Center for Conservation Biology

The lung microbiome is also beneficial to our health — and harmful dust can alter it

tomwt — Tue, 21 Oct 2025 22:13:15 +0000

The lung microbiome is also beneficial to our health — and harmful dust can alter it tomwt Tue, 10/21/2025 - 15:13 More CNAS in the Media Monica Cull | Discover Magazine October 21, 2025

DISCOVER MAGAZINE - When it comes to the microbiome, researchers have extensive knowledge of the microbial community living in our guts. The lungs, however, are a different story. While it may sound odd, microbes do live in our lungs, and breathing in certain substances, like certain dust, can cause harm to the lung microbiome.

A new study in mSphere examines how dust from the evaporating Salton Sea in California — a saline, landlocked lake — may be irritating the microbes in the lungs and altering the immune response.

The Lung Microbiome
Though researchers know much more about the gut microbiome than the microbes in the lungs, they still believe the lung microbiome is beneficial to our health. While genetic factors or bacterial infections can contribute to a weakened lung microbiome, researchers from the University of California, Riverside (UC Riverside) have found, for the first time, that environmental exposures can also have adverse effects.

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Department of Microbiology & Plant Pathology

Emma Aronson

22 Miles on Foot, 10 Minutes on a Tram: An ‘Extraordinary’ Day Hike

tomwt — Fri, 04 Apr 2025 14:57:02 +0000

22 Miles on Foot, 10 Minutes on a Tram: An ‘Extraordinary’ Day Hike tomwt Fri, 04/04/2025 - 07:57 More CNAS in the Media Dina Mishev | The New York Times March 25, 2025

THE NEW YORK TIMES - The steep trail near the top of the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway was covered in inches of spongy fallen needles and peppered with ankle-twisting pine cones. It was also shady, which felt remarkable after the first seven miles of the grueling Cactus to Clouds hike offered little more than a brittlebush leaf’s worth of relief.

I had already hiked up 7,549 vertical feet and still had about 3,000 to go to the top of Mount San Jacinto, a granite crag towering just west of Palm Springs, Calif.

...

“The environment and life look very different down in the Colorado-Sonoran Desert than at the top of Mount San Jacinto,” said Melanie Davis, a lead field botanist with the Center for Conservation Biology at the University of California, Riverside, a few days before I hiked. But it’s the in-between zones that are the most interesting, she said. “That’s where there will be the most biodiversity.”

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UCR hosts inaugural Southern California Conference on Ecological Change

owenw — Mon, 17 Mar 2025 16:41:51 +0000

UCR hosts inaugural Southern California Conference on Ecological Change owenw Mon, 03/17/2025 - 09:41 More Blog Posts March 17, 2025

The UC Riverside departments of Evolution, Ecology & Organismal Biology, Botany and Plant Sciences, and Environmental Sciences hosted the inaugural Southern California Conference on Ecological Change on February 14.

The inaugural event was organized in response to the effects of warming climate, larger and more frequent fires, urbanization and land development, and invasive species on Southern California's changing ecosystems.

The conference was sponsored by the College of Natural & Agricultural Sciences, UC Natural Reserves, the Department of Entomology, and the Center for Conservation Biology. Over 90 attendees came together to discuss these ecological changes, share knowledge, and identify research opportunities for sustainable management of our Southern California ecosystems. Attendees included scientists and practitioners from five UC campuses, two California State university campuses, and several county, state, and federal agencies, including USGS, USFS, NPS, CDFW, Caltrans, Riverside County Parks, and MSHCP.

Also in attendance were representatives of the non-profit organizations California Botanic Garden, Dwelling on Carbon, Mojave Land Trust, Nature Conservancy, Point Blue Conservation Science, Rivers & Land Conservancy, San Diego Natural History Museum, San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, Tejon Ranch Conservancy, Urban Ecology Conservancy, and the Santa Ana Watershed association.

