Dear Colleagues,

As we conclude the academic year, I extend my sincere appreciation to our faculty, staff, and partners whose dedication continues to advance the mission and impact of the UC Merced School of Engineering. This has been a year of meaningful progress across our research, academic programs, and broader institutional contributions.

Our collective efforts have yielded significant results. Notably, our graduate programs reached a national top-100 ranking — 11 years after first entering the U.S. News rankings, and 20 years after the campus opened. This is a significant milestone that reflects both sustained investment and the strength of our scholarly community. In parallel, UC Merced’s designation as both a Carnegie Community-Engaged University and a Research and Access University underscores the distinctive role our campus plays in expanding opportunity while advancing impactful research.

Our research enterprise continues to grow, with annual expenditures approaching $30 million. This trajectory speaks to the innovation and leadership of our faculty in addressing complex societal challenges. Individual recognitions this year further highlight this excellence. We congratulate Ming-Hsuan Yang on his election as an AAAS Fellow, Mukesh Singhal on being named an IEEE Life Fellow, Faculty including Ming-Hsuan Yang, John Abatzoglou, and Crystal Kolden continue to gain international distinction for their scholarly impact, while NSF CAREER Awards to Qian Wang and AHA Career Development award to Arian Aghilinejad reflect the promise of our early-career faculty.

We have also advanced strategically within our academic portfolio. Proposed programs in Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence, alongside growing demand in our new Aerospace Engineering program, demonstrate our responsiveness to emerging disciplines and workforce needs. New approaches are under way in electrical engineering to enhance workforce development, aling with new initiatives in master’s-level education, expanded pathways such as direct MS admissions and BS+MS programs, are strengthening both access and student success.

This year also brought a moment of deep loss with the passing of our colleague, Professor YangQuan Chen. Professor Chen was a distinguished scholar, educator, and mentor whose contributions have left a lasting imprint on our community and field. We honor his legacy and extend our condolences to all who were impacted by his work and friendship.

I am proud of the progress we have made and grateful for the collaborative spirit that defines our school. We look forward to building on this momentum and continuing to contribute to the broader engineering and higher education community in the years ahead.

Boldy Forward | UC Merced is building the future in the heart of California, and the School of Engineering is proud to be a major part of the university’s continued success.

UC Merced’s School of Engineering broke into the top 100 in the rankings, securing No. 99 in the Best Engineering Schools and ranked in the top 12 among California universities

The 2026 Carnegie Elective Classification for Community Engagement affirms the university’s deep and expanding commitment to serving the public.

Quantum Computer Research Earns CAREER Award

Electrical engineering Professor Qian Wang has received a CAREER award for her research into quantum computing.

Wang will receive $600,000 over the next five years for the project “Securing and Optimizing Quantum-Resilient Cryptography for Versatile Computing Architectures.” Wang’s Sequioa lab focuses on hardware-centered security in the post-quantum and quantum computing era.

She is the 42nd researcher from UC Merced to earn a CAREER award from the National Science Foundation (NSF).

CAREER awards are among the NSF’s most prestigious awards. They are given through the Faculty Early Career Development Program to recognize untenured faculty members as teacher-scholars. Early-career faculty members are selected based on three factors: the strength of their research proposals; their potential to serve as academic role models in research and education; and their leadership in their field and organizations.

AHA Career Award, UC Merced's First, Funds Project Aimed at Improving Heart Interventions

UC Merced Bioengineering Professor Arian Aghilinejad has earned an American Heart Association (AHA) Career Development Award to fund his work on improving how mechanical pumps (left ventricular devices, or LVADs), interact with the heart and body.

This award will support groundbreaking research to improve heart interventions and save lives. This is a first for UC Merced!

Two Faculty Named 2025 Fellows of AAAS

Professors Asmeret Asefaw Berhe and Ming-Hsuan Yang have been named 2025 fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the world’s largest general scientific society and publisher of the Science family of journals.

Being named an AAAS Fellow is one of the most prestigious honors awarded by the American Association for the Advancement of Science. From advancing soil–climate research to breakthroughs in computer vision, their work drives innovation and global impact.

Asmeret Asefaw Berhe

Berhe is recognized for her distinguished contributions to soil sciences and for her exemplary leadership in scientific organizations, leading to a more equitable and innovative scientific culture.

Ming-Hsuan Yang

Yang, who joined AAAS in 2021, is being recognized for distinguished contributions to the field of computer vision, particularly for visual tracking, low-level vision and visual learning. He has appeared on Clarivate’s list of highly cited researchers for the past eight years, demonstrating the influence of his research.

