News

There’s something weird going on inside the plants and animals that call the Baja California peninsula home.

By studying nearly five decades of data on more than 5,800 saguaros dotting Tumamoc Hill, researchers found that small variations in the hill’s topography might buffer saguaro populations from the impacts of climate change.

Tumamoc Hill is a beloved Tucson landmark with an existential challenge: How to balance its popularity with hikers and its role as a living scientific laboratory.

As director, Ben Wilder hopes to not only honor the history of the hill—which stretches back thousands of years—but also re-establish it as a leader in desert ecology.

Announcing the release of a new on-line, peer reviewed, open access journal, The Proceedings of the Desert Laboratory, a scholarly endeavor aiming to continue the over 100 years of foundational desert research on Tumamoc Hill.

Thousands of visitors walk Tumamoc's paved path each year, but few are aware of the ecological and archaeological value of the site. The University of Arizona’s College of Science hopes to change that with a new mobile app.