Posts

UCLA faculty voice: A smarter way to pay for parks

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In California, we often pass multibillion-dollar environmental bonds and don’t look back at who benefited from the spending. But what if we could look back and learn?

UCLA IoES fundraiser honors champions of the environment

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At its recent annual gala, UCLA Institute of the Environment and Sustainability raised a record $1.75 million for UCLA’s environmental research, education and community projects and honored four individuals who’ve made major contributions to that effort.

Antarctica could be headed for major meltdown

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In the early Miocene Epoch, temperatures were 10 degrees warmer and ocean levels were 50 feet higher — well above the ground level of modern-day New York, Tokyo and Berlin. It was more than 16 million years ago, so times were different.

Uphill battle for California’s native plant species

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Invasive species have moved faster than native species, colonizing and competing in new territories. But endemic species — those unique to California — have largely stayed put. Endemics currently occupy spaces where they can successfully compete against invasive species and other disturbances – but climate change could prove too challenging.

UCLA faculty voice: Ten environmental reasons to be thankful

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Thanksgiving is the one national holiday that has avoided being despoiled by excessive commercialization. It is a time when families and friends gather to appreciate one another and be thankful.

Q&A with Ryan Harrigan on West Nile virus, silent killer of songbirds

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Remember West Nile virus? While it makes headlines every few years for causing a flurry of deaths in people, the virus has also meant significant declines in the survival of some of the most common North American songbird species, according to a new study coauthored by Ryan Harrigan of UCLA’s Institute of the Environment and Sustainability (IoES).

UCLA faculty voice: Nine environmental myths everyone needs to unlearn

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School is back in session, and many college students around the country are taking their first course in conservation and environmental science. I have taught these introductory courses for 30 years, and have been consistently surprised by the erroneous certainties students bring to the first environmental science lecture.

UCLA faculty voice: California universities launch experiment to go carbon-neutral ‘at scale’

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What does it look like when a university decides to walk the walk as well as talk the talk on climate change? The University of California system — which encompasses 10 university campuses and two national scientific research laboratories — is about to find out.