Sterling College to Celebrate Founders Day with Special Heritage Convocation | Sterling College
Thursday, October 24, 2024
Sterling College will honor its legacy and rich history with a Founders Day celebration on Friday, November 1, 2024, the same day the College was founded in 1887. The highlight of the day will be a Heritage Convocation service, which will take place at 10 a.m. in Culbertson Auditorium and is open to students, faculty, alumni, and the public.
David Earle, vice president for advancement and alumni relations, will present a reflection on Sterling College’s heritage and enduring impact on the community and beyond. During this special presentation, Earle will share stories from the College’s past and celebrate how Sterling continues to shape future leaders in line with its Christian mission.
In addition to the Heritage Chapel, attendees are invited to wear Sterling apparel and enjoy the spirit of the day by engaging with the campus community. Founders Day celebrates not only the College’s history but also the ongoing contributions of students, faculty, and alumni who advance its mission every day.
The event coincides with Giving Day 2024, another momentous occasion for Sterling College. As part of the celebration, the College encourages alumni and supporters to participate in both events by giving, sharing their Sterling stories, and wearing their Sterling gear with pride.
For more information about the Founders Day celebration, contact the Office of Advancement at 620-278-4219. To take part in Sterling College’s Giving Day, visit www.sterling.edu/giving-day or contact the Office of Advancement at 620-278-4219.
Sterling College is a Christ-centered, four-year college located in Sterling, Kansas, with a mission to develop creative and thoughtful leaders who understand a maturing Christian faith. For more information, visithttp://www.sterling.edu.
As the climate continues to change, the risks to farming are only going to increase.
That’s the key takeaway from a recent paper published by a team that included UC Merced researchers. The paper dives into what those challenges are, how farmers are working to address them and what should come next.
“Climate Smart Agriculture: Assessing Needs and Perceptions of California’s Farmers” was first authored by Samuel Ikendi, academic coordinator, with engineering research Professor Tapan Pathak as a corresponding author. Pathak is also a project director of National Institute of Food and Agriculture-funded project “Multifaceted Pathways to Climate-Smart Agriculture through Participator Program Development and Delivery,” which supported this study. The study appeared in the open access journal Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems.
The needs assessment was designed to understand farmers’ perceptions and experiences with climate change exposures; the risk management practices they currently use; and what tools and resources would assist them in making strategic decisions.
Of the farmers surveyed, roughly two-thirds agree climate change is occurring and requires action. Even more said they are interested in learning more about the impacts of climate change on the agricultural industry. Most respondents said they experience greater climate change impacts on their farms today compared with 10 years ago.
Farmers were very concerned with water-related issues, with those in the San Joaquin Valley, Central Coast and Inland Empire areas particularly worried about a reduction in the availability of groundwater. Increased drought severity was a very significant concern among farmers in the Inland Empire, Central Coast and Southern regions. Farmers in the North Coast and Southern regions were concerned about increased damage to crops due to wildfire.
Closely related were temperature-related issues, including crop damage due to extreme heat.
Those who farm vegetables were more concerned about water availability for irrigation, while fruit farmers were more concerned about increased crop/water stress and increased crop damage due to extreme heat.
Many respondents said they are implementing climate adaption practices including managing water resources, maintaining soil health and making more use of renewable energy sources. They are seeking insurance and government help to pay for these adaptations and increase their agricultural resilience, the researchers wrote.
The farmers expressed interest in learning more about measures they might take to mitigate climate change. But they cited significant barriers to this work, including government regulations, high implementation cost, labor access/cost, access to water and the availability of money to pay for it.
“Climate change is significantly altering California’s highly diverse agricultural landscape, posing challenges such as increased water stress, heat stress, and shifting growing seasons,” Pathak said. “Climate-smart agriculture practices can alleviate some of those stresses.”
But, he said, research and UC Extension efforts only have value if they lead to enhanced climate-informed decision-making at the local level.
“Assessing their level of knowledge, perception and needs will help in tailoring research and extension activities that are most relevant to farmers on the ground,” Pathak said. “Results from this study could also provide important policy insights on financial incentives and technical assistance.”