UC Merced Scientists Among Global Elite Shaping AI, Climate and Health

UC Merced continues to demonstrate its growing influence on the global stage. Several faculty members (profiled below) have been named on the prestigious Clarivate’s 2025 list of the world’s most cited researchers, demonstrating that they are recognized by their peers and demonstrating the importance of their work

The honor is reserved for the top 1% of scholars whose work has shaped their fields over the last 10 years. Clarivate, which produces journal impact factors and other analytics, says the award identifies the world’s most influential researchers.

Ming Hsuan Yang

Professor Ming Hsuan Yang, of the Electrical Engineering department, has appeared on the Highly Cited list annually since 2018, helped by seminal work in face detection, object tracking and representation learning. Now, his group is pushing into vision language models — systems that connect images and text and increasingly power generative tools and reasoning engines.

Crystal A. Kolden

Management of Complex Systems Professor Crystal Kolden, a pyrogeographer, focuses on the human environment dimensions of wildfire, from prescribed fire and mitigation to recovery planning. She is a recognized expert in community-focused resilience strategies.

John Abatzoglou

Professor John Abatzoglou, of the Management and Complex Systems department, is listed in both environment and ecology and geosciences, reflecting the breadth of his climate science portfolio. His lab develops datasets and tools that help communities, agencies and land managers understand climate variability and anticipate impacts.

Erin Hestir

Distinguished Graduate Teaching/Mentorship Award (GC)

John Abatzoglou

Distinction in Research Award (CoR)

Ashlie Martini

Distinguished Scholarly Public Service Award (CoC)

Bioengineering Professor Among Senate District’s ‘Women Who Inspire’

State Sen. Anna Caballero recently honored UC Merced bioengineering Professor Sushma Shrinivasan among the “Women Who Inspire” in 2026 for District 14. Shrinivasan (far left), who joined UC Merced in 2017, was honored for her continued contributions to education and for serving as an inspiration to girls aspiring to careers in STEM.

UC Merced bioengineering Professor Eva de Alba has secured a $3.2 million grant from the National Institutes of Health.

Li and Lu are among 63 award recipients representing 41 universities.

Greer's project aims to leverage NVIDIA's technology to adapt driverless cars to better process what is happening on the roads.

UC Merced Project Aimed at Making Autonomous Cars Safer with NVDIA

Thanks to a grant from Santa Clara-based tech company NVDIA, researchers at UC Merced are looking into ways to improve the safety of autonomous vehicles. The artificial intelligence pioneer has selected Professor Ross Greer's project, "Edge-Deployed Multimodal Safety Reasoning for Autonomous Vehicles," for inclusion in its Academic Grant Program.

Researchers are working on ways to better identify, predict and manage drought.

Can AI Help Predict and Manage Drought?

Once again much of California is showing "abnormally dry" conditions, according to the state drought monitor. And as climate change adds more swings between wet and dry conditions, researchers are working on ways to better identify, predict and manage drought. Toward that end, a UC Merced team contributed a chapter on "Artificial Intelligence for Multiscale Drought Modeling and Decision Making," in the new book "Global Drought and Sustainability. UC Merced researchers (project scientist Abid Sarwar, postdoctoral scholar Rui Gao and professors Safeeq Khan, John Abatzoglou, Josué Medellín-Azuara and Joshua Viers) say combining machine learning, satellite data, and climate records could improve forecasting and water management.

UC Merced's team is looking into topological materials.

Project Aims to Put AI to Work Reducing its Own Energy Needs

Can AI help cut its own energy use? A new project, led by UCMerced chemical and materials engineering Professor Beth Nowadnick, is exploring how AI can reduce the power it consumes—making tech smarter and greener. By identifying the most promising candidates before laboratory testing, this AI approach could dramatically accelerate the discovery of new chip materials that switch faster while consuming less energy.

Sustainable Concrete Research

Professor Marina Garcia Lopez-Arias will start teaching at UC Merced this fall.

Work with Making More Sustainable Concrete Earns Award from Purdue

Concrete constitutes 8% of global carbon emissions. But what if the concrete itself could not only be created more sustainably but also act as a sort of filter, pulling pollutants out of the air?

Professor Marina Garcia Lopez-Arias a new professor of civil engineering at UC Merced joining UC Merced this fall, is working on this with her award winning research —making concrete more sustainable AND able to clean the air.

Garcia Lopez-Arias recently earned the Outstanding Postdoc Award from the College of Engineering at Purdue University. A native of Spain, Garcia Lopez-Arias went to Purdue to study concrete and better ways to make it.