The conference featured plenary speeches by Dr. Megan Jennings of San Diego State University, and Amy Waltz of the Ecological Research Institute at Northern Arizona University, who emphasized collaborative engagement among researchers, land managers and communities to address regional ecological research needs.

The conference also included breakout discussions which tackled pressing environmental issues in Southern California, grant and career panels, and many opportunities for attendees to network, build new collaborations, and share ideas.

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Department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology

Department of Botany & Plant Sciences

Center for Conservation Biology

UCR Natural Reserves

Department of Entomology

Department of Environmental Sciences

Tall flowers, dead shrubs, ephemeral lake: Death Valley has become a picture of climate whiplash

tomwt — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 16:58:54 +0000

Tall flowers, dead shrubs, ephemeral lake: Death Valley has become a picture of climate whiplash tomwt Mon, 04/22/2024 - 09:58 More CNAS in the Media Evan Bush | NBC News April 20, 2024

NBC NEWS - In California’s boom-and-bust climate, Death Valley has offered some of the strangest scenes over the past few years.

Some of the area’s perennial creosote bushes died back during a severe drought that hampered the region through 2022. Then torrential downpours — from the remnants of Hurricane Hilary and subsequent storms — revived annual wildflowers from seed over the last year.

During the winter, extreme rainfall resurrected an ancient lake that is now disappearing once again.

“Death Valley is very extreme. You have to assume that plants and animals are adapted to the edges of what’s livable there. As it gets hotter, that gets to be more of a challenge,” said Lynn Sweet, a research ecologist at the University of California Riverside.

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Lynn Sweet

Joshua Tree National Park is more popular than ever — but its namesake trees are facing extinction

ilseu — Sat, 19 Dec 2020 22:03:29 +0000

Joshua Tree National Park is more popular than ever — but its namesake trees are facing extinction ilseu Sat, 12/19/2020 - 14:03 More CNAS in the Media Miles W. Griffis | VOGUE December 18, 2020

VOGUE — In a wilderness area at the northwest corner of Joshua Tree National Park, ecologist Lynn Sweet treks across the high desert as raucous pinyon jays swoop overhead. She navigates carefully across the landscape of blackbrush and fragrant junipers to inspect the stump of a Joshua tree. Much of the tree’s trunk, branches, and dagger-shaped leaves are sprawled across the desert floor—most likely the casualty of a gust of wind that snapped it like a toothpick.

The tree was one of thousands that Dr. Sweet and her team examined in a recent study that predicted a worrisome future for the iconic western Joshua tree, Yucca brevifolia, within the national park due to climate change. The tree was less than 25% alive during Dr. Sweet and her team’s last recording. Now, the tree is dead.

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Center for Conservation Biology

Lynn Sweet

Joshua Tree

Here’s what happens to science when California’s researchers shelter in place

ilseu — Tue, 31 Mar 2020 22:50:11 +0000

Here’s what happens to science when California’s researchers shelter in place ilseu Tue, 03/31/2020 - 15:50 More CNAS in the Media Rachel Becker | CalMatters March 26, 2020

CALMATTERS - As California officials desperately try to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus, Chris Miller is coaxing a sample of the virus to grow in a secure laboratory at UC Davis.

Working in a laboratory nestled inside containment rooms and cut off from the world by filters, scientists dressed in space suit-like protective gear are feeding cells to a virus isolated from a COVID-19 patient at UC Davis Medical Center.

The goal is to create a supply of viral genetic material to help the clinical pathology team develop new tests. Without these viral samples to provide an unequivocally positive result, researchers can’t tell if a test is truly working.

It’s a new mission for Miller, who, until about two weeks ago, was studying HIV and working to develop a pandemic flu vaccine. “Flu, at the time, seemed like the virus that was going to kill us all and was going to be the big pandemic,” Miller said. “But it seems like coronavirus has other plans.”

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Department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology

Center for Conservation Biology

Lynn Sweet

William Ota