Science & Technology

Over 14 million Americans live with a mental illness, and over 8 million of them rely on prescription medication to treat their condition. While many evidence-based treatments are effective, many patients do not benefit enough and there remain patients who suffer from treatment-resistant conditions. These unmet challenges have driven interest in novel therapeutic approaches: one such emerging area of research interest being psychedelic-assisted therapy. 

How does your brain know where your hand is without looking, or adjusts when you pick up an object that’s heavier than expected? These everyday feats rely on the remarkable process known as sensorimotor integration.

Every day, seventeen people in the United States die waiting for an organ transplant while more than 100,000 patients are currently on national waiting lists, and kidneys being the most critically short supply. The demand for donor organs has vastly outpaced supply for decades, and no amount of public awareness campaigns has been capable of closing this gap. However, a very different solution is emerging from research labs. This technology instead involves pigs, molecular scissors, and reimagining where transplantable organs come from.

Nanotechnology is rapidly transforming the field of biotechnology by changing how scientists diagnose, treat, and understand diseases. At its core, nanotechnology involves manipulating materials at the nanoscale (usually between 1-100 nanometers). At that level, matter behaves a lot differently than at larger scales. The ability to work at such a small level allows breakthroughs that used to be impossible. For students and innovators interested in medicine, this topic represents the future of healthcare and scientific research.

Rapid advances in biology has led to a biotechnological revolution in recent decades. This progressing revolution has enabled breakthroughs in genetic technology once believed to be science fiction. The concept of human intervention in the natural processes of biology goes back millennia. Animal and plant breeding to create domestically useful breeds of animals and plants dates back to the earliest forms of domestication.

Typically, psychology often feels like a deeply human science as it is mainly concerned with our thoughts and behaviors. But some of the most powerful insights in the human mind have often come from looking beyond our species. Comparative and translational psychology bridge this gap, using animal research to illuminate universal principles of behavior, and apply them to human health. At UC Davis, the Bliss-Moreau Lab is an extremely strong example of this integrative approach in psychology.

Given the exponentially rising global population, agriculture is under increasing pressure to meet human needs. With the world estimated to reach 9.7 billion people by 2050, food production must increase by roughly 25–70%. This challenge is compounded by obstacles in plant breeding which include water scarcity, pest pressure, climate change, and limited arable land.

In August 2024, baby KJ was born in Philadelphia with a rare and life-threatening genetic condition: CPS1 deficiency. A mutation in his DNA meant he lacked a liver enzyme (CPS1) that breaks down ammonia–a waste product of protein metabolism. Patients with CPS1 deficiency need liver transplants, and to do so they need to be medically stable and old enough to handle a transplant procedure. In the meantime, there runs a risk of ammonia levels building up in the body and damaging organs, particularly the brain and liver.

Antibiotics are one of the most important discoveries in modern medicine. Since their introduction in the early twentieth century, doctors have used them to treat infections that used to be deadly, as well as making many modern medical procedures possible. However, the effectiveness of antibiotics is slowly decreasing due to antibiotic resistance. Antibiotic resistance happens when bacteria evolve mechanisms that allow them to survive exposure to drugs.

The global biosphere has seen rapid and dramatic shifts due to anthropogenetic climate change and habitat loss. In our contemporary world biodiversity has been plummeting at rapid rates, with the IUCN classifying 48,600 species across the planet as threatened or endangered accounting for roughly 28% of all assessed species. As of 2024 the World Wildlife Fund has measured an astonishing 73% decline in the average size of wildlife populations across the planet in the last 50 years.