Conor McCabe sits down with CLEAR Conversations host, Tracy Sellers. At the CLEAR Center at UC Davis, researchers spend their days asking a big question with global stakes: how can we raise livestock in ways that are more climate-friendly? For PhD student Conor McCabe, now approaching the end of his fifth year in the Mitloehner Lab, that question has fueled not just one research project—but nearly an entire year of long days, early mornings, and a sprawling scientific effort that spans animals, microbes, emissions, and the future of food systems.

McCabe didn’t start out as a dairy kid. He grew up on a small farm in Oregon—“pretty much an Old McDonald’s farm,” he jokes—with pigs, cattle, pumpkins, and Christmas trees. His mother once served as a dairy princess, but dairy cattle weren’t part of Connor’s life until college. After studying animal science across Cornell, Purdue, and now UC Davis, he’s seen “different pockets of cows across the country,” as he puts it. But it wasn’t until arriving at Davis that he found the right intersection of ruminant biology and real-world impact.

Dr. Troy Rowan sits down with CLEAR Conversations host, Tracy Sellers. Dr. Rowan was a featured speaker at the 2025 State of the Science Summit at UC Davis. The event will return next year on June 16-18, 2026, continuing its focus on advancing livestock methane research and collaborative solutions. Rowan, now an assistant professor at the University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture, grew up surrounded by cattle on his family’s Charolais operation in Iowa. His family has been farming and ranching there for more than a century — long enough for the rhythms of agriculture to get in his blood. Listen on: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/clear-conversations/id1844923534 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0EsxxMUuHGRysasRq5k1bS iHeartRadio: https://iheart.com/podcast/299490214 Amazon Music/Audible: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/94808eee-a498-49ec-a3da-9bae97d0250d

When it comes to climate action, Denmark has rarely been content to sit on the sidelines. Now, the small Nordic nation is taking another pioneering leap — becoming the first country in the world to implement a carbon tax on livestock emissions, set to begin in 2030. During a CLEAR Conversations podcast, which was filmed at the 2025 State of the Science Summit held at UC Davis, Anna Trillingsgaard from the Embassy of Denmark shared how this ambitious plan came to be and what it means for farmers, the environment, and the global agricultural community who is watching closely.