Prof. Martini and postdoctoral scholar Sourabh Kumar publish their research in Chemical Reviews

UC Merced Researchers Explain How Mechanical Force Can Trigger Chemical Reactions

Mechanical force doesn’t just move things—it can trigger chemical reactions. UCMerced researchers, led by Mechanical and Aerospace engineering Professor Ashlie Martini, explain in Chemical Reviews how squeezing or stressing molecules changes their structure and lowers the energy needed for reactions—opening doors to cleaner, more efficient manufacturing.

Talking About Energy Dominance? Solar Would Like to Have a Word

A recent paper in Nature Energy, cowritten by UC Merced electrical engineering professor Sarah Kurtz, summarizes where we’re likely heading. It lists more than 60 co-authors from some of the world’s leading research institutions, including the National Laboratory of the Rockies (which was the National Renewable Energy Laboratory before a recent name change), the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems in Germany and the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology in Japan.

Project Nexus:

California's First Solar-Covered Canals

State leaders gathered at the Project Nexus sites to celebrate completion of the construction pilot

The wide span of Project Nexus stretches over a canal in Hickman

State's First Solar Canal Project Moves from UC Merced Lab to Real World

What started as a premise in a UC Merced lab culminated with a commemoration of Project Nexus, California's first solar canal project. State leaders gathered at the Project Nexus sites in Hickman and Keyes to celebrate the completion of the construction pilot, which demonstrates how covering operational irrigation canals with solar panels can help save water, generate clean energy, and conserve natural lands.

"For the past three years our UC Merced research team - including our project manager Dr. Brandi McKuin and team members here today - has treated these canals as a living laboratory," said Roger Bales, professor emeritus of civil and environmental engineering. "We didn't just want to build a canopy to produce electricity; we wanted to quantify a 'triple win' for California: water, energy and land."

Project Nexus, launched in 2022, represents an innovative public-private-academic collaboration between the California Department of Water Resources, Turlock Irrigation District, Solar AquaGrid LLC and UC Merced.

Agave has multiple uses ranging from nutritional supplements to fabrics

Is Growing Agave a Good Fit for California? UC Merced Aims to Find Out

A recent event at UC Merced on Main brought together those with an interest in agriculture, sustainability and biotechnology as well as growers, scientists and community members from the Merced area and beyond to talk about the many possibilities of growing agave in the region. Though agave, mainly grown in Mexico, is best known as the source of tequila and mezcal, it has other uses that range from nutritional supplements to fabrics.

Partnerships with leading institutions like Tecnológico de Monterrey, combined with Mexico's millennia-old agave heritage, are critical to advancing research on climate-resilient cultivation and processing across diverse landscapes and production systems," said civil and environmental engineering Professor Josué Medellín-Azuara.

The event brought together farming, industry and research innovators.

Innovative Solutions Turn Rural Energy Challenges Into Opportunities

Hosted by the UC Merced Energy Center (center director Professor Sarah Kurtz) and the Sierra Nevada Research Institute, the all-day event brought together farming, industry, agency and research innovators to make new connections and identify new research directions.

Climate News

Mitigating climate change will take collective action on a large scale, Stokes said.

Turning A Carbon Footprint into a Carbon Wave

At the UCMerced Climate Speaker series, Sarah Kurtz spotlighted the rapid rise of solar batteries. Keynote Speaker Leah Stokes challenged us to think bigger with a "carbon wave" of collective action. The energy transition is happening. Now it is about scale and equity.

Forecasters predict record-breaking early season heat this week.

UC Merced Climate Experts Explain Why March Heat Wave is Dangerous

Early heat will deplete the snowpack much of California relies on for its water. UC Merced experts explained why such heat when it's still technically winter, is more hazardous than the same temperatures later in the year.

Unusually hot temperatures may also impact the agricultural sector, affecting both outdoor workers and crops that are flowering or fruiting. Early heat waves could exacerbate and lengthen wildfire seasons, which already are overlapping globally, new research co-authored by Professor Abatzoglou and postdoctoral researcher Cong Yin shows.

Synchronized extreme fire weather is increasing, researchers found.

Copyright AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File

Wildfire-friendly weather nearly triples: Will outbreaks leave countries scrambling for resources?

Synchronous wildfire risk is rising sharply, with the number of days featuring hot, dry, and windy conditions nearly tripling worldwide over the past 45 years. More than half of this increase is driven by human-caused climate change, leading to overlapping fire seasons that strain global firefighting capacity. The Americas have seen some of the steepest increases, with far more days each year prone to simultaneous fires.

UC Merced fire scientist John Abatzoglou warns these trends are making fires increasingly difficult to suppress and limiting countries’ ability to support one another.

