In addition to providing service to the citizens of California, organized research units provide research opportunities to faculty and students that otherwise would not be readily available.
The history of the Riverside campus dates back to the Citrus Experiment Station with its mission to research agricultural problems. Today, research is conducted by the Citrus Research Center-Agricultural Experiment Station (CRC-AES) on more than 230 crop commodities. The Center's projects cover a broad and diverse number of topics which emphasize not only the research itself, but also its applicability in solving various agricultural problems. Research results are disseminated to other scientists, farmers, and the general public.
Additional research centers continue to be established in other disciplines at the UCR campus. The CRC-AES and the other centers are described in the sections that follow.
The Air Pollution Research Center (APRC) was established as an organized research unit on the Riverside campus in 1961. Its principal mission is to conduct fundamental and applied research in atmospheric science. These studies include such phenomena as biogenic or anthropogenic emissions, physical and chemical removal and transformation processes, and effects of chemical sand particles emitted or formed in the atmosphere on human health, vegetation, soil and water systems, and visibility.
Present research concerns: mechanistic and kinetic studies of the photolysis and reactions of small molecules of atmospheric interest using molecular beam and discharge flow techniques; laboratory studies of gas-to-particle conversion using a particle beam-mass spectrometer system; investigations of the kinetics, products, and mechanisms of the gas-phase reactions of organic compounds emitted from anthropogenic and biogenic sources with hydroxyl (OH) radicals, nitrate (NO3)radicals, and ozone (O3); the development of detailed chemical mechanisms for use in computer models to investigate the formation of ozone and other components of photochemical air pollution; investigation of the mutagenicity of atmospheric reaction products of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons using human cell lines; and studies of the effects of ozone on agricultural crops.
The Center conducts investigation on a broad range of disciplinary and interdisciplinary fields. Its goal is to advance the scholarship on the cultural, social, political, spatial, and environmental conditions, which impact the inhabitants of the United States. It serves as the umbrella for several research units.
The Center conducts policy analysis and research using quantitative, historical, and social scientific approaches. One of the goals of the Center is to bring the expertise and non-partisan perspective of the University's faculty to the service of policy making, the news media, and the public. It will also assist faculty in integrating policy analysis into courses and to teach students the basics of good policy analysis. The Center also provides access for faculty and graduate students to large-scale longitudinal and historical data collections relevant to social and economic policy concerns.
The Center promotes interdisciplinary context devoted to research and dissemination of new advances in knowledge about the contemporary family. The goals of the Center are focused on significant advances in family theory, research, and treatment requiring an interdisciplinary approach to family issues.
The Center (CVR) explores ways in which emerging technologies can be incorporated into teaching and research. It promotes the establishment of local digital communities, develops community partnerships, provides technical assistance, and serves as a forum for telecommunication policy development.
ROBERT PRESLEY CENTER FOR CRIME AND JUSTICE STUDIES
The Center is a leading force in the study of crime and a national presence in the development of effective crime reduction policies. See separate listing under Special Study Resources and Facilities.
CASA (CENTER FOR THE ADVANCED STUDY OF THE AMERICAS)
CASA, under the auspices of CSBSR, is an international center for research, training, publication, and community services. Its primary mission is the creation of new knowledge and opportunities for its applicability to the solution of human problems impacting the inhabitants of the Americas. Its four research units (the Center for Asian Pacific America Research; the Costo Historical and Linguistic Native American Research Center; the Ernesto Galarza Public Policy & Humanities Research Institute; the Paul Robeson Center for Legal and Historical Research) focus on the affect of global processes upon these populations and the regions they occupy.
WOMEN IN COALITION RESEARCH CENTER
The Center is committed to working across geographical, political, as well as academic borders in the interest of intellectual and political collaboration and innovation. Its mission is to chart new directions in both scholarly and activist feminist work.
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Jean-Claude Mollet, a postdoctoral researcher in Botany and Plant Sciences, checks a lily for pollen readiness. He is researching new methods to promote cell growth.
Photo by Steve Walag
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CENTERS FOR WATER AND WILDLAND RESOURCES
The Centers for Water and Wildland Resources is a Universitywide organized unit that is composed of the Water Resources Center, Wildland Resources Center, Salinity and Drainage Research Program, and Water Quality Program. The Centers are headquartered at the Riverside campus. The Salinity and Drainage Research Program and Water Quality Program are coordinated from the Riverside office, and the remaining programs are coordinated from the Davis campus. The Centers support research, extension, and educational activities on a broad spectrum of water and wildland resource topics.
