UC Davis' awesome animals

After a whole year here at UC Davis, my time here has come to an end. There are many creatures that I will miss in this charming college town. 

Growing up in Los Angeles, California, my lifestyle was very different from the slow-paced world of UC Davis. At UC Davis, instead of being surrounded by buildings and traffic, I found myself surrounded by nature and agriculture. Soon after arriving at Davis, I found myself slowing down and taking in the beautiful scenery.

PREP outing to San Francisco

As a Southern California Native, Davis and Sacramento had been my only taste of what Northern California was like. Davis’ 113 ℉ heat wave back in September was unbearable, the hottest climate I ever had the misfortune to experience; the rest of the month still hovered around the 80’s. To say I was excited to finally experience weather below 70 ℉ at San Francisco in early October was an understatement. I couldn’t wait to experience this famous city that was well known across the globe and would always pop up in cultural media and cinema.

Congratulations to Professors Karen Zito and John Albeck!

Karen Zito, Professor of Neurobiology, Physiology, and Behavior, was named a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science for her "contributions to understanding excitatory synapse formation and the dynamics of postsynaptic excitatory proteins."

John Albeck, an associate professor in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology, was recently named a 2021-22 UC Davis Chancellor’s Fellow, which includes $25,000 in support of research or other scholarly work. 

Prosthetics: collaborations in neuroscience and engineering

PREP@UC Davis trainer Wil Joiner (Associate Professor, Neurobiology, Physiology, and Behavior) works with UC Davis faculty member Jonathon Schofield (Associate Professor, Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering) to design improved prosthetic limbs for children.

Joiner studies how the brain controls the limbs and movement, and collaborates with Schofield and clinicians at the Northern California Shriners Hospital for Children in this project.

Congratulations to Professors Megan Dennis and Crystal Rogers!

PREP@UCD mentors Dr. Megan Dennis and Dr. Crystal Rogers both earned National Science Foundation CAREER Awards this year! The CAREER Award, NSF's most prestigious grant to early career faculty, provides five years of funding in support of both research and mentoring. UC Davis now has 23 faculty who have been selected for these awards in the 2020-2021 and 2021-2022 cycles.

Life with an axolotl

UC Davis faculty member Crystal Rogers studies neurodevelopment, and specially addresses how neural crest cells migrate and differentiate to form facial features, external pigment, and parts of the nervous system. What's more, she uses a comparative lens and studies development in chickens, quail, peafowl, and axolotls. Insights from her research may lead to increased understanding of vertebrate evolution, as well as disorders in developmental pathways that can lead to some types of cancer.

Scientific aquaculture, starring Dr. Crystal Rogers and Chonk

Dr. Jackson Gross, an aquaculture cooperative extension specialist and faculty member at UC Davis, visited the lab of Dr. Crystal Rogers to learn about vertebrate development, comparative embryology, and the importance her colony of axolotls. PREP@UCD scholar Connor Christensen studies axolotls for his project in 2020-2021, and alumnus and current BMCDB student Colton Baumler has joined the Rogers lab for his PhD research.