Copyright 2026 Associated Press

Warming World Increases Fire Risk Around the Globe

The number of hot, dry, and windy days— ideal weather to spark extreme wildfires — has nearly tripled in the past 45 years across the globe, with the trend increasing even higher in the Americas, a new study shows. And more than half of that increase is caused by human-caused climate change, researchers calculated.

“These sorts of changes that we have seen increase the likelihood in a lot of areas that there will be fires that are going to be very challenging to suppress,” said study co-author John Abatzoglou, a fire scientist at the University of California, Merced.

The event highlighted projects aimed at helping people and communities solve problems.

Projects to Make the World Better Promoted at Merced 2 Market

An artificial intelligence-powered system to ensure the safety of the elderly while still providing privacy. Wearable muscle monitoring to speed recovery from injury. A chemical-free method of putting out fires. A more effective way to detect methane leaks.

These were just some of the projects highlighted during the innovators showcase at Merced 2 Market, an event on campus where products resulting from research are highlighted for the community and potential investors.

Celebration of UC Merced and CITRIS Looks Both Back and Forward

The commemoration marked 25 years of the Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society (CITRIS) and the Banatao Institute and 20 years of UC Merced, one of its member institutions.

CITRIS and the Banatao Institute facilitates interdisciplinary work among hundreds of University of California faculty members, students, corporate partners and international institutions. "CITRIS is about one thing - taking ideas and making them become solutions that make a difference in people's lives," said Professor Erin Hestir, director of CITRIS at UC Merced. 

The event also paid tribute to Joshua Viers, currently UC Merced's associate vice chancellor for Interdisciplinary Research and Strategic Initiatives, who was the university's CITRIS director for 10 years starting in 2013. Viers expanded the center's scope and reach, including several programs oriented toward students, such as the Mobile App Challenge, where students competed with app development for social impact; and NexTech, where UC Merced students served as near-peer advocates in local middle schools to elevate curricula in computer science and robotics.

A shared legacy of research, innovation & opportunity—with even more ahead. From student success to real-world solutions, the best is still ahead. 

The region includes more than 100 active chapters.

Black Engineering Society Honored as Chapter of the Year, Again 

UC Merced's chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers was again honored as the Region VI Medium Chapter of the Year. It is the second consecutive year the organization received this recognition. The NSBE, established at UC Merced in 2007, provides support, guidance and advocacy for its members through their college journeys and beyond.

The Bobcat crew won the competition!

This marked UC Merced's second time participating in the competition.

Bobcats Outbuild Bears in Timber Strong Competition 

UC Merced's student chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers (Professor Siddaiah Yarra serves as the ASCE chapter's adviser) showcased their structural engineering skills in the annualTimber Strong Build Competition in April, going up against UC Berkeley in a day-long contest at nearby Lake Yosemite and constructing a two-story building in less than 1.5 hours.

The UC Merced team delivered an outstanding performance, earning a well-deserved victory. The hands-on experience allowed students to strengthen their teamwork, problem-solving, and practical skills in a competitive setting.

The event was further enriched by strong community support, with families in attendance creating an encouraging and celebratory atmosphere. Special thanks go to MID engineers and staff for hosting the event, the judges for their valuable feedback, and Anna Coffman for her support with contracting and insurance processes.

Building on this success, UC Merced looks ahead to co-hosting next year’s ASCE Mid-Pac Conference and competing in the Concrete Canoe, Steel Bridge, and Timber Strong events.

$1M Grant to Adapt Curriculum Redesign 

The $1 million grant will allow the department to adapt to changing needs.

New Approaches Coming to UC Merced Electrical Engineering Department

The National Science Foundation, through its Revolutionizing Engineering Departments (RED) program, has awarded the department a $1 million grant to adapt proven curriculum redesign approaches developed at other institutions. 

This project aims to expand UC Merced's electrical engineering program by introducing new approaches that strengthen the connection between coursework, engineering practice and the communities from which the university's students come.

Faculty from the electrical engineering department are part of the team participating in the curriculum redesign

A team of faculty, staff, educational and career experts and previous students will redesign classes that will bring a stronger understanding across these courses.

By rethinking how these courses are taught, the program seeks to build a more cohesive and effective learning pathway.

The money will go toward paying for club members to attend and participate in conferences.

Turner Construction Foundation Gifts Future Engineers

The Turner Construction Company Foundation donated $5,000 to UC Merced’s ASCE student chapter, opening doors for future engineers to attend conferences, build networks and explore career pathway.

Profiles in Student Success

Jacqueline Garcia found her core sense of belonging from her civil engineering peers.

