A new study documents how Southern Californians are chronically being exposed to toxic airborne chemicals called plasticizers, including one that’s been banned from children’s items and beauty products. Plasticizers are chemical compounds that make materials more flexible. They are used in a wide variety of products ranging from lunchboxes and shower curtains to garden hoses...
Several Southern California communities, including Riverside, are being hit with smoke from the huge Line Fire in the San Bernardino Mountains, creating what the Environmental Protection Agency classifies as “very unhealthy” air quality. UC Riverside experts on environmental pollution describe what we’re breathing, how long the airborne particles are likely to stick around, and what...
With temperatures across much of Southern California crossing triple digits this week, we are relying more than ever on plants to keep us cool outside. But the plants don’t get much of a break from the relentless sun. How founded are fears that one of our main sources of shade might not make it through...
New research shows that California’s Central Valley, known as America’s breadbasket, gets as much as half of its groundwater from the Sierra Nevadas. This is significant for a farming region that, in some parts, relies almost entirely on groundwater for irrigation. While it is easy to see above-ground reservoirs rise and fall with the rain...
A new study greatly reduces uncertainty in climate change predictions, a move economists say could save the world trillions in adaptations for a hotter future. The study, published in the journal Nature Communications, considers dozens of climate models from different countries that differ in the magnitude of global warming they predict to occur by the...
Lack of rainfall is not the only measure of drought. New UC Riverside research shows that despite a series of storms, the impact of drought can persist in streams and rivers for up to 3.5 years. There are two measures of drought in streams. One measure is the total water level, which is impacted by...
UC Riverside scientists are taking a modern approach to studying a murky subject — the quantity, quality, and sources of microplastics in Los Angeles County’s urban streams. Microplastics are particles with a maximum diameter of 5 millimeters, roughly the size of a pencil eraser. The category can include nanoplastics, which are far smaller than the...
Using a new detection method, UC Riverside scientists found a massive amount of methane, a super-potent greenhouse gas, coming from wildfires — a source not currently being accounted for by state air quality managers. Methane warms the planet 86 times more powerfully than carbon dioxide over the course of 20 years, and it will be...
Water in California’s Central Valley contains enough manganese to cause cognitive disabilities and motor control issues in children, and Parkinson’s-like symptoms in adults. Read More
UC Riverside researchers have identified tiny organisms that not only survive but thrive during the first year after a wildfire. The findings could help bring land back to life after fires that are increasing in both size and severity. The Holy Fire burned more than 23,000 acres across Orange and Riverside counties in 2018. Wanting...
New UC Riverside research suggests nitrogen released by gas-powered machines causes dry soil to let go of carbon and release it back into the atmosphere, where it can contribute to climate change. Industrial manufacturing, agricultural practices, and significantly, vehicles, all burn fossil fuels that release nitrogen into the air. As a result, levels of nitrogen...
New research from the University of Quebec in Canada has led to recent headlines like this one from the BBC, declaring coffee pods are “better for the planet than filtered brew.” Read More
University of California scientists have a new way to demonstrate which neighborhoods returned to pre-pandemic levels of air pollution after COVID restrictions ended. Vehicle emissions are the biggest source of carbon dioxide in Southern California’s air. As people drove their cars far less in 2020 compared to 2019 due to the pandemic, there was a...
"The Salton Sea, California’s most polluted inland lake, has lost a third of its water in the last 25 years. New research has determined a decline in Colorado River flow is the reason for that shrinking. As the lake dries up, the concentration of salt and chemicals in the remaining water has increased dramatically, causing...
"A $342,000 grant will allow more Latinx students at UC Riverside and UC Berkeley to conduct environmental and climate change research. The project, “Latinxs and the Environment: Partnerships to Pave Pathways to the Professoriate,” is funded by the University of California Hispanic Serving Institutions Doctoral Diversity Initiative and will be led by UCR and UC...
"Dairy farms produce large amounts of two things: milk and poop. Milk finds its way into delicacies like hot cocoa and grilled cheese sandwiches but the poop just piles up. Dairy farmers bulldoze the mess into artificial ponds called manure lagoons, where anaerobic microbes break it down into methane, a powerful greenhouse gas. Methane traps...
New research reveals that items in litter typically originate less than two miles from where they’re found — and unless humans remove them, most of these items will never leave the environment. For the study, researchers from the University of California, Riverside spent a month collecting trash from seven sites across the Inland Empire. They...
"It is unlikely that a cancer-causing chemical inside your car can be dusted or wiped way, according to new UC Riverside research. This finding has now been published in the journal Environmental Research. It follows on the heels of a related study showing the longer your commute, the more you’re exposed to this chemical." Read...
Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a drought emergency for the entire state of California this past month. The period from Oct. 1, 2020 to Sept. 30, 2021 was the second-driest year on record in California. Almost 90% of the state is in throes of extreme drought. Reservoir storage is 60% of average. Said one state water...
Salini Sasidharan has been featured as the 'Featured Soil Modeller' in a recent newsletter for the International Soil Modeling Consortium. "Salini Sasidharan is an emerging young scientist in the critical areas of Environmental Science and Engineering, including groundwater quantity and quality management, sustainable irrigated agriculture, and resilient urban and rural water resources infrastructures." Read More
