We live in a geometric world. From the rectangular skylines of our cities and the orbiting planets of our solar system to the symmetry of butterfly wings and the spiraling double helix of DNA, every shape has its place.
For as long as he can remember, Ryosuke Motani has been fascinated by shapes. And he’s built an illustrious paleobiology career studying them.
You don't have to be a student at UC Davis to learn from these professors. Their knowledge about Earth and its environment is woven throughout these new books, including two from College of Letters and Science faculty, that came out in 2023 or are about to be published.
Paleontologists are getting a glimpse at life over a billion years in the past based on chemical traces in ancient rocks and the genetics of living animals. Research published Dec. 1 in Nature Communications combines geology and genetics, showing how changes in the early Earth prompted a shift in how animals eat.
For decades, Geerat Vermeij has forged an illustrious career in the sciences by studying the intricacies of ancient seashell fossils. The findings he’s gleaned from his meticulous work have yielded broader insights about evolution, humanity, biology, economics and now, the role of power. In his new book, Vermeij explores how “the history of life on Earth can be meaningfully and informatively interpreted as a history of power” with the human species representing the current apex.
Working in the lab of Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences Ryosuke Motani, doctoral candidate Benjamin Faulkner is exploring how plant-eating developed in diapsids, a lineage that includes dinosaurs and modern day lizards, snakes, turtles, birds and crocodilians.
Distinguished Professor Emeritus Geerat Vermeij, Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, will deliver the upcoming New Emeriti Distinguished Lecture scheduled for Feb. 15.
The next time you feel your heart racing and your blood pressure rising, try this: Go outside and gaze at a body of water. Research by a UC Davis psychologist suggests that contemplating water — even if it’s a swimming pool — may be good for psychological well-being.
Many people mistakenly think of evolution as progress. But humans, despite their ability to manipulate objects and change their environment, are not “on top” of the world’s species. Research by Lynn Isbell, chair of the UC Davis Department of Anthropology, suggests that ancestral humans and other primates developed different strategies to find food and avoid predators.
The story of how Claudio Monteza-Moreno came to UC Davis illustrates how research today often crosses boundaries — reaching across disciplines and around the globe to explore complex problems. Monteza-Moreno is a graduate student working in the lab of evolutionary anthropologist Meg Crofoot, studying how wildlife in Panama navigate landscapes transformed by humans. However, his background is in biology.
No animal alive today looks quite like a duck-billed platypus, a semi-aquatic, egg-laying mammal hailing from eastern Australia. But about 250 million years ago, something very similar swam the shallow seas in what is now China, finding prey by touch with a cartilaginous bill. The newly discovered marine reptile Eretmorhipis carrolldongi from the lower Triassic period is described in the journal Scientific Reports Jan. 24.