The Citrus Research Center and Agricultural Experiment Station is the oldest institution on the UCR campus. The CRC-AES is a branch of the University's Statewide Agricultural Experiment Station, which is the nation's largest land grant experiment station and the research arm of the University's Division of Natural and Agricultural Sciences, headquartered in Oakland. The CRC-AES was the outgrowth of a lobbying effort launched by Riverside citrus growers in 1899 under the community leadership of pioneer orange grower John Henry Reed, who is recognized as its founder. The Citrus Experiment Station--as it was first known--began operations in 1906 on a small site at the foot of Mount Rubidoux, where its original research emphasis was on citrus and subtropical horticulture.
In 1914, the Regents of the University approved expansion of the Experiment Station and a new site was purchased at the base of the Box Springs Mountains, where the UCR campus lies today. The corridors of the earliest buildings on the site, first occupied in 1917, are rich in associations with pioneer scientific discoveries and the early researchers who made them. Those headquarters buildings are today marked by a Riverside County Historical Landmark plaque.
Over the years, research of the Experiment Station was expanded to cover a variety of fruit, vegetable, field, and industrial crops grown in Southern California. In 1961, the original name of the Experiment Station was changed to the Citrus Research Center and Agricultural Experiment Station to reflect the increasingly broader scope of research.
The mission of the CRC-AES and Cooperative Extension (see separate listing) is:
to discover and advance knowledge in the agricultural and environmental sciences
to provide leadership in the dissemination and application of research-based knowledge to the people of California
to provide opportunities for education and preparation of tomorrow's leaders in agricultural and environmental sciences
Today the major programmatic strengths of the CRC-AES are in Plant Sciences, Pest and Disease Management, and Environmental and Natural Resources.
Emphasis within the CRC-AES is currently being placed on innovative research that will lead to development of new technologies, such as those involving recombinant DNA and other genetic engineering techniques. Collaborations of CRC-AES researchers are under way to create research centers focusing specifically on desert agriculture and exotic pests. Interdepartmental graduate programs in Plant Genetics, Microbiology, and Environmental Toxicology also reflect the collaborative approach of CRC-AES researchers. Each of these programs consists of a federation of UCR scientists whose research thrusts are closely linked together at the frontiers of scientific research.
The present academic research staff of the CRC-AES is comprised of approximately 100 people, who are engaged in studies of fundamental problems of cellular and molecular biology, plant and invertebrate animal ecology, and basic aspects of plant breeding, culture, and protection. Most of the research staff teach both undergraduate and graduate students in the College of Natural and Agricultural Sciences. Their familiarity with current research problems and solutions strengthens academic programs and provides instruction and training for approximately 500 students in 15 graduate programs.
The CRC-AES and the College of Natural and Agricultural Sciences together maintain 1,720 acres of land for agricultural research. This includes 420 acres immediately adjacent to the campus, 760 acres at the Moreno Ranch field station, and 540 acres in the Coachella Valley. The regional office of Cooperative Extension is also located on the UCR campus. CRC-AES scientists, in carrying out their research tasks, work closely with the 15 Cooperative Extension offices in the Southern Region, campus-based specialists, and regional county advisors to ensure a continuous flow of information from research programs to the public and specialized clientele.
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Geological Sciences graduate student Eric Riggs works with a machine that simulates pressures within the earth's mantle. It weighs 6 tons and can generate 1,000 tons of force.
Photo by Steve Walag
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The Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP) is a multicampus research unit, established in 1967, that promotes basic research at UCR into the structure, origin and evolution of the universe. In pursuit of this mission, IGPP research extends from the earth's core to the far reaches of space. Interdisciplinary research by faculty and students of the colleges of Natural and Agricultural Sciences and Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences focuses on the areas of astrophysics, space physics, solid earth geophysics, geochemistry, archeometry, and tectonophysics.
The specific emphases at UCR vary with time as the interests of the faculty change, as new faculty are added, and as the science advances. Integral to IGPP research projects is the development of the new technologies, such as high resolution gamma ray telescopes for astrophysics research, development of the capacity to simulate the extreme pressures and temperatures of the earth's lower mantle for mineral physics and tectonophysics experiments, alternate thermonuclear fusion technologies, and enhancement of radiocarbon dating techniques for archeology and paleoenvironmental analysis.