Jacqueline Garcia, a 3rd-year civil engineering major who commutes to UCMerced, found belonging through peer connections—showing how student orgs, mentorship and career learning build community.

Eduardo Savala Alvarez accepted a job as a project engineer with Clark Construction.

A Brand-New Degree and a Stellar Job Offer to Accompany it

UC Merced prides itself on its high social mobility ranking (No. 3 among public schools in the country, according to the Wall Street Journal). Social mobility is defined as the ability to move between socioeconomic tiers.

Look to Eduardo Savala Alvarez, who recently graduated with a bachelor's degree in civil and environmental engineering, to understand what this really means. Before he graduated, Savala Alvarez received three job offers, with an average starting salary of $92,000 per year and an average signing bonus of $4,300. He ultimately accepted an offer from Clark Construction, where he will serve as a project engineer.

He credited his experience at UC Merced with preparing him for a successful career in engineering.

The program runs for 12 weeks.

High School Students Invited to Apply for Free Computer Science Internship

High school students have an extraordinary opportunity to explore software development through a summer internship program at UC Merced. Computer science and engineering Professor Ahmed Arif started the High School Internship program in the Inclusive Interaction Lab in 2018 to give young minds early exposure to research. Arif receives numerous applications each year, mainly from students in the Bay Area. He said he would like to see more applicants from the northern San Joaquin Valley.

Designing Student Success

Check out our

Spring 2026 Capstone Project Lineup!

The I2G program is a unique "experiential learning" program that engages external partner organizations with teams of students who design systems to solve real-world problems.

The Innovate to Grow program encompasses the following experiential learning classes: Engineering Capstone, Engineering Service Learning, and Software Engineering Capstone.

Research Week Marks UC Merced’s First Full Year as an R1 Institution



UC Merced hosted Research Week April 13-17, celebrating innovative work across campus and encouraging engagement in research among students, faculty and staff.

Research Week also commemorated the university’s first year since earning R1 status from the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. UC Merced is one of 187 doctoral-granting universities in the United States — out of nearly 4,000 — recognized for “very high research spending and doctorate production.”

The week concluded with the inaugural School of Engineering Industry Day connecting faculty researchers with industry partners.

Alumni Highlights

Alumnus Rahim Moulanazada works for Turner Construction, currently on a large-scale project in Sacramento

Alumnus Rahim Moulanazada Continues to Build His Future

Rahim came to UC Merced intending to study computer science and engineering, but switched when the School of Engineering launched its civil engineering program in 2021. Now he is a master’s student at Sacramento State, and an assistant engineer for Turner Construction Company – the company that has built many of the campus’s buildings.

Arrieta encouraged students to make use of the resources uniquely available on campus.

Robotics Expert Kevin Arrieta Inspires UC Merced Students

Kevin Arrieta, a graduate of UC Merced, recently returned to his alma mater to share insights from his journey as a robotics expert at Amazon.

Graduating in 2024, Arrieta has quickly established himself in the field of automation engineering, and he took the opportunity to advise current students in an electrical engineering class on the importance of hands-on experience.

Chen's work contributed to the advancement of engineering on a global scale.

The UC Merced community recently gathered to honor the life and legacy of Professor YangQuan Chen, a pioneering mechanical engineering scholar, educator, and mentor whose impact will be felt for generations.

Since joining UC Merced in 2012, he helped shape the School of Engineering and founded the Embedded Systems and Automation (MESA) Lab, advancing research in robotics, control systems, and unmanned aerial technologies.

A globally recognized researcher, Professor Chen authored more than 1,000 scholarly works and was named a Highly Cited Researcher by Clarivate Analytics from 2018 to 2021. His work significantly advanced engineering knowledge and innovation, while his collaborative spirit connected initiatives across UC Merced’s schools and research centers.

Beyond his scholarly achievements, Professor Chen was deeply committed to mentorship and student success. He inspired generations of undergraduate and graduate students to view engineering not just as a discipline, but as a means to serve society. Colleagues and students remember him as generous with his time, intellectually curious, and passionate about fostering creativity and excellence.

Professor Chen’s legacy lives on through the programs he helped build, the research he advanced, and the countless individuals he mentored. His contributions continue to shape UC Merced and the broader engineering community.

• Aerospace Engineering
• Artificial Intelligence (F'27)
• Biochemical and Biomolecular Engineering
• Bioengineering
• Chemical Engineering
• Civil Engineering
• Computer Science and Engineering

• Data Science and Analytics
• Electrical Engineering
• Environmental Engineering
• Management of Innovation, Sustainability and Technology
• Materials Science and Engineering
• Mechanical Engineering