The Agricultural Sustainability Institute at UC Davis has announced that Rachel Surls, UC Cooperative Extension sustainable food systems advisor for Los Angeles County, is this year's recipient of the Eric Bradford and Charlie Rominger Agricultural Sustainability Leadership Award.

Surls has been committed to community gardens, school gardens, and urban agriculture since long before our cities took notice. For 30 years, she has worked at the UC Cooperative Extension Office in Los Angeles County, helping to bring city-grown food into the mainstream.

If you grew up in the 1980s or 1990s (or were a child at heart during that era), the famous Powers of Ten film likely left an indelible mark in your mind.

The film starts with a couple lounging on a picnic blanket and zooms out to the outer reaches of the universe, then back in to peer into the microscopic world of the human body: from white blood cells to DNA, and finally down to the proton of a carbon atom.

In its short 9-minute run time, Powers of Ten manages to inflame an existential angst about the size of a single human life while at the same time connecting the viewer to the beauty of the universe and the human body.

As a high school...

Grape acreage being removed from production and the strong demand for nut tree crops have grape growers concerned about the economic sustainability of grape production in the San Joaquin Valley. The gross income of grapes per acre depends on two elements: price per ton and tons per acre. Price per ton is determined by a lot of factors, e.g. quality, region, demand, and inventory, and it is really difficult to predict the price per ton for a certain vintage. So the major target for growers is to achieve the optimum tons per acre from their vineyards.

Recently, it seems we have reached a plateau of production with current planting materials and management methods in the San Joaquin Valley vineyards. Making a vineyard less variable...

Isao Fujimoto, lecturer emeritus of Community Development and Asian American Studies at UC Davis, has been named the 2014 recipient of the Eric Bradford and Charlie Rominger Agricultural Sustainability Leadership Award for his commitment to California agriculture, rural communities, and social change.

The prestigious award, given each year by the Agricultural Sustainability Institute (ASI) at UC Davis, will be presented at a ceremony at UC Davis on April 23. UC Agriculture and Natural Resources, with its Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program, is a partner with ASI.

The keynote speaker at the awards presentation will be Navina...