Research in experimental and theoretical space and astrophysics includes imaging high-energy space data to the properties of cosmic gamma ray bursts, active galactic nuclei, pulsars, supernovae and other discrete sources gamma rays; experimental and theoretical studies of the earth's magnetosphere; measurements of neutrons and gamma rays produced in the earth's atmosphere and the sun; and ground-based measurements of very high-energy gamma rays. Laboratory plasma simulations of the earth's magnetosphere and comets in the solar wind complement observations of space probes.
Solid-earth research includes a wide range of geophysical, geological, and geochemical investigations. Since 1968 the IGPP at UCR has explored and assessed areas that are potential sources of geothermal energy, particularly the Imperial Valley and Coso Hot Springs of Southern California and Cerro Prieto in Northern Mexico. Laboratory investigations of rock and water samples recovered from geothermal fields are used to study active metamorphism and ore genesis as well as water-rock interactions in hydrothermal systems. Advances in stable-isotopic geochemistry are now being exploited to determine the processes by which mineral deposits form and to characterize the sources of atmospheric aerosols and particulates ejected from climate-altering volcanic eruptions. A new program initiated in 1993 involves studies of flow and phase transformations in the earth's deep interior. Apparatus capable of deformation of rocks to pressures of 250,000 atmospheres and 3,000º centigrade are being used to investigate the physical mechanism of deep earthquakes, the mechanisms of flow of partially molten mantle upwelling beneath oceanic ridges, and the rheology of the mantle transition zone and lower mantle. An integrated program of field geophysics includes heat flow, gravity, active and passive seismic measurements, and electrical and magnetic methods. Research on earthquakes includes studies of the structure and physical properties, and field studies of earthquake phenomena. Additional studies encompass geothermal exploration, groundwater studies, fault zone characterization, and regional tectonics.
Research in Quaternary geochronology involves both radiocarbon (14C) and amino acid racemization dating with an emphasis on the research in the dating of bone samples as well as studies to extend the 14C time frame in excess of current conventional limits of about 50,000 years. Portions of the 14C research are being conducted in conjunction with the University of California, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Laboratory. These geochronological studies are being applied to problems in the dating of the emergence of anatomically modern Homo sapiens in the Old World and the timing of the arrival of human populations in the Western Hemisphere.
One dimension of the IGPP is the electron microscopy facility housed in Bourns Hall. It is part of a $1.7 million project funded jointly by UCR and the National Science Foundation to acquire state-of-the-art transmission and scanning electron microscopes. The microscopes, installed in January 1996, function with the campus Center for Visual Computing, also in Bourns Hall, to provide microvisualization at the frontier of both physical and biological sciences.
The IGPP has other branches on the Los Angeles and San Diego campuses and at the Los Alamos National Laboratory and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
California maintains an important and complex relationship with Mexico. Mexico has become a dynamic, influential, and unpredictable neighbor, and the Mexican-origin population is the largest ethnic minority group and the fastest-growing population in California's society.
With the advent of the North American Free Trade Agreement, border industrialization, and increasing trade, California and Mexico are integrating rapidly. Individually and jointly, they are key players in the economic, social, and political associations of the Pacific Rim countries. Understanding and explaining the California-Mexico connection is critical to assuring a prosperous future for the people of the region.
UC MEXUS was established in 1980 to focus the resources of the nine campuses of the University of California as they relate to Mexico, United States-Mexico relations, Mexicans and people of Mexican descent in the United States, and a wide variety of cultural and scientific issues of importance to both countries. The Institute's Universitywide headquarters located at the Riverside campus in 1984. As a multi-campus research unit that serves the entire UC system, UC MEXUS contributes to many Riverside campus interests in Mexican and Chicano topics through sponsorship of research, guest lecturers and performances, conferences, and its photographic and videotape collections, some of which are housed in the Media Library.
More than 400 University of California faculty members participate in the programs of UC MEXUS. Competitive grants fund faculty and graduate student research, publications, binational collaboration, and other innovative and creative work. The Institute hosts Mexican researchers and serves as a center for interdisciplinary, intercampus, and international projects in a wide variety of subjects. Current research foci involving UCR faculty include the diverse topics of agricultural labor and California's rural communities; the border environment and shared resources such as geothermal energy and water; tropical resources and conservation programs; and Chicano theater.