National & International Faculty Honors

UC Davis is home to globally renowned visionaries in the arts and education, law and letters, engineering, and the physical and life sciences, assuring its place as one of the top public universities in the country. Click through the categories on the right to view a sampling of the many premier faculty honors received. For more faculty distinctions by discipline and related stories, visit the colleges and schools linked here.

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Sandra J. Carlson, Prof. Emerita of Earth and Planetary Sciences, has been named the 2026 recipient of the American Geophysics Institute William B. Heroy Jr. Award for Distinguished Service to AGI.

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Prof. of Physics and Astronomy Andrew Wetzel has been appointed to the newest class of the US Defense Science Study Group (DSSG) of the Institute for Defense Analyses.

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Christina Harvey, Asst. Prof. of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, has received an NSF CAREER Award. (Photo Credit: Mario Rodriguez)

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Arthur Charles-Orszag, Asst. Prof. of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, received a Hypothesis Fund Scout Award for seed work in archaeal cell biology.

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Neal Williams, Prof. of Entomology and Nematology, has been elected a Fellow of the Entomological Society of America.

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Valerie Williamson, Professor of Plant Pathology, was named an Honorary Member of the Society of Nematologists.

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Shahid Siddique, Associate Professor of Entomology and Nematology, received the 2026 Outstanding Educator Excellence in Teaching Award from the Society of Nematologists.

Christine McBeth, DO, Assistant Professor of Emergency Medicine, has received a Fulbright US Scholar Program Award for 2026-27.

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Mary Ziegler, Martin Luther King, Jr. Professor of Law, has been elected a member of the American Law Institute. (Image: UC Davis School of Law).

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André Naffis-Sahely, Asst. Professor of English, French and Italian, has received a Society of Authors Cholmondeley Award For Poets, one of the highest honors presented in poetry. (Image: UC Davis)

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Simon Cherry, Distinguished Prof. Emeritus of the departments of Biomedical Engineering and Radiology, has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, UK.

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Ermias Kebreab, Prof. of Animal Science, Assoc. Dean in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, and Dir. of the World Food Center, received three honors in 2026 from the American Dairy Science Association (ADSA), including ADSA Fellow election, the Journal of Dairy Science Highly Cited Award, and the Zinpro Award for Excellence in Dairy Science. (Photo: UC Davis-CAES)

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Marisol de la Cadena, Professor of Anthropology, has been elected a member of the Class of 2026 American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

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Jeffrey Ross-Ibarra, Professor of Evolution and Ecology in the College of Biological Sciences, has been elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences. (Photo: Sasha Bakhter / UC Davis).

The research team of V. Sundaresan and I. Khanday in plant laboratory

Venkatesan Sundaresan, Distinguished Professor of Plant Biology and Plant Sciences (right), and Imtiyaz Khanday, Assistant Professor of Plant Sciences, were awarded the VinFuture Special Prize for Innovators with Outstanding Achievements in Emerging Fields. (Photo: UC Davis)

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Huaijun Zhou, Professor of Animal Science and Chancellor’s Leadership Professor, received the 2026 ASAS Innovation in Breeding and Animal Genetics Award.

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Philip H. Kass, Vice Provost for Academic Affairs and Distinguished Professor of Population Health and Reproduction in the UC Davis Weill School of Veterinary Medicine, received the 2026 American Veterinary One Health Society Gold-Headed Cane Award.