Farmhand Ventures announces the publication of its research paper, “Inclusive Innovation in Agriculture: Redesigning Agtech Ecosystems for All,” funded by UC Merced’s Valley Institute for Sustainability, Technology and Agriculture (VISTA).
The team of authors, led by Connie Bowen with support from Suma Reddy and Jamil Wynne of Riffle Ventures and Sarah Mock, author of “Farm and other F Words” and “Big Team Farms,” interviewed entrepreneurs and support organizations to develop five best practices for agriculture.
Leveraging their first-hand experience as entrepreneurs, the authors describe how agricultural technology has unique challenges – limited funding, seasonal constraints on iteration and a diverse workforce – and obligations to continue to serve farmers, farmworkers and all who depend on the agricultural system. According to the research paper, “Inclusive innovation is a strategy that actively involves a diverse range of stakeholders in the design, development, and implementation of solutions to ensure they are technically viable, socially acceptable and practically usable.”
Agriculture faces challenges such as misaligned solutions and barriers to innovation. Inclusive innovation brings together different people in technology development to create practical and usable solutions. This method helps develop technologies that address real-world needs.
“Through intentionality, ongoing commitment and strategic support, inclusive innovation can lead to more resilient and sustainable agricultural practices,” the paper states.
“Including the people who actually do the work in the innovation process derisks product development,” said Connie Bowen, general partner of Farmhand Ventures. “Fewer than 1% of Americans have direct exposure to farms and agriculture and farmers and farmworkers are aging out of the system. Those currently engaged in ag must collaborate with those looking to innovate within ag to maintain domestic food security.”
The report offers strategies for entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial support organizations, such as learning about the problems, listening to marginalized voices and working together. These methods can build trust, encourage adoption and lead to important improvements in agriculture.
“Inclusive innovation is the defining factor for our research – it’s what sets us apart,” said Professor Joshua Viers, faculty director of the Farms, Food, Future Innovation Initiative at UC Merced (F3 Innovate). “Our faculty and students focus on this region and the people who work in agriculture because California is a leader for the world in climate, equity and economic development. Designing for our people and our planet creates better outcomes for everyone.”
Inclusive innovation begins with a thorough understanding of the problem and its context, crucial in sectors such as agriculture where distinctions between customers and end-users are pronounced. Entrepreneurs then engage deeply with all stakeholders, gaining insights into their strengths and needs. Emphasizing input from marginalized groups ensures diverse perspectives during solution development. Through iterative processes and overcoming participation challenges, entrepreneurs manage conflicting stakeholder interests by prioritizing common goals, aiming for transparent and equitable outcomes.
“As an agtech entrepreneur who did not grow up on a farm, closing the distance between myself and farmers and farmworkers can feel challenging. But it is absolutely essential that it happen for all of us in the industry to work together to solve real problems and co-create innovative, yet practical, solutions,” said Suma Reddy from Riffle Ventures.
“This report is a valuable introduction with concrete recommendations for agtech innovators and entrepreneurs, as well as entrepreneur support organizations like F3 Innovate,” said Kimberly Gibson, postdoctoral scholar in inclusive innovation at UC Merced. “As the report demonstrates, inclusive innovation is not only a strategy for positive social change but also a smart business practice as it can result in more creative designs, better product-market fit and greater customer satisfaction.”
“We hope all agtech innovators, including those in the Central Valley, will use this guide to create more relevant tech and stronger solutions to our greatest challenges,” said Leigh Bernacchi, executive director of F3 Innovate at UC Merced. “If we design with all participants in mind, just imagine what the food system could be as tech is finally catching up with what we know we need to do for sustainability and the people who grow our food: cleaner, greener and healthier.”
California’s agriculture faces challenges from a highly variable climate with temperatures that will increase over the next several decades. Droughts are worsening and the Sierra snowpack, integral to the water supply, is volatile.
However, there are a number of ways to mitigate those changes, as outlined in a new paper coauthored by a group of UC faculty.
The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a peer-reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences, published a special issue on “Climate Change and California Sustainability – Challenges and Solutions.” It includes the paper titled “Cultivating Climate Resilience in California Agriculture: Adaptations to an Increasingly Volatile Water Future.”
