News – Page 3

From Waste to Wealth: Researchers will Transform Anaerobic Digestion

Written on October 30, 2019.

Oct. 30, 2019 – Every year, a staggering amount of organic waste including uneaten food, yard clippings and manure is dumped into landfills, occupying precious land while producing methane and other gases that pollute the atmosphere. For a multi-institutional team of engineers, this 115 million tons of waste represents not a calamity, but an opportunity – to turn that waste into wealth. The team is led by engineers at Colorado State University and includes two researchers from the...

Plant physiology will be major contributor to future river flooding, UCI study finds

Written on October 21, 2019.

By hoarding water underground, vegetation will help saturate soil, boosting rain runoff Irvine, Calif., Oct. 21, 2019 – The next time a river overflows its banks, don’t just blame the rain clouds. Earth system scientists from the University of California, Irvine have identified another culprit: leafy plants. In a study published today in Nature Climate Change, the UCI researchers describe the emerging role of ecophysiology in riparian flooding. As an adaptation to an overabundance of carbon...

UCI-led Team to Study Socioeconomic Effects of Coastal Flooding in California

Written on October 9, 2019.

NSF-funded project involving 3 other UC campuses will use advanced simulations October 9, 2019 – Researchers at the University of California, Irvine are leading a new project with three other UC campuses to study the impact of coastal flooding on disadvantaged communities in California. Launched with funding from the National Science Foundation’s Coastlines & People initiative, the effort will employ advanced simulation systems to deepen understanding of increasing...

UCI Receives $1 Million from CDC/ATSDR to Study PFAS Contaminated Drinking Water and Health

Written on September 30, 2019.

September 30, 2019 – The University of California, Irvine was awarded $1 million by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) to participate in the first year of a major multi-site health study to investigate the relationship between drinking water contaminated with per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) and health outcomes. Under the agreement, UCI researchers will conduct an investigation in...

UCI to collaborate in Department of Energy hub addressing water security issues in U.S.

Written on September 27, 2019.

The U.S. Department of Energy has selected the National Alliance for Water Innovation – a public-private partnership with more than 35 members, including UCI – to lead an energy and desalination hub addressing water security issues in the U.S. The organization will conduct early-stage research and development on energy-efficient and cost-competitive water treatment technologies. “Desalination and water reuse are important parts of the research portfolio at UCI,” said project leader Sunny Jiang,...

UCI Team Uses Machine Learning to Help Tell Which Wildfires Will Burn Out of Control

Written on September 17, 2019.

New technique could help authorities conduct triage in multiple-blaze scenarios September 17, 2019 – An interdisciplinary team of scientists at the University of California, Irvine has developed a new technique for predicting the final size of a wildfire from the moment of ignition. Built around a machine learning algorithm, the model can help in forecasting whether a blaze is going to be small, medium or large by the time it has run its course – knowledge useful to those in...

UCI-led team creates first high-resolution global map of surface ocean phosphate

Written on August 28, 2019.

Researchers also find plankton more resilient to nutrient stress than previously thought Irvine, Calif., Aug. 28, 2019 – An international team of Earth system scientists and oceanographers has created the first high-resolution global map of surface ocean phosphate, a key mineral supporting the aquatic food chain. In doing so, the University of California, Irvine-led group learned that marine phytoplankton – which rely on the trace nutrient – are a lot more resilient to its scarcity than previously...

Study examines a million corals one by one in urgent call to save reefs

Written on August 12, 2019.

UCI biologist among data contributors to large, unprecedented project Irvine, Calif., Aug. 12, 2019 — When Joleah Lamb strapped on a scuba tank and plunged into the ocean over a decade ago, it was the first of many expeditions to examine the effects of climate change and other human-produced factors on coral. Now, 13 years after that foray, she has contributed one of the largest amounts of data to a landmark study on how to save coral reefs in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. Lamb, an assistant...

UCI, JPL glaciologists unveil most precise map ever of Antarctic ice velocity

Written on July 29, 2019.

Project utilized 25 years of data from six international satellite missions Irvine, Calif., July 29, 2019 – Constructed from a quarter century’s worth of satellite data, a new map of Antarctic ice velocity by glaciologists from the University of California, Irvine and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory is the most precise ever created. Published today in a paper in the American Geophysical Union journal Geophysical Research Letters, the map is 10 times more accurate than previous renditions,...

‘Committed’ CO2 emissions jeopardize international climate goals, UCI-led study finds

Written on July 1, 2019.

Existing, planned fossil fuel-burning infrastructure must be retired early, replaced Irvine, Calif., July 1, 2019 – The nations that have signed agreements to stabilize the global mean temperature by 2050 will fail to meet their goals unless existing fossil fuel-burning infrastructure around the world is retired early, according to a study – published today in Nature – by researchers at the University of California, Irvine and other institutions. “We need to reach net-zero carbon dioxide...