Zhenglin Zhang, a March graduate known as a gifted researcher dedicated to agricultural sustainability, is the winner of the 2025 Kinsella Memorial Prize.

Zhang, who is now a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford University, earned his bachelor’s degree and Ph.D. at University of California, Davis, where he researched rice crops and how erratic weather and fallowed fields affected methane emissions and nitrogen cycling. He studied in the lab of Bruce Linquist, a Cooperative Extension specialist in the Department of Plant Sciences.

Maci Mueller, who earned her doctoral and master’s degrees in animal biology at UC Davis, is the winner of the 2024 Kinsella Memorial Prize for her leadership and work developing novel breeding technologies for cattle.

Mueller graduated in 2023 and is now an assistant professor at Kansas State University where she focuses on animal genomics and biotechnology.

Bernardo “Bernie” Bastien-Olvera, a recent Ph.D. graduate from the Geography Graduate Group at UC Davis, is this year’s recipient of the Kinsella Memorial Prize for his doctoral research on the effects of climate-driven impacts on global ecosystems and the influence on human well-being.

Jiyoon Yi, a postdoctoral researcher of biological and agricultural engineering, is this year’s Kinsella Memorial Award recipient for her research into preventing cross-contamination of surfaces at produce processing sites.