IoES in the News
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Tom Smith moderates biodiversity discussion for World War Zero
UCLA Professor and Center for Tropical Research Director Tom Smith moderated a World War Zero Facebook Live discussion on biodiversity with Dr. Kristen Ruegg (Asst. Professor at Colorado State University…
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Pritzker Finalist Leah Penniman in Bay Journal: Black farmers embrace African practices as empowering
In recent years, Axum said he has noticed a “big movement” among Black farmers toward embracing organic methods. These aren’t practices borrowed from White organizations and individuals but rather from…
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Alex Halll in Scientific American: California’s Mega Fires Have Arrived 30 Years Early
Climate models that looked at temperature change could not foresee the effects of drought and fire suppression. The UCLA study, which included researchers from the University of California, Irvine, saw earlier…
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Jason Cong in Semiconductor Engineering: Power/Performance Bits
Computer scientists at the University of California Los Angeles found that current compilers for quantum computers are inhibiting optimal performance and argue that better quantum compilation design could help improve computation…
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USAID grant supports Congo Basin Institute’s Distance Learning Center
The Congo Basin Institute (CBI), UCLA’s first foreign affiliate, recently received a grant from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to support the building of a Distance Learning…
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Ann Carlson in The Hill: Environmentalists sound alarm over Barrett’s climate change comments
Environmentalists are sounding the alarm over Judge Amy Coney Barrett’s comments this week casting doubt on the science of climate change, saying her remarks should disqualify her from sitting on the…
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UCLA Fielding School of Public Health adds nine new faculty for 2020-2021 academic year
The UCLA Fielding School of Public Health welcomes nine new faculty members, in four different academic departments, in time for the 2020-2021 academic year including Miriam Marlier, assistant professor of environmental health…
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UCLA Offers New Green Building LEED Lab Course Beginning Fall 2020
The “LEED Lab” course will follow the program developed by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) and offer team-oriented, project-based and hands-on learning. It will provide practical instead of theoretical experience…
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Bradley Shaffer in UCLA Newsroom: UCLA draws record $1.4 billion in research funding
UCLA attracted record support for its wide-ranging research in the 2019–20 fiscal year, receiving $1.427 billion in research funding. The UCLA College, home to the university’s divisions of life and…
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Glen MacDonald in Le Devoir: California, a state on the fringes of American politics
On the environmental level, California does indeed stand out with, among other things, stricter rules on air quality, as well as a carbon exchange system that it shares with Quebec,…
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Daniel Swain in USA Today: Fact check: Some of viral post’s facts that ‘stand up for the Golden State’ lack context
Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability at the University of California-Los Angeles, fact-checked Melissa Hillman’s viral post and said that fire is common in…
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Daniel Swain in The Los Angeles Times: Fire-dampening rain for California fizzles; more heat and possible Santa Ana winds are on the way
Chances of beneficial rain in Northern California have largely done a vanishing act, the National Weather Service said. After a brief respite, Southern California returns to temperatures that are well…
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Ann Carlson in The American Prospect: Four More Years of Trump Would Be an Environmental ‘Fiasco’
By weakening clean air and water standards, rolling back regulations, and allowing more drilling on both federal lands and waters, Trump’s EPA is just making it easier for polluters to…
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Deepak Rajagopal in BBC: Can Peru’s beloved dish help save Machu Picchu?
Unesco threatened to place Machu Picchu on its List of World Heritage in Danger in 2016 because of the unsustainable ways in which the site was being run. Prof. Deepak…
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Sean Hecht in Bloomberg Law: Supreme Court’s Climate Case Focuses on Procedure, Not Policy
Baltimore sued oil companies over local climate impacts and the U.S. Supreme Court last week added an important climate change case to its docket, giving oil and gas companies another…
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Pritzker Finalist Leah Penniman in Yahoo! Finance: America’s Black farmers work to uproot racism
Soul Fire Farm, is a “BIPoC-centered community farm” — the acronym standing for Black, Indigenous and People of Color. The 80-acre (32-hectare) farm was founded in 2011 by an African-American…
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Daniel Swain in The New York Times: What Made This a Record Fire Season? It Started With Lightning
An unusual confluence of weather conditions sent nearly 14,000 bolts of lightning into the dry, hot forests of Northern California in August. But that was only the beginning.
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Alex Hall in The Guardian: Smoke choking California again as dangerous fire conditions continue
Smoke from nearly two dozen wildfires burning across California will continue to darken skies across the west this weekend, as residents prepare for more heat, toxic air and conditions that…
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Video: Pritzker Finalist Leah Penniman in Yahoo! New: This Farmer Is Determined To Use Food To Help End Racism & Injustice
Soul Fire Farm manager & co-director and 2020 Pritzker Award finalist Leah Penniman explains how the community training farm educates young people + delivers food to people in need.
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Daniel Swain in KQED: Rain Next Week? Forecast Models Give Some Hope, But Too Early to Count on It
Moisture for a low-pressure system expected to arrive in Northern California late next week. UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain, a weather nerd and Twitter must-follow, made much the same point about…
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Ann Carlson in The Hill: Supreme Court to decide whether climate suit can be moved to federal court
The Supreme Court says it will hear arguments over whether the city of Baltimore’s lawsuit against several oil companies can be moved to federal court. Ann Carlson, a professor at…
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Daniel Swain on KCRW’s “Press Play:” California fires have burned some 4 million acres. How to protect people and property
This year has been full of natural disasters for California: record temperatures, hazardous air, and the worst fire season ever. The fires have collectively burned nearly 4 million acres in…
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Daniel Blumstein in The Scientist: Wielding Fear
Harnessing fear can lead to responsible behavior & sound thinking. UCLA Institute of Environment and Sustainability animal behavior researcher Daniel Blumstein discusses the ecological power &evolutionary history of fear, an…
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Tom Smith in World War Zero: The Congo Basin in an Era of Climate Change
World War Zero, a coalition fighting the climate crisis, features an op-ed by CBI’s Founding Co-Executive Director Tom Smith discussing the effects of climate change on Congo Basin biodiversity. “Climate…
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Daniel Swain in WIRED: The Debate Was a Disaster. But Hey, Climate Change Came Up
The good news: The presidential debate addressed global warming. The bad news: Trump dodged it, especially when it came to wildfires. “It was kind of interesting that that was the…