In a new article in the journal Nature Communications – Rainfall Drives Variation in Rates of Change in Intrinsic Water Use Efficiency of Tropical Forests – the authors inferred water use efficiency (WUE) from carbon isotope discrimination in tree rings from tropical forests around the world for most of the 20th century (1915–1995). “As expected,…
Continue reading →
Processing tomato growers are struggling to contain a potentially devastating parasitic weed that had not been seen since growers waged a successful eradication campaign four decades ago. Branched broomrape is so destructive in tomatoes that if it is detected in a grower’s field, quarantine regulations require that the crop be destroyed and the field be…
Continue reading →
Researchers at the University of California, Davis, have partnered with a federally compliant pharmaceutical company to analyze the chemical and biological profiles of cannabis for the benefit of law enforcement, health care providers and scientific professionals. The agreement with Biopharmaceutical Research Company (BRC), which is registered with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, is among the…
Continue reading →
Barbara Blanco-Ulate, Assistant Professor in the Department of Plant Sciences, UC Davis, received a prestigious Hellman Fellowship grant this year for the research project “Epigenomics of Tomato Fruit Susceptibility to Fungal Disease.” Blanco-Ulate’s overall research focuses on the systems biology of fruit ripening, fruit-pathogen interactions, and postharvest quality. The one-year grants are awarded to early-career…
Continue reading →
“California grasslands are very different from their original state,” said Professor Emilio Laca, an agricultural ecologist in the Department of Plant Sciences at UC Davis. “They have been completely invaded by exotic species, several of which have become naturalized in the ecosystem, and the grasslands have lost most of the native perennial plant component.” The…
Continue reading →
Travis Parker Wins National Photo Contest in Plant Breeding Travis Parker, Ph.D. candidate in Plant Sciences, UC Davis, won first place in the national NAPB 2019 Photo Contest, sponsored by the National Association of Plant Breeders (NAPB). The competition drew 68 entries, with first, second, and third place awards, and several honorable mentions. Parker’s winning…
Continue reading →
The annual Tahoe: State of the Lake report, by the UC Davis Tahoe Environmental Research Center, presents data from 2018 regarding lake clarity, temperature, snowpack, invasive species, algae, nutrient loads and more, all in the context of the long-term record. The report notes, “Climate change is expected to impact all aspects of the Tahoe basin…
Continue reading →
Louise Ferguson, faculty member in the Department of Plant Sciences at UC Davis, and UC ANR Cooperative Extension pomology specialist for California, is the new President-elect of the American Society for Horticultural Science (ASHS), a professional academic society. Her appointment commenced in July 2019 at the ASHS annual conference in Las Vegas. Following the upcoming…
Continue reading →
The annual Rice Field Day, sponsored by the California Cooperative Rice Research Foundation and the University of California, will be held at the Rice Experiment Station in Biggs, California on Wednesday, August 28, 2019. The day includes field tours of research on rice varieties and its diseases and pests. Kassim Al-Khatib, professor of weed science,…
Continue reading →
University of California rice researchers are exploring a more precise way of deciding whether the crop would benefit from a side-dress nitrogen fertilizer application, using drone-mounted cameras. Hand-held Greenseeker-normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) readings have already replaced color charts as a research tool for in-season fertilizer decisions, but drone photos of the normalized difference red…
Continue reading →