tree on fire

Strengthening Climate Resilience

We advance human, infrastructure and ecosystem resilience in the face of potentially devastating climate impacts by developing and implementing leading-edge technologies and engineering approaches.

From droughts to flooding, heatwaves and wildfires, the need to adapt and strengthen community resilience to the impacts of climate change is critical and immediate. By developing solutions such as safer water systems, more robust fire-resistant materials, optimized irrigation, and novel cooling systems, we’re engineering better ways to protect communities.

The House That Doesn’t Burn

More than 2.7 million Californians live in places with a high or extremely high risk of wildfire, as of 2007. Since then, California has only gotten hotter, drier, more populated and experienced its largest and most destructive wildfires in recorded history. How do you make your home where disaster is a given? How do you learn to live with it?

Those questions are at the root of Michele Barbato’s research.

Michele Barbato and 3 students

Research in Action

Erika La Plante stands outdoors, smiling

Erika La Plante Receives Award for Research Initiative in Sustainable Minerals, Metals and Materials

The materials science and engineering researcher and an interdisciplinary team formed at the Research Corporation for Science Advancement's Scialog have received funding to investigate water-free mining of valuable metals like iron and lithium.

Researcher Zhaodan Kong stands behind wildfire drone

Bridging Minds and Machines: Zhaodan Kong Designs Safer, More Successful Human-Tech Teams

From fire-detecting drone swarms to optimally efficient human-autonomy collaboration, the UC Davis mechanical and aerospace engineering professor and a principal investigator at CITRIS uses complex technological systems to address complex challenges.

Four images of different materials

Assessing the Real Climate Costs of Manufacturing

Producing materials such as steel, plastics and cement in the United States alone inflicts $79 billion a year in climate-related damage around the world, according to a new study by engineers and economists at the University of California, Davis. Accounting for these costs in market prices could encourage progress toward climate-friendly alternatives.


Read more research in action

Engineering a better world calls for solutions of a different caliber, demanding innovation across disciplines using a design-centric approach.

We employ and develop intelligent systems and automation, tools at the nano-and-micro- scales and engineering for all that will revolutionize energy systems, strengthen climate resilience, advance human health and transform mobility to bring a sustainable, healthier and more resilient world within reach.