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Recent News and Stories

Hands holding tangled green aquatic plants in shallow muddy water

What Makes Seagrass Survive? Look to the Microbes

by Douglas Fox
May 07, 2026

Research and Impacts

On her first day of graduate school, Karolina Zabinski rose at 4:00am. She spent the day on the muddy shores of Tomales Bay, collecting eelgrass for a survey of aquatic plant diseases. These ribbon-like seagrasses are common along the California coast and form knee-high meadows that undulate in the water.

Group of people at Cape of Good Hope sign on rocky coast, some with arms raised

A Global Effort to Decode the Ocean’s Most Productive “Hotspots”

by Jessica Lee
May 05, 2026

Research and Impacts

While they cover less than 1% of the ocean’s surface, the world’s four major upwelling zones are biological powerhouses. Located along the coasts of California, Chile, Portugal, and South Africa, these Eastern Boundary Upwelling Systems (EBUS) drive cold, nutrient-rich water to the surface, supporting massive populations of fish, birds, and mammals.

Two yellow-brown butterflyfish with dark stripes swimming above a coral reef.

Fish Evolution Accelerated After Adapting to Eat off Hard Surfaces

by Liana Wait
April 28, 2026

Research and Impacts

Why are there so many species of coral reef fish? According to a new study, it’s because about 50 million years ago, some fish figured out how to bite food from hard surfaces.

Scuba diver using a quadrat to survey coral reef in clear blue water

Stop-and-Go Science: Researchers Pivot to Try to Salvage Important Work

by Kat Kerlin
April 27, 2026

Research and Impacts

Conducting environmental science in a time of rapid climate change can be like a game of Whac-a-Mole. Just as you get close, the focus moves, burns, melts or disappears.

Woman wearing gloves using a pipette over a microtube beside a laptop and aquarium

Fishing for answers and testing the waters

by Isabella Beristain
April 22, 2026

Research and Impacts

Mikaila Hishaw, a fourth-year marine and coastal science major from Tucson, Arizona, arrived at UC Davis with plans to become a veterinarian. She soon discovered that research offered not just a new way to work with animals but also an avenue to explore her curiosity beyond the classroom.

Snorkelers explore underwater structures in clear blue water, surrounded by marine life.

Survival of the Most Cooperative

by Jessica Camille Aguirre (National Geographic)
March 30, 2026

Rarotonga, the largest island in the archipelago of the Cook Islands, is protected by a coral reef that forms a barricade around the kidney-shaped dollop of terra firma moored in the middle of the South Pacific. If that reef were to die off or disappear—as reefs are, globally, at a disheartening rate—it would spell catastrophe for Rarotonga’s more than 10,000 inhabitants. That partly explains how Anya Brown came to be a regular at a hardware store on the island.