In a collaboration with Kathleen Tresder’s lab, Earth System Science student Morgan Gorris and Ecology and Evolutionary Biology student Linh Anh Cat returned successfully from a 1 week sampling trip throughout the Southwest. Morgan and Linh Ahn collected soil samples in California, Arizona, and New Mexico and are currently conducting DNA analysis to test for the presence or absence of the fungi that cause Valley Fever. Morgan and Linh Anh received a UCI Data Sciences Initiative 2015 Summer Fellowship for this work.