Three alumni of the College of Letters and Science at UC Davis — an international economist, a racial justice advocate, and an assets manager dedicated to supporting research and educational excellence — are recipients of Cal Aggie Alumni Association’s 2023 Alumni Awards.
In rural Nigeria in 2014, 276 teenaged girls were abducted from their school by the militant Islamist group, Boko Haram. A few escaped, some were later released, but nearly a decade later about 100 are still missing.
Ten doctoral students across many disciplines in the College of Letters and Science and two students from outside the college will present research done as UC Davis Hemispheric Institute on the Americas Summer Fellowship recipients. The fellowships allowed the students to travel to further their scholarship into diverse topics ranging from music about the Panama Canal to examining human remains for insights into drought and societal collapse in Peru.
Ryan Lee Cartwright, an American studies professor in the UC Davis College of Letters and Science, has received a $1.5 million award from the Mellon Foundation for a project to explore the intersection of research on disability and chronic illness. The three-year project in partnership with Yale University aims to develop a national network of scholars, culture workers and organizers who will bring disability justice approaches to the study of chronic illness.
Babies learn from looking at human faces, leading many parents and childhood experts to worry about possible developmental harm from widespread face-masking during the pandemic. A new study by researchers in the UC Davis College of Letters and Science allays those concerns, finding that 6- to 9-month-old babies can form memories of masked faces and recognize those faces when unmasked.
Liza Grandia, associate professor of Native American studies, and Keith David Watenpaugh, professor and director of human rights studies, have been honored by the International Association for Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement (IARSLCE) for research and partnerships with a tangible impact on the daily lives of people in countries such as Guatemala and Syria.
Distinguished Professor Emeritus Geerat Vermeij, Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, will deliver the upcoming New Emeriti Distinguished Lecture scheduled for Feb. 15.
As in years past, the UC Davis Global Tea Initiative for the Study of Tea Culture and Science annual colloquium will take a broad view of tea: its history, use as medicine, role in culture and society, agricultural practices and the tea industry. Taking place Jan. 19, this year’s colloquium is entitled “Tea and Value.”
Chemist Justin Siegel is one of two UC Davis faculty members elected to the National Academy of Inventors’ 2022 class of fellows. Siegel's work in computational enzyme engineering is focused on discovering catalysts that improve health and environmental outcomes. He holds more than 100 global patents and has co-founded eight startups in the last 10 years.
Albert J. McNeil, UC Davis professor emeritus of the Department of Music and an original faculty member and chair of the Department of African American and African Studies, died on Nov. 29. He was 102. At UC Davis from 1969 to 1990, McNeil transformed the University Chorus from an occasional course to a full public performance group and also created the Chamber Singers.