“Climate change impacts on productivity and profitability of California agriculture are increasing and forebode problems for standard agricultural practices, especially water use norms,” lead writer Josué Medellín-Azuara, a UC Merced professor of environmental engineering, said in the paper. “In the face of clear conflicts among competing interests, we consider ongoing and potential sustainable and equitable solutions, with particular attention to how technology and policy can facilitate progress.”
Though California’s soil is among the most fertile on Earth, at first glance the state might seem a poor choice for farming: Much of the state doesn’t see rainfall for six months of the year. But toward the beginning of the 20 th century, irrigation infrastructure and pumping allowed cultivation of water-intensive summer crops. Now the state produces $60 billion worth of agricultural products each year, according to the California Department of Food and Agriculture.
The multidisciplinary team of coauthors included economists Kurt Schwabe from UC Riverside and Daniel Sumner from UC Davis, agroecologist Amélie Gaudin from UC Davis, and water systems engineer Alvar Escriva-Bou, who works with both UC Davis and UCLA.
Researchers identified three key areas of action to help reduce California agriculture’s vulnerabilities to climate change: water demand, water supply and the institutions that govern its use.
On the demand side, how and when water is delivered can have a major impact on how much is used.
“More efficient watering, fallowing land when needed and changing the crop mix will likely reduce overall water demand by agriculture,” according to the paper, although the authors caution that proposed farm-level efficiencies may not lead to overall savings of any appreciable degree.
Over the past four decades, agricultural water use in California has decreased by nearly 15% while overall farm revenue has increased by nearly 40%, the researchers found.
On the supply side, researchers listed options that include better capture and use of flood water, maintaining healthy soils, and effectively monitoring and responding to extreme weather events. Groundwater recharge, water recycling and reuse, and desalination also provide opportunities to enhance supply. Another option, trading water with areas that have more of it, can help reallocate water supplies to reduce costs of both temporary and long-term shortfalls.
Experiments conducted by UC Merced researchers find that people who perform good deeds are far more likely to be thought of as religious believers than atheists. Moreover, the psychological bias linking kindness and helpfulness with faith appears to be global in scale.
Research on the mental link between moral behavior and religious belief goes back more than a decade. Prior research, however, emphasized the dark side of this equation, with participants asked whether they assumed it was more probable that a serial killer believed in God or was an atheist (people in nations all over the planet thought the latter was more likely).
The UC Merced studies, conceptualized by cognitive science graduate student Alex Dayer and published this week in the journal Scientific Reports, flipped the switch to the bright side: What if someone was a “serial helper,” prone to extraordinary benevolence?
The research found that the stereotype of an extraordinarily good person being religious was dramatically stronger that of an extraordinarily cruel person being an atheist, said co-author Colin Holbrook, a professor in the university’s Department of Cognitive and Information Sciences .
“Though we also found that people intuitively link atheism with immoral behavior, people appear to associate believing in God with being generous, helpful and caring to a much greater extent,” Holbrook said.
The research consisted of experiments conducted in two nations with disparate levels of religious belief:
The United States, where 47% of the population describes itself as religious, according to a recent Gallup poll.
New Zealand, where 49% of respondents in the 2018 census indicated no religious belief.
Participants read a description of a man who took a path of increasing benevolence, from helping stray animals as a child to, as an adult, giving food and clothes to homeless people. Sometimes, during bitingly cold weather, he offered a spare room to homeless families.
Half of the participants were asked which is more probable: The man is a teacher or the man is a teacher and believes in God. The other half were asked the same question, but the options were “the man is a teacher” or “the man is a teacher and does not believe in God.”
The most logical response would be to guess the man is a teacher, a group that would include both teachers who believe and teachers who are atheists. But people have been found to pick the less likely option to this type of question if it matches a strong social stereotype in their minds.
The results were striking. U.S. respondents were nearly 20 times more likely to guess that the helpful man believed in God than that the man was an atheist. In New Zealand, respondents were 12 times more likely to guess that the helpful man was religious.
