AirUCI Co-Director Sergey Nizkorodov is the recipient of the 2021 Daniel G. Aldrich, Jr. Distinguished University Service Award. This prestigious award, established in 1990, is given to professors who are respected scholars and who have made outstanding contributions of service to the University of California and/or public service.
An outstanding contribution is not defined simply as having served on a large number of Senate Committees, although such may be one of the factors, but as service which leads to the betterment of the academic and/or personal lives of large segments of the University community. Sergey has an extensive history of such service, but a few of his recent examples in the Department of Chemistry include: Vice Chair for Academic Programs and Curriculum, Chair of the Committee on Undergraduate Curriculum, and Chair of the TA Assignment Committee. Examples of his service to the UCI campus include chairing the Subcommittee on Courses and Continuing Education, Science in Action faculty representative, and several panels involving everything from graduate research fellowships to the strategic plan for the School of Physical Sciences. In addition, he is Vice President of the American Association for Aerosol Research and is an Associate Editor of Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics.
This list only scratches the surface of all that Sergey does in addition to being AirUCI's Co-Director and a busy Professor of Chemistry with numerous grants and research projects to oversee. His dedication to the graduate student community is tireless and his results are excellent. We are thrilled that he has been recognized with this well-earned honor.
News
Here's the latest news from AirUCI — our events, our people, our science.
2021
AirUCI faculty James Randerson is quoted in an MIT Technology Review article on the effects of wildfires in carbon storage. Climate change is making wildfires worse in most forested areas of the globe, he says, and fires, droughts, insect infestations, and shifting climate conditions will convert major parts of California’s forests into shrublands. Among other impacts, that will clearly complicate the state’s reliance on its lands to capture and store carbon through its forestry offsets program and other climate efforts. Read the article
In an article in the Orange County Register, AirUCI faculty Jack Brouwer is taking issue with potential changes to solar energy policy that encourages rooftop panels but neglects energy storage. California is reviewing its solar incentive program at the urging of large utility companies, who argue that non-solar customers unfairly foot the bill. Proponents of green energy want to increase the state's solar generation, but a problem with increasing the rooftop capacity is that most of the excess energy is sent back to the power grid during the middle of the day, when demand for power is lowest. “You have so many people installing solar that the electricity it produces costs the utilities money to manage it in the middle of the day,” Jack says. “People are playing games with solar policy when they know it’s not sustainable until we have long-term storage. Until the utilities find a a way to cheaply store energy long term, they will not want more solar in the middle of the day.” Read the article
AirUCI grad student Shane Coffield (Randerson group) is quoted in the Daily Pilot as lead author on a study that shows how the decrease in California's vegetation due to massive fires could cause up to a 16% decrease in the state’s natural carbon storage capacity. Since part of the state’s goals to achieve carbon neutrality by 2045 involves putting more carbon into the land, with the help of vegetation that absorbs CO2 and stores it, the substantial increase in drought conditions and wildfires that have killed so many trees are leading to carbon being emitted to the atmosphere, not sequestered, so the state's mitigation models may be incorrect. Read the article
On July 9th, U. S. Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh came to learn about the workforce implications of developing more sustainable transportation infrastructure, including a nationwide network of electric vehicle charging stations, a key component of proposed legislation currently being negotiated in Congress. Two local Congressional representatives, Katie Porter (CA-45) and Mike Levin (CA-49) attended the meeting, as did City of Irvine Mayor Farrah Khan, Chancellor Howard Gillman, and other University of California dignitaries.
AirUCI faculty Scott Samuelsen and Jack Brouwer, both also with our partner organization APEP, discussed a variety of research projects happening at UCI with the goal of decarbonizing transportation in the United States. Secretary Walsh was shown an array of sustainable transportation assets, part of UCI's zero-emissions support system and transportation fleet. Read the article
A new study by AirUCI faculty Jun Wu and cited in an article in National Geographic measures the impact of fireworks on air quality and population health. Fireworks produce colorful, crackling light displays but they also create smoke. It’s less widely known that the smoke can be dangerous due to their particulate matter, which can be an asthma trigger and a leading contributor to respiratory disease as well as a cocktail of toxic metals like strontium, barium, and lead. While the pollution from a single fireworks display tends to dissipate quickly, many fireworks being set off over the Fourth of July can cause regional air pollution levels to spike and remain elevated for several days, posing a potentially serious health risk to vulnerable populations. Read the article
AirUCI is thrilled to announce the addition of three new faculty to our institute: James Randerson (Earth System Science), Ulrike Luderer (Environmental and Occupational Health), and Vojislav Stamenkovic (Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering). Additional details about each of our new colleagues are available on our People page, but here is a brief biography for each of them.
AirUCI grad student Anqi Jiao (Wu group) was chosen as the 2021 Solutions that Scale Graduate Fellow from the School of Public Health. Anqi will be among a cohort of only seven other UCI scholars who were selected for this prestigious project. These fellowships are designed to support convergent research between two or more UCI schools to enable interdisciplinary approaches to scalable solutions to climate change. The award provides one year of support starting on July 1, 2021. Read the article
AirUCI faculty Jun Wu is quoted in a May 25th article in National Geopgraphic that discusses the combined effects of air pollution and extreme heat on health, particularly respiratory health. Bad heat and bad air work in tandem to increase the stress on people’s bodies and increase their risk of hospitalization. “Some of the associations [of extreme heat and ozone pollution] are hidden unless you look at the very local scale,” says Jun, pointing to historical influences like decisions to route freeways through communities of color which contribute to the extra burden of heat and pollution for some heavily affected areas. The risks will persist and perhaps expand in the future due to climate change. Read the article
The Edward K.C. Lee Dinner is the annual ceremony for UCI’s Department of Chemistry where numerous awards are presented. Most years, AirUCI team members are among the recipients of these prestigious awards, and it was true again for the May 2021 virtual awards ceremony.
AirUCI undergraduate Kimberly Zhang (Nizkorodov and Furche groups) received the 2021 Don L. Bunker Award which is given to one undergraduate student in the UCI Chemistry Department who has shown outstanding research and plans to pursue graduate work in chemistry.
Graduate student awardees of the 2021 Michael C. Gebel Award are Alexandra Klodt, Natalie Smith, and Jose Uribe. (Alexandra and Natalie are AirUCI team members from the Nizkorodov research group.) This award goes to graduate students working in Environmental Chemistry who have had a period of time employed outside of school before continuing on to graduate studies, and additional awards are also presented to undergraduate students in Environmental Chemistry. Undergraduate awardees of the 2021 Michael C. Gebel Award are Zaira Barrera , Jonathan Galicia, Elliott Einstein, and Sofiya Woodcock. We congratulate all winners at the Lee Dinner from all of Chemistry!
