UC Davis engineers have invented shaking and inversion machines that are a critical part of the UC Davis Genome Center’s award-winning asymptomatic COVID-19 testing. These machines, designed and built by biological and agricultural engineering (BAE) development engineer Dennis Sadowski, professor Stavros Vougioukas and postdoctoral researcher Zhenghao Fei in just six weeks, help treat saliva samples so they can be tested for the virus.

The University of California flag was flown at half-staff at the Memorial Union, Mark Hall and the UC Davis Airport recently to honor the memory of Professor Emeritus of Neurobiology, Physiology and Behavior Edmund Bernauer. Born on Sept. 27, 1926, Bernauer passed away on Aug. 12, 2021, at the age of 94. 

Opioids are powerful painkillers but their use is hindered because patients become tolerant to them, requiring higher and higher doses, and overdoses can cause respiratory depression and death. A recent study from researchers at the UC Davis Center for Neuroscience contradicts existing thinking about how opioid drugs cause tolerance and respiratory depression, and suggests a new, balanced approach to developing safer analgesics. The work was published July 13 in Neuropsychopharmacology.

Mark Winey has been reappointed as the dean of the College of Biological Sciences (CBS) and will serve a second five-year term, Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Mary Croughan announced today (August 24). Concurrent with his leadership of CBS, overseeing all aspects of its work and the advancement of its excellence and impact, he will continue to serve as a professor in the college.