The bias intuitively connecting religious belief to socially uplifting behavior was significantly stronger than that found with the study’s inverse, “dark side” conditions, which looked for stereotypes of atheists as antisocial. The bias was there, but far less powerful.
“So instead of a stereotype of atheists as immoral driving the effect, the stereotype of the moral person of faith may be the more important force,” Holbrook said. “We replicated the findings of the earlier studies linking evil with atheism, but we found that the effects linking prosociality with faith were remarkably larger.”
The study’s results fit with a theory about the historical development of major world religions that emphasizes cooperation. Belief that a powerful being or spiritual force rewards positive moral behavior – and punishes immoral behavior – is shared by all major religions. This kind of belief might help members of religious groups trust one another, cooperate and grow.
“Strangers with little in common beyond their shared spiritual beliefs in moralizing gods might be more inclined to trust and less inclined to exploit one another,” Holbrook said.
Of course, the UC Merced experiments and similar research measure only what stereotypes people project onto others – how they think someone would act based on what they believe.
“Our evidence indicates that people stereotype believers as more likely to care about and help others. But this theoretical model suggests that the stereotype might actually have had merit in the past as major religions grew or may possibly be true even now — people who believe in God might actually be more likely to help others,” Holbrook said. “The evidence that believers are more prosocial is currently mixed, and it’s a question that calls for more research.”
A group of UC Merced researchers modeled predation behaviors, as well as changes in those behaviors, among large carnivores, developing a new theory that will help biologists assess the health of various ecosystems.
Department of Life and Environmental Sciences Professor Justin Yeakel, Department of Physics Professor Ajay Gopinathan and their former graduate student V. P. S. Ritwika use the new theory to predict how predators forage — do they predominantly hunt, scavenge or steal from another predator?
The study results are detailed in the March issue of the Journal of Animal Ecology, published by the British Ecological Society.
The predicted behaviors are based on several sets of variables:
· The size of the predator and the relative size of the prey (in the case of stealing, the size of the competitor as well);
· The relative risks and rewards of consumption – the quality of the meal, the energy expended to get the meal, and the risk of injury in fighting for the meal;
· And how hungry or healthy the predator is — sated, starving or near death.
“We wanted to understand what induces a predator to switch between these behaviors,” said Yeakel, who studies the ecology of contemporary and ancient food webs. “First, we had to consider the differences between different ways that predators obtain their prey.”
By hunting, a predator can have the prey all to itself, but must expend the energy and take the risks associated with finding and taking down that prey, while also keeping it away from scavengers and those who would steal it.
Scavengers benefit from the effort of others by sharing the spoils of a successful hunt. That means they don’t have the risk associated with the hunt, but have access to less of the kill, and potentially exposure to harmful microbiota. Stealing can be an even riskier proposition but can have a bigger payoff if the thief manages to get the whole kill while avoiding injury.
“Stealing can be a good alternative for some animals, if their body size is similar to or larger than that of the primary hunter, which increases the chance of success.” Yeakel explained. “There can be a lot of risk in stealing from another predator.”
Animals tend to use a more flexible and diverse toolkit for obtaining food as they get closer to starvation, the researchers found.
“That’s not surprising, because if you’re far away from starvation you have an energetic buffer and can afford to go after prey giving a good return at minimal risk,” Yeakel said. “But as you they get closer to starvation, animals tend to incorporate multiple alternative behaviors.”
But all of this is tied to the body size of the hunter, the size of the predator compared to the prey and the relative size of the predator and its potential competitors.
“The bigger you are, the greater percentage of your body mass can be carried as fat, such that the risk of starvation is lower,” Yeakel said. “But as you go after larger prey, the risk to yourself becomes greater. So scavenging is the typical approach if the prey is much larger than the predator, while hunting predominates for predators that are of similar size to their prey.”
The researchers are now able to predict these behavioral transitions based on body size. They and others can also use their model to better understand the effects of climate change as the warming climate pushes ecological communities into new, and potentially hazardous, states.
Their model was borne out by observations of such animals as lions, tigers, wild dogs, hyenas and cheetahs.
“Lions will tend to hunt prey up to about wildebeest size, and they will scavenge prey that is larger than that,” Yeakel said. “Hyenas transition at a size class closer to that of zebra.”
