UC Merced Astrophysics

Fellow Mercedians, please join us for a public lecture and stargazing event on October 23. We are honored to have the lecture will given by the director of UC Observatories, Dr. Bruce Macintosh! All details can be found here: ucm.edu/e49fvk @bmac_astro @UCObservatories

Announcing @ucmerced's 42nd NSF CAREER award winner Physics Professor @annanierenberg. Nierenberg received this award for her research on dark matter using strong gravitational lensing. UC Merced has the most active CAREER awards in the UC system! news.ucmerced.edu/news/2025/nsf-…

Need a break from world events? Come to "Celestial Tales: Stars, Exoplanets, and the Myths that Connect Us". A FREE public lecture by two researchers from Kyoto University, followed by stargazing with the UCM astronomy club! Thursday March 6 at 7 PM. news.ucmerced.edu/news/2025/star…

Calling all friends of physics: Join us for our famous pumpkin carving contest next Wednesday 10/30 in the physics lounge (ACS 238) starting at 6 PM:

UC Merced Ranked No. 1 in the Nation for Social Mobility, No. 18 Overall When it comes to changing the lives of its students, UC Merced is second to none. news.ucmerced.edu/news/2024/uc-m…

Awesome eclipse viewing event on campus yesterday. Including a solar telescope and sightings of sun spots, organized by Professor @sloebman

Solar Eclipse 2024 — UC Merced style!

Now done with exoplanets and moving to much larger scales with a great talk by @annanierenberg on measuring invisible small dark matter halos with Keck, JWST, and ELTs

Another annual physics faculty retreat in the books. Great discussions and concrete plans for our research and academic programs as well as for continuing to build community between undergrads, grads and faculty in the upcoming academic year. @ucmerced @ucmgraddiv

What is one of the best parts of being a @UofCalifornia astronomer? Access to @UCObservatories including @keckobservatory! Thanks to everyone who made this trip possible. Special shoutout to @astronomeara and @richmatsuda for showing us around.

We are thrilled to welcome @JonArenberg, the chief engineer at @NASAWebb, to UC Merced! He will be giving a free public lecture about his journey leading the design, construction and launch of the Webb Telescope today from 6-7pm in COB 102. To register: ucm.edu/FhETny

@JonArenberg The chief engineer of the @NASAWebb James Webb Space Telescope will be visiting @ucmerced on Thursday February 16th and giving a free public lecture from 6-7 PM in COB1 102. We hope you can attend! Info: forms.gle/RgpMzYz22erx6

As the Sun sets in this #imageoftheweek, and its light scatters through Earth’s atmosphere, the Arizona sky at @KittPeakNatObs, a Program of @NSF’s @NOIRLabAstro, glows in wondrous shades of vivid color. noirlab.edu/public/images/… Image: KPNO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/T. Slovinský.

The storm Sunday and Monday covered Mount Hamilton with snow, making the road dangerously icy. We expect the sunny weather today to melt most of the snow and icy. kron4.com/news/bay-area/…

Shout out to our amazing employees for pitching in to help those impacted by the recent storms. We are all one big family, and we are happy to give back to the community that has supported us over the years! #BobcatsGiveBack #PlanadaStrong

UC Merced Professor Anna Nierenberg leads a team that has cooked up a clever way to use the James Webb Space Telescope to try to understand the fundamental nature of dark matter, that invisible stuff that makes up a quarter of the universe. ucm.edu/CyVUce via @NPR

If you weren't able to tune in live this AM, you can listen to the @CapRadioInsight interview I did this morning here on this link. The JWST segment starts around the 12 minute mark :) capradio.org/news/insight/2… @UCMerced_Astro @UCMercedPhysics @ucmerced @UCMerced_NatSci

@UCMerced_NatSci Professor Anna Nierenberg (@annanierenberg) is featured in a new NPR story about @NASA's James Webb telescope and her idea to use the telescope to further understand dark matter. npr.org/2022/07/11/111…

Big congratulations to graduate student @MicahOeur for receiving an honorable mention from the extremely competitive @NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program.