News

What makes for a successful climate-resilient fishery, one that sustainably produces resources for human benefit despite increasing climate stressors and human impacts? It’s a question that faces present and future fisheries, their practitioners and fishing communities as the world turns to the ocean to feed its growing population.

The Pacific Ocean covers 32% of Earth’s surface area, more than all the land combined. Unsurprisingly, its activity affects conditions around the globe.

Periodic variations in the ocean’s water temperature and winds, called the El Niño–Southern Oscillation, are a major meteorologic force. Scientists know that human activity is affecting this system, but are still determining the extent. A new study in Nature has revealed that the atmospheric component — called the “Pacific Walker Circulation” — has changed its behavior over the industrial era in ways that weren’t expected. The international team of authors also found that volcanic eruptions can cause the Walker Circulation to temporarily weaken, inducing El Niño conditions. The results provide important insights into how El Niño and La Niña events may change in the future.

UC Santa Barbara recently received $1 million in new funding intended to accelerate climate innovation and entrepreneurship developments on campus. This funding comes after the UC system announced $15 million in grants, part of a historic partnership between UC and the state of California to address the climate crisis and create innovative strategies for drought, wildfire and other impacts of a warming planet. This has allowed for the Climate Innovation Fellows to be created by the California NanoSystems Institute (CNSI), an integrated research facility for science and innovation at Elings Hall that is managing…

As interest in climate science has exploded with the looming threat of climate change, scientists around the world have sought to better understand how precipitation patterns may change in the future or have changed in the past due to corresponding changes in temperature.

In a paper published today — World Bee Day — in the Annual Review of Resource Economics, a team of researchers at UC Santa Barbara, the University of North Texas (UNT) and the University of Maryland (UMD) take a look at pollinators, examining them from economic and ecological perspectives. Kathy Baylis, a professor of geography at UC Santa Barbara, Elinor Lichtenberg, an assistant professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at UNT, and Erik Lichtenberg, a professor in Agricultural and Resource Economics at the University of UMD, are the article’s coauthors.

As is abundantly clear to everyone, this past year turned all of our lives upside down and kept us away from the routine that we had known so well. While students, staff, and faculty settled into remote schooling, Transportation & Parking Services & the Associated Students (AS) Bike Committee began a series of sustainable transportation improvements, including adding more electric vehicle charging stations, installing parking occupancy systems, improving bike paths, and planning the building of a new AS Bicycle Shop.

Javiera Barandiarán, an associate professor in UC Santa Barbara’s Department of Global Studies, has been awarded a 2021-22 Berlin Prize by the American Academy in Berlin.

UC Santa Barbara expands its leadership on coastal issues with revival of Ocean & Coastal Policy Center within the Marine Science Institute