Scientists understand less about scavenging because it is hard to observe in the field, he said. It is not well understood how scavenging contributes to the assembly and structure of food webs or how dependent species are on scavenged biomass. Hunting is better understood because it is more actively observable.
“We think of hyenas as scavengers and lions as hunters, but they scavenge roughly similar proportions of their diet,” Yeakel said.
The framework provided by the researchers provides valuable insights into predator foraging behaviors, offering a powerful tool for future observational research.
As California lawmakers consider a package of bills aimed at increasing the production of clean energy, a major question arises: How would we store all this new power?
Storage is a vital issue because while the state can create plenty of energy through solar, wind and hydro power, there must be ways to effectively stockpile it for use overnight or on calm, overcast days or when the waterways dwindle.
A project commissioned by the California Energy Commission and led by UC Merced electrical engineering Professor Sarah Kurtz aims at evaluating solutions for long-duration energy storage.
Researchers examined various scenarios to better understand the value of long-duration energy storage to meet California’s goal to reach net-zero emissions from retail electricity sales by 2045. The study also explored duration, cost and other attributes of future energy storage.
The project also studied how energy policy and the state’s power grid’s conditions may affect the need, benefits and desired attributes of energy storage. Researchers wanted to find solutions that would be practical and relatively inexpensive to implement. They leveraged existing modeling tools and modified them.
Solar accounts for 27% of the electricity generated in California. Historically, the state turned to natural gas in the overnight hours, But this year, battery storage provided enough energy to meet peak demand in the early evening.
“During times of high demand (like the state’s recent heat wave) and during cloudy times, having storage that holds enough energy to provide power to the grid for a longer time (long-duration energy storage) will be useful,” Kurtz said. “The study showed that the majority of the storage should be designed to last eight hours, with some storage designed to last 100 hours to serve during the most challenging demands for power.
“It’s an exciting time to see which technologies will come together to provide a reliable, sustainable energy system.”
The most efficient system for storing energy now is lithium batteries, which have been dropping in price. Researchers advised utilities and homeowners investing in solar energy to consider including lithium batteries to extend the use of power collected during the day into the evenings and through the night. Though many current lithium batteries last for four hours, the study found an eight-hour battery would be ideal to serve electricity needs overnight.
In addition to storing solar energy, the report advocated rethinking when electricity should be used the most. Electricity providers historically have structured rates to discourage people from using power during times of peak demand, currently 4 -9 p.m.
“In the future, the focus should be to shift electricity use to daytime,” Kurtz said. Thinking about shifting electricity use toward daytime (maybe 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.) instead of away from peak hours will be a change in mindset for our utilities, but an important change.”
This shift can present a low-cost opportunity to reduce the need for energy storage while still working to expand storage capacities. For example, Kurtz said, many electric vehicles are programmed to charge after midnight. But it would make more sense to charge them during the day in California when solar energy is abundant.
“The study predicts that daytime charging of electric vehicles could reduce the required storage power for charging electric vehicles in the electric grid by half compared to nighttime charging, leading to substantial savings in grid-level storage capital costs,” said Farzan ZareAfifi, a Ph.D. candidate in Kurtz’ research group. “Therefore, it would be beneficial to install more charging stations at workplaces, enabling owners to charge their cars while they work at times when solar power is abundant.”
When fixed arrays are used, south-facing solar panels can help to balance seasonal supply with demand. Although east- and west-facing arrays effectively reduce the storage needed to go through the night, a study explained that south-facing solar arrays better align with seasonal energy demands, reducing the reliance on long-duration energy storage compared to east-west-facing solar panel orientation.
California aims for 7.6 gigawatts of offshore wind by 2035 as the first step toward fulfilling the state’s long-term plan of getting 25 gigawatts of wind energy online by 2045. A gigawatt can sustain up to 300,000 homes in the United States a year, according to the Department of Energy. The high wind integration may change the storage landscape in the grid. Zabir Mahmud, another Ph.D. candidate in Kurtz’ lab, noted, “As the proportion of wind energy increases, the optimal storage duration is likely to shift from 8 hours to 24-36 hours.”
