News
3 September 2020
UCSB researches gene critical to floral nectar spurs
Source: Santa Barbara NewsPress
by Grayce McCormick
Biologists discovered a new gene that will lead them to new insights on evolution.
This specific discovery deals with evolution in plants: floral nectar spurs. These small tubes...
12 August 2020
A longtime research leader in marine science, UC Santa Barbara is at the center of myriad projects and conversations about the composition, health and future of the world’s oceans. A new effort led by UCSB marine ecologist Bob Miller focuses on California. With a grant from the National Science...
10 August 2020
Aiming to foster high-impact research on everything from machine learning techniques for early locust swarm detection, to understanding the impact of algal blooms across the Atlantic Ocean, to reducing microplastic pollution in stormwater, Eric and Wendy Schmidt have extended by two more years...
6 July 2020
Up and down the coast of California, the region’s iconic kelp forests are disappearing. While attention has focused on the state’s north coast — where loss of bull kelp has driven fishery closures — all of California is in danger of kelp forest decline.
In fact, many areas of the central and...
23 January 2019
In the animal kingdom, food access is among the biggest drivers of habitat preference. It influences, among other things, how animals interact, where they roam and the amount of energy they expend to maintain their access to food. But how do different members of ecologically similar species manage...
23 January 2019
An animal’s evolution is not only a matter of adapting to external conditions, or what’s “out there.” Oftentimes, what’s inside is equally important.
Now, an international team of scientists, including two at UC Santa Barbara, has set out to better understand the genetic history of organs...
26 March 2018
Healthier fish stocks. Higher catches. Profits from fishing. Is there a way to achieve these holy grails of commercial fisheries without harming endangered species that are caught incidentally?
A new UC Santa Barbara-led study has found that may indeed be possible about half the time. According...
15 March 2018
When British naturalist Charles Darwin traveled to the Galapagos Islands in 1835, he took notice of the giant kelp forests ringing the islands. He believed that if those forests were destroyed, a significant number of species would be lost. These underwater ecosystems, Darwin believed, could be...
6 March 2018
The Asian tiger mosquito — carrier of such diseases as dengue, yellow fever, Rift Valley fever, Chikungunya and Zika — appears to have vanished from Palmyra.
Not native to the small atoll 1,000 miles south of Hawaii, Aedes albopict likely came to Palmyra during World War II, when the United...
5 March 2018
UC Santa Barbara ecologist Douglas McCauley has been selected a 2018 early career fellow of the Ecological Society of America (ESA). An assistant professor in UCSB’s Department of Ecology, Evolution and Marine Biology (EEMB) and director of the Benioff Ocean Initiative, McCauley is one of seven ESA...