Ocean plastic pollution is accidentally on the menu for southern giant petrel chicks. Even small nibbles of it may affect their physiology during development, according to a study from the University of California, Davis, and Argentina's National Research Council (CONICET).Lea este comunicado de prensa en español.

UC Davis researchers have stripped down LSD to the base features responsible for its hallucinogenic and therapeutic effects.

When two major wildfires burned through the Sierra Nevada in 2020 and 2021, they took thousands of giant sequoia trees with them. Without prescribed burns, thousands more would have died, according to...

UC Davis scientists discovered gray mold adapts to different crops, revealing why decades of disease-resistant breeding failed.

The causes of male infertility can be hard to diagnose, with many tests failing to detect genetic defects. Sometimes, infertility doesn’t even involve the genes themselves. It can arise from improper ...

The causes of male infertility can be hard to diagnose, with many tests failing to detect genetic defects. Sometimes, infertility doesn’t even involve the genes themselves. It can arise from improper ...

Being a single mother of 20 is no joke, especially if the survival of a whole species depends on it. A queen bumblebee faces this very challenge when she lays her first eggs in the spring: She is utte...

The genomics of peppermint are not as fresh as their flavor but scientists from the University of California, Davis, have found a way to breathe new genetic variation into the species.

The widespread hypothesis that climate warming will result in unprecedented agricultural pest populations and cause food insecurity worldwide is oversimplified, according to a new study by a team led ...

Researchers at the University of California, Davis, are working with California Cultured, a Sacramento based food-tech company, to keep chocolate affordable and sustainable by growing everyone’s favor...

Experiences in the first days and weeks of life can have a profound impact on humans — and birds. A new study led by Sage Madden, a graduate student in evolution and ecology at the University of Calif...

This week in UC Davis science news, we go from the far reaches of the Universe to the human heart, survey western wildfires and take a trip to Alcatraz.

Thousands of times per year, a family’s moment of joy turns to unexpected grief. A seemingly healthy infant stops smiling or making eye contact. Their limbs grow weak. The tiny child suffers seizures ...

A UC Davis study in Science found that 7% to 16% of global plant species studied face high risk of extinction by 2100 under current climate change projections.

A UC Davis study finds every dollar spent on forest fuel treatments saves $3.75 in wildfire damages.

A UC Davis study in Science found that 7% to 16% of global plant species studied face high risk of extinction by 2100 under current climate change projections.

While they cover less than 1% of the ocean’s surface, the world’s four major upwelling zones are biological powerhouses. Located along the coasts of California, Chile, Portugal, and South Africa, thes...

A male coyote that became famous after swimming to Alcatraz Island in January likely came from Angel Island State Park, according to National Park Service researchers, who used DNA from the coyote’s s...

Why are all those Velella velella — also known as “by-the-wind sailors” — washing up in the Bay Area right now, and where to spot them.

Salicylic acid, the active molecule in aspirin and some acne medications, is a hormone in plants that is essential for immunity, but it’s a double-edged sword: Too much can cause autoimmunity and stun...

The saying “cold hands, warm heart” is usually meant metaphorically — but new research from UC Davis School of Medicine and collaborating institutions suggests it has a striking biological parallel.

Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have made a surprising discovery about a galaxy long, long ago and far, far away: It isn’t rotating.

Climate change is likely to drive rodent-borne arenaviruses into parts of South America that have never faced these diseases, putting new communities of people at risk, finds a study from the Universi...

The National Academy of Sciences has elected Jeffrey Ross-Ibarra, professor in the Department of Evolution and Ecology at University of California, Davis, as a member. His election was announced April...

An inherited form of blindness directly comparable to a common inherited optic nerve disease in humans has been discovered in rhesus macaques at the California National Primate Research Center at the ...

Why are there so many of species of coral reef fish? According to a new study, it’s because about 50 million years ago, some fish figured out how to bite food from hard surfaces. Evolution doesn’t pro...

When climate change is faster than the speed of science and unstable funding threatens discovery, UC Davis scientists pivot to try to save important research.

Across an expanse of open grassland in Sacramento County, an eight-foot, stream cut bank holds dozens of mud-domed bird nests, where tiny heads peeked out before a colony of cliff swallows took flight...

This week's round up of research ranges from plant clones to wildfires with a detour into helping families in poverty. Also, geese. Propagating plants without mutationsA cool thing about plants is tha...

Plant scientists use clones for their research, but they’re different from the kind people grow from cuttings. Scientists grow these clones in Petri dishes by the thousands, along with a potential hea...

From a single veterinarian in Rwanda to an international force for gorilla health, the organization marks four decades of work that has helped more than double mountain gorilla populations Gorilla Doc...

California has one of the highest rates of wildfire-driven deforestation in the world, and the trend has accelerated over the past three decades, according to a UC Davis study.

A basic income program in Yolo County — one of the first such programs nationwide — lifted unhoused families above the California poverty line for two years. Families could, for a while, spend less ti...

Geese use this trick to save energy on long journeys—soon, airplanes could too.

It's the 112th UC Davis Picnic Day tomorrow (April 18) and whether your tastes run to cockroach races or fashion, there's something for every taste on campus. A rundown from Dateline and highlights of...

UC Davis researchers are playing a key research role in the battle against branched broomrape, developing in-field sanitation guidelines for tomato harvesters.

Fourth-year Biomedical Engineering Ph.D. candidate Eden Winslow won first place at the UC Davis Grad Slam Semi-Final round on Friday, April 3, 2026. Her winning presentation "Born Without a Hand: Chan...

Among dog breeds, Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retrievers (tollers) have an unusually high rate of Addison's disease, a condition in which the adrenal glands do not produce enough hormones, notably cortis...

On a sunny day in early April, young wheat plants stood waist-high in test fields near the UC Davis campus, their heads full of still-green grain. A walk along some furrows left pants and boots covere...

Climate models generate billions of data points, but traditional analysis methods can't keep up. UC Davis Ph.D. student Yuya Kawakami developed ClimateSOM, an interactive visualization tool that helps scientists explore thousands of climate futures and uncover patterns that current methods can miss.

One of the big challenges with traveling to the Moon and beyond is protecting both human bodies and the electronics that support them in space against the onslaught of radiation from the sun and the r...

Penguins can serve as living monitors of their environment by using small, chemical-detecting leg bands, according to a study from UC Davis and SUNY-Buffalo.

Back from Spring Break, here's a roundup of UC Davis research news from the past week.