their mobile devices.

• share
• favorite_border

In new research publishing Sept. 8 in the Open Access journal PLOS Biology, University of California, Irvine biologists Anne Calof and Arthur Lander and colleagues report that the role of genes in CHD is more complex than previously realized and that overall risk is determined by a combination of gene effects both inside and outside of the heart itself.

• share
• favorite_border

Chronically ill, homebound children who use robotic surrogates to “attend” school feel more socially connected with their peers and more involved academically, according to a first-of-its-kind study by University of California, Irvine education researchers.

• share
• favorite_border

China scholar and commentator Jeffrey Wasserstrom, chancellor's professor of history at the University of California, Irvine, offers fresh and surprising ways to look at China.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

Leaving a child unattended is considered taboo in today’s intensive parenting atmosphere, despite evidence that American children are safer than ever. So why are parents denying their children the same freedom and independence that they themselves enjoyed as children? A new study by University of California, Irvine social scientists suggests that our fears of leaving children alone have become systematically exaggerated in recent decades – not because the practice has become more dangerous, but because it has become socially unacceptable.

• share
• favorite_border

Research from University of California, Irvine scientists and their colleagues offers new insights into why many animals sleep at night and are active during the day, while others do the reverse.

• share
• favorite_border

An alternative to using Twitter geotags and hashtags to identify community members who have experienced collective trauma, such as a school shooting, shows promise in helping researchers rapidly assess local effects. The approach, developed by researchers at the University of California, Irvine, was deployed to study the impact of deadly gun violence at UC Santa Barbara, Northern Arizona University and Oregon’s Umpqua Community College.

• share
• favorite_border

Recent findings indicating the possible discovery of a previously unknown subatomic particle may be evidence of a fifth fundamental force of nature, according to a paper published in the journal Physical Review Letters by theoretical physicists at the University of California, Irvine.

• share
• favorite_border

A University of California, Irvine entomologist has discovered that a brief blast of heat can kill bedbugs traveling on the outside of luggage, suggesting an additional way to use this nonchemical means of controlling the annoying insects.

• share
• favorite_border

The world’s leading atmospheric scientists overwhelmingly deny the existence of a secret, elite-driven plot to release harmful chemicals into the air from high-flying aircraft, according to the first peer-reviewed journal paper to address the “chemtrails” conspiracy theory.

• share
• favorite_border

Highlighted by the largest gift in campus history and an investment of more than $40 million in cancer studies, the University of California, Irvine continues advancing toward its brilliant future with a record-breaking year in both research funding and philanthropic support.

• share
• favorite_border

The Gulf of Maine coastline, historically home to one of the richest shellfish populations in the U.S., is undergoing a dramatic change, with once-flourishing wild blue mussels all but disappearing, according to a study led by University of California, Irvine ecologists.