News

Here's the latest news from AirUCI — our events, our people, our science.

 

2016

Monday, April 18, 2016

AirUCI's Tuija Jokinen, postdoc in the Smith research group, received the University of Helsinki Dissertation Award for the best PhD thesis of 2015 — congratulations, Tuija!

Tuesday, April 12, 2016

AirUCI Director Barbara Finlayson-Pitts is the winner of the 2017 National Honorary Member Award from Iota Sigma Pi, National Honor Society for Women in Chemistry.  She shares this honor with many distinguished women chemists, including Marie Curie.  Barbara has served as the faculty advisor for the UCI Chapter of Iota Sigma Pi since its inception here.  Congratulations, Barb!

Thursday, April 7, 2016

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced today that it has awarded over $700,000 to AirUCI faculty Donald Dabdub and Sergey Nizkorodov.  Their project will help answer the question of how to protect the air we breathe from the impacts of climate change. Donald and Sergey will use the funds to study the effects of ammonia and rising global temperatures on secondary organic aerosol formation.  Both ammonia and organic compounds will be emitted more strongly in the future and this can bring about new chemical reactions, which increase the burden of particulate matter. This research will better quantify the effect of this previously unexplored chemistry by the end of the project.
Read the announcement

Monday, April 4, 2016

AirUCI faculty Scott Samuelsen is extensively quoted in an article on Forbes.com after he gave a tour of the APEP facility to one of their reporters who writes about renewable energy.  The tour reinforced how APEP, partner institute with AirUCI, works to develop and refine efficient and green power generation.  Read the article

Tuesday, March 22, 2016

Work being done by AirUCI co-director Sergey Nizkorodov's research group is cited in an article at Phys.org, who reviewed a recent paper published in Phys Chem Chem Phys (lead author, Mallory Hinks).  Atmospheric chemistry is almost entirely driven by sunlight, but the group has found that the stickiness of some particles protects them from sunlight in cool and dry conditions.  The findings show toxins trapped inside viscous particles — which are more abundant in cold, dry parts of the atmosphere — may take longer to decompose than expected, with unknown effects on air quality and environmental conditions.  Read the article

Tuesday, March 8, 2016

AirUCI PI Don Blake is quoted in an article on HBO's Vice program web site regarding the impact of cattle and hogs on the environment; specifically, the amount of methane they generate.  Read the article

Friday, February 26, 2016

AirUCI PI Don Blake has been testing the air quality in and around the Aliso Canyon methane leak near Porter Ranch, and his work is referrred to in an article in Smithsonian Magazine along with that of other researchers from UC Irvine, UC Davis, NOAA, and other agencies.    Read the article
 

Wednesday, January 20, 2016

AirUCI co-Director Sergey Nizkorodov has been awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to teach and conduct research at the University of Eastern Finland in the fall and winter of 2016-17. Congratulations, Sergey!

2015

Sunday, December 20, 2015

AirUCI graduate student Sandra Blair of the Nizkorodov group has won a 2016 UCI Chancellor's Club Fellowship. These fellowships are awarded to "the brightest and the best graduate students at UCI who also show great promise as future leaders".  Congratulations, Sandy!

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

AirUCI Senior Researcher Mike Ezell gave a science demonstration to 5th graders at Hillview Elementary School in Fullerton on December 15, 2015. He introduced concepts of basic chemistry and discussed careers in science.

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