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Patty Guerra

UC Merced campus photo of sign

Department of Energy Grant will Fund Research into Improving Machine Learning

UC Merced Computer Science and Engineering Professor Xiaoyi Lu is leading a collaboration that earned a $4.35 million grant from the Department of Energy (DOE) to improve machine learning systems.

Lu is partnering with the University of Iowa and Argonne National Laboratory near Chicago to improve the understanding of scalable, federated, privacy-preserving machine learning. The project was among five aimed at distributed resilient systems in science awarded a total of $40 million in funding from the DOE.

'Farming Data': UC Merced Students Spend Summer Working with Crops and Spreadsheets

For UC Merced students working to maintain the campus's Experimental Smart Farm this summer, the day's tasks can range from the high-tech to the grubby.

Kat Corti and Austin Mercado, both fourth-year students come fall, are spending their summer tending the farm and preparing it for what's next. Also working at the farm this summer is Adam Mercado, Austin's twin brother.

Research into Electric Vehicles Earns Awards

Two of mechanical engineering Professor Ricardo de Castro 's Ph.D. students recently earned awards for their research on electric vehicles.

Dilawer Ali, whose work centers on the electrification of tractors, won the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers (ASABE) award for the best student poster presentation in California during the 2023 Agricultural Equipment Technology Conference (AETC23).

Math Academies Provide Skills - and Fun - in a College Environment

Here's a challenge:

Four weeks, five days a week and seven hours a day, you have to teach math to middle school students.

During the summer.

And you have to keep it interesting.

The Center for Educational Partnerships (CEP) has been doing just that for the past 18 years at several sites, including UC Merced.

How?

UC Merced Drone Team Soars to New Heights in Global Competition

After seven months of working for hours each weekend to design, build and fly a drone, it all came down to a nervous moment for UC Merced students taking part in a worldwide competition.

Their drone had to be suspended between two poles and held together while weight was placed inside it.

"We were a little bit nervous," said team member Alex Minton. "We didn't have the best luck with our prototypes."

But the team's drone held up, though there was some concerning creaking at one point, the team members said.

New Bobcat Brings Wealth of Experience to College Career

Incoming first-year student Hayden Elliott will hit the UC Merced campus this fall with quite a bit of college already under his belt.

A 2023 graduate of Turlock High School, Elliott has earned associate's degrees from attending both Modesto Junior College and Merced College in their dual enrollment programs.

Collaboration Across Continents: Agreement Brings Merced, Kyoto Campuses Closer

Merced, California, and Kyoto, Japan, are nearly 5,500 miles apart, but their research universities' shared goals to improve society is bringing them together. A new agreement between institutions of higher education in both cities will foster collaboration among researchers and an exchange of students.

Water Research Goes Deep with Rafting Trip to Utah

The USDA-funded Secure Water Future (SWF) team at UC Merced believes that to fully understand water, you must do more than just study this vital resource. You must immerse yourself in it - sometimes, literally.

A recent trip to Utah that culminated in rafting The Gates of Lodore on the Green River allowed student participants to both learn about and experience water, in all its forms. This was the second year for this trip, and thanks to this winter's heavy and lengthy snowfall, students got to see the solid form of water, as well.

CAREER Award Funds Research Into Lip Reading for Mobile Devices

Professor Ahmed Sabbir Arif has received a CAREER award for his research into non-acoustic, image-based speech input on mobile devices.

He is the 35th researcher from UC Merced to earn a CAREER award from the National Science Foundation (NSF).

UC Merced-Led Project Wins $1 Million NSF Engines Development Award

The Circular Bioeconomy Innovation Collaborative (CBIO Collaborative) has been awarded $1 million from the U.S. National Science Foundation's (NSF) Regional Innovation Engines program for "Advancing Circular Bioeconomy Technologies in North San Joaquin Valley."

The CBIO Collaborative is among the more than 40 unique teams to receive one of the first NSF Engines Development Awards, which aim to help partners collaborate economic, societal and technological opportunities for their regions.