In simulated life-or-death decisions, about two-thirds of people in a UC Merced study allowed a robot to change their minds when it disagreed with them — an alarming display of excessive trust in artificial intelligence, researchers said.
Human subjects allowed robots to sway their judgment despite being told the AI machines had limited capabilities and were giving advice that could be wrong. In reality, the advice was random.
“As a society, with AI accelerating so quickly, we need to be concerned about the potential for overtrust,” said Professor Colin Holbrook , a principal investigator of the study and a member of UC Merced’s Department of Cognitive and Information Sciences . A growing amount of literature indicates people tend to overtrust AI, even when the consequences of making a mistake would be grave.
What we need instead, Holbrook said, is a consistent application of doubt.
“We should have a healthy skepticism about AI,” he said, “especially in life-or-death decisions.”
The study, published in the journal Scientific Reports, consisted of two experiments. In each, the subject had simulated control of an armed drone that could fire a missile at a target displayed on a screen. Photos of eight target photos flashed in succession for less than a second each. The photos were marked with a symbol – one for an ally, one for an enemy.
“We calibrated the difficulty to make the visual challenge doable but hard,” Holbrook said.
The screen then displayed one of the targets, unmarked. The subject had to search their memory and choose. Friend or foe? Fire a missile or withdraw?
After the person made their choice, a robot offered its opinion.
“Yes, I think I saw an enemy check mark, too,” it might say. Or “I don’t agree. I think this image had an ally symbol.”
The subject had two chances to confirm or change their choice as the robot added more commentary, never changing its assessment, i.e. “I hope you are right” or “Thank you for changing your mind.”
A group of faculty members at UC Merced has been awarded a $1 million seed grant from the National Science Foundation to form a research collaborative to expand participation and access to materials, research-focused facilities, education, training and careers.
The Venture for Innovation in Self-assembly and Integration of Optoelectronic Nanostructures (VISION) at UC Merced will work with the NSF Science and Technology Center for Integration of Modern Optoelectronic Materials on Demand (IMOD) headquartered at the University of Washington and spanning a network of institutions across the nation.
The VISION Partnership brings together a multi-disciplinary team from UC Merced and IMOD. At UC Merced the core members of the VISION team are professors Michael Scheibner, Sayantani Ghosh and Hui Cai with the Department of Physics, Tao Ye with the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, and Mehmet Baykara with the Department of Mechanical Engineering, as well as several others. The IMOD team features researchers from the University of Washington, the University of Colorado Boulder, the Renewable and Sustainable Energy Institute, the University of Pennsylvania and Lehigh University
Together, they will develop a program that cultivates student potential in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. They will offer enriched research opportunities, transdisciplinary scientific collaboration, pedagogical development and inclusive mentoring.
The three-year seed grant will fund a teacher training component to help K-14 educators and graduate students integrate contemporary materials science into diverse classrooms, fostering early enthusiasm and confidence to explore STEM topics, along with other efforts.
Scheibner, the principal investigator, is leading the effort and said this seed grant is funding the foundation of a Partnerships for Research and Education in Materials center on campus, focused on increasing diversity among the materials science and engineering community.
“We are creating pathways by giving students experiential learning opportunities that will allow them to learn about modern materials, and also to try out career trajectories, whether it’s at our campus or partnering universities, national labs or in industry,” Scheibner said. “We aspire to be a steppingstone for students into the exciting world of materials, starting at very early ages.”
In addition to outreach to younger students, VISION will offer hands-on research opportunities and mentoring for undergraduate and graduate students, train faculty members in culturally responsive mentoring, and expand materials science and engineering research.
“Starting in the spring, we will offer fellowships to undergraduate students because we want to enable them to get involved in the research projects we and IMOD are working on, including DNA-guided nano-assemblies of colloidal quantum dots for quantum light generation and light manipulation,” Scheibner said. “We plan to select up to eight research fellows each semester.”
The fellows will be part of transdisciplinary projects that involve several faculty members from both the schools of Engineering and Natural Sciences.
VISION and IMOD have also planned an exchange program for faculty and graduate students so they can build research collaborations and learn from each other. IMOD comprises several universities, and the exchange could include any of them.
