Posts Tagged: UC Merced

Fighting drought with soil

A team of University of California scientists recently received a $1.69 million grant to use several UC agricultural research stations to study an often overlooked tool to fight the drought: soil.

The team, led by Samantha Ying, an assistant professor of environmental sciences at UC Riverside, received the grant from the University of California Office of the President.

The funding will allow for the establishment of the University of California Consortium for Drought and Carbon Management (UC DroCaM), which will design management strategies based on understanding soil carbon, the soil microbiome and their impact on water dynamics in soil.

The researchers will conduct field and lab research on microbiological, biophysical, and geochemical mechanisms controlling soil formation and stability under different row crops (tomatoes, alfalfa, wheat), farming practices (carbon inputs and rotations) and irrigation methods (furrow and flood, microirrigation).

Information on mechanisms will be integrated into a regionally-scalable predictive model to describe soil carbon dynamics and estimate the response of agricultural systems to drought.

Field research will initially be conducted at three UC Research and Extension Centers (Kearney, West Side and Desert) the Russell Ranch Sustainable Agriculture Facility near UC Davis.

Recommendations will then be made for broader monitoring and field experiments throughout the state based on input gained from local growers and citizens at workshops at the agricultural research stations. Ultimately, the hope is to expand and involve all nine research and extension centers from the Oregon border to the Mexican border.

“Having agricultural research stations throughout the state is a huge part of this project,” Ying said. “It is going to help us create one of the best research centers in the country focused on soil and drought.”

There is also a public engagement component. Citizens will be recruited to participate in workshops to learn how to monitor and sample their local soils. Information will then be imputed into an online soils database that will help create a map of the biodiversity of agricultural soils in California.

Ying's collaborators are: Kate Scow and Sanjai Parihk (UC Davis); Eoin Brodie and Margaret Torn (UC Berkeley); Asmeret Berhe and Teamrat Ghezzehei (UC Merced); and Peter Nico and William Riley (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory).

The grant is one of four awards totaling more than $4.8 million from University of California President Janet Napolitano's President's Research Catalyst Awards.

UC Cooperative Extension positions to connect research, community

Two UC Cooperative Extension specialists are being deployed to UC Merced to take advantage of its location at the center of California agriculture and build on ongoing research into agriculturally significant matters related to climate, food security and nutrition.

The two UCCE specialists, from the UC Division of Agricultural and Natural Resources, will help further connect campus research with local farmers and residents.

One of the positions, which will be housed in the Sierra Nevada Research Institute, will help farmers and ranchers adjust to the problems created by climate change and participate in statewide efforts, which include state and federal agencies in addition to UC, address climate change adaptation and mitigation.

The other position, housed in the Health Sciences Research Institute, will focus on nutrition research and education and food security, aiming to improve the lives of local residents. The UCCE nutrition specialist will connect with a larger team of nutrition researchers and educators throughout the UC system addressing issues related to healthy food and human health.

UC Merced Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Tom Peterson said even though the campus doesn't have an agriculture school, current areas of faculty research can and do benefit San Joaquin Valley citizens and farmers. For example, research on unmanned aerial vehicles offers more efficient means to monitor soil and crop conditions. UC Merced scientists are also conducting research into factors that affect the flow of water out of the Sierra Nevada and into the San Joaquin Valley.

“These positions come with a focus on interacting with the community, conducting applied research, and translating UC research to help the agricultural economy and local residents,” he said. “This is a recognition that we're making important contributions to the agricultural industry and that we have research and outreach important to it.”

Both positions require applicants with Ph.D.s who are ready to start projects that will work toward solving pressing problems. 

The climate change specialist could potentially study precision technologies that help better manage agricultural systems or increase the quality and scale of information.

The nutrition specialist will work with experts in the field to understand regional and state research needs and outreach priorities. The specialist will also have an emphasis on nutrition and disease prevention.

“We're an ideal lab for these kinds of research experiments,” Peterson said.

“Serving California agriculture with UC science-based solutions is what we do on an everyday basis. California agriculture is a world-recognized marvel, and we'd like to think the university, through its Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources, is a big reason why,” said Barbara Allen-Diaz, Vice President of ANR. “This collaboration with UC Merced will only strengthen UC efforts.”

ANR focuses on agriculture, nutrition, natural resources and youth development. UC Cooperative Extension, which is part of ANR, conducts research on campuses, at research and extension centers and in counties.

UCCE advisors and educators work directly with people in their communities to conduct and apply this science-based research on the farm and field and in classrooms and homes. UCCE's 20,000 Master Gardener Program and 4-H Youth Development Program volunteers help extend UC's information even further into communities around the state. 

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