This seed grant award allows the VISION partnership to compete for full six-year multimillion dollar PREM awards.
If they are awarded full PREM funding, they plan to greatly increase the number of undergraduates and graduates they work with, as well as offering immersive programs for younger students.
This year, NSF gave out more than $50 million across 15 minority-serving institutions, with awards of more than $4 million going to each of 11 schools.
“Supporting the scientific talent present in every community in our country is imperative to strengthening the nation’s materials research infrastructure, which is central to everything from semiconductors to medical implants,” said NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan.
Visit this site to hear an AI-generated discussion about the program.
Natural rubber is used in a wide range of products used throughout the globe. Lab-produced rubber works for many applications but is insufficient for vital items like airplane tires and specialty medical products.
Natural rubber also is a precious resource; 90% of the plants that serve as its source for are grown in a tiny area of Southeast Asia.
A $26 million grant from the National Science Foundation will fund an Engineering Research Center aimed at producing natural rubber in the United States, an industry that has the potential to enhance access to this precious natural resource and to produce millions of jobs.
UC Merced chemical and materials engineering Professor Kara McCloskey is a co-principal investigator for the newly awarded ERC, titled Transformation of American Rubber through Domestic Innovation for Supply Security, or TARDISS. The center is led by Ohio State University; in addition to UC Merced, partners include Caltech, North Carolina State University and Texas Tech University.
“The School of Engineering at UC Merced is pleased to accept this award and looks forward to participating in this impactful interdisciplinary research that aligns with UC Merced’s mission to incorporate sustainable best practices in all areas of technology,” Dean Rakesh Goel said.
According to its abstract, TARDISS will integrate engineering, biology, biotechnology, agriculture and other disciplines to produce new natural rubber materials at scale. McCloskey said she is “particularly excited to explore the use of natural rubber materials to generate new biocompatible medical products.”
Researchers across the participating institutions will work with students, farmers, processors and rubber manufacturers to enable natural rubber production in parts of the United States. They envision a circular biomanufacturing economy that respects natural systems, including pollinator services by the new domestic crops, water recycling and re-use, CO 2 capture, and an estimated 2 million domestic jobs.
In addition to McCloskey, the TARDISS team at UC Merced includes professors Colleen Naughton, Jay Sexton, Joshua Viers, Erin Hestir and Josué MedellÍn-Azuara. Together, they aim to understand how plants naturally produce rubber, develop new crop variants, disseminate “smart” crop production practices, quantify life cycle environmental and techno-economic market impacts, and extract and characterize new rubber and latex materials, along with novel processes-for-products.
“Engineering workforce development feeds directly into training the next generation of workers in these broad areas and “will synergize with the campus’s new chemical engineering B.S. degree program with hands-on experimentation in rubber and latex extraction from new plant materials” McCloskey said.
The ERC feature an inclusion effort involving underrepresented minorities, and will include training for neurodiverse youth. The outcomes will be a sustainable domestic natural rubber industry and a new, young workforce for engineering and agriculture trained through a new American Rubber Academy.
The lab is one of four recently funded by NSF’s Engineering Research Center program for a total of $104 million over five years, and the potential for up to $208 million over 10 years. The others ERCs will develop technologies to tackle the carbon challenge, expand physical capabilities and make heating and cooling more sustainable. Since its founding in 1985, the NSF has funded 83 such centers, which receive support for up to 10 years.
“The centers build partnerships with educational institutions, government agencies and industry stakeholders to support innovation and inclusion in established and emerging engineering research,” the NSF said.
“NSF Engineering Research Centers are powerhouses of discovery and innovation, bringing America’s great engineering minds to bear on our toughest challenges,” said NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan. “By collaborating with industry and training the workforce of the future, ERCs create an innovation ecosystem that can accelerate engineering innovations, producing tremendous economic and societal benefits for the nation.”
“This achievement will propel UCM research in new and exciting ways,” said Viers, Associate Vice Chancellor for Interdisciplinary Research and Strategic Initiatives in the Office of Research at UC Merced.
Oregonstate News Blog 