Making a poster

As a final project for the summer, Jim asked us to create a poster on the research we helped with. This was definitely an eye-opening experience. I have decided to include the third diurnal in my poster, which will happen after my 8-weeks is finished, so my poster will continue to be worked on through the school year. I'm confident this is the right decision though, so I'm willing to put in the extra work. It felt like the poster went no place fast, but after a couple hour shifting data and making graphs it started to really look like something.

Right now the poster is relatively finished, but we have no place to present it associate with the REU. I may submit my to a undergraduate exhibit with Penn State and/or the AAG (American Association of Geographers) conference. They talked about sending us to Dallas in November to present, but don't know if the conference they wanted was appropriate/will not have travel funds.

In other news, the monsoon season was a bust this summer. We had two decent rainfalls, but nothing that I would consider a monsoon. It's funny since the people I work with put os much emphasis on the monsoon, Erin and I just tell them they made it up.

I'm ready to move onto other things, and really excited to get the school year started. I leave for home tomorrow and have three days of driving ahead of me, but I'm excited.

Diurnal 2

So yesterday was our second, and last, diurnal. We spent 14 hours in the field, including the drive back. It was kind of rough, and a lot more difficult compared to the last one. I think a large part of that had to do with this round we did not have the cloud cover like last time. Right now I'm waiting to get batteries so I can download the data and analyze it.

I hate the waiting part of this REU. In general I think we do way too much waiting. While its nice since our field days are pretty intense/long, at the same time I could be productive right now. The worse part of this lazy time is once I get the data I have A LOT of work to do to get it in the correct format for the poster.

7th Inning Stretch

Coming down to the final stretch of this REU experience. We are doing a night measurement at Lucky Hills on Tuesday and we have one more diurnal on Thursday. Besides that we are spending a lot of time processing some more grasses to see if there is any difference in leaf area now compared to the measurements we got pre-monsoon. In addition, slowly but surly I'm starting to get pieces of my poster put together. The final week I am here will be focused on the poster, though admittedly I'm a little nervous about being able to process all the diurnal data before I leave (which would be data I want to include in my poster). Only time will tell.

Science Nerd Hazing

Today was our first of two diurnals, which affectionately became nicknamed as "science nerd hazing." We started out at 1a.m. to arrive at the Santa Rita experimental range at 2:30a.m. Once we arrived at the site we found that one of our two green wagons had been stolen. The day before we had left the wagon hidden near the road in hopes that we would be able to take a cooler with food to the site early in the morning. The two most promising theories are that 1) someone stole the wagon for drug runs or 2) Border Patrol thought the wagon was being used for drug runs and confiscated it.

Once we got to the site Erin and I did the pre-dawn water potential measurements on Lehman's lovegrass, Arizona cottontop, and Bush Muhly. The pre-dawns were done relatively quickly and we started our tenting exercises. We had two teams for tenting (4 people total) and 1 person doing soil moisture and leaf-level gas exchange. All in all it took about an hour and a half for each set of measurements. Each team did 12 measurements: 2 bush muhly in the open, 2 bush muhly under mesquite trees, 2 lovegrass, 2 cottontop, 2 open bare soil plots, 2 bare soil plots under a mesquite. On each of the grass plots we took photosynthesis measurements and respiration measurements (using a space blanket draped over the tent). Measurements were taking at 3 a.m., 6 a.m., 9a.m., and noon. After noon another group came in to take measurements at 3p.m., 6p.m. and 9p.m.

All in all the diurnal was pretty intense. My body definitely misses sleep and its been difficult to try to stay awake once we got back. However, it was relatively cloudy today so it was a lot cooler than it could have been.

Pre-dawns are brutal!

This week of work was really weird. Having been away for the 4th of July weekend and working in Biosphere 2 it seemed like we hadn't been in the lab in the longest time. We finished processing (i.e. getting the leaf-area index) of the grasses from our first pre-dawn. There were 12 samples total of 3 different species, thus 4 samples of each species. The lovegrass proved to be the easiest, followed by the cottontop, while the bushy muhly was a massive little plant and we were only able to get two done in a day before we went cross-eyed.

Our pre-dawn on Friday went well (at Walnut Gulch). Our numbers were very consistant unlike our first run in Walnut Gulch. We had about two hours to kill between pre-dawn water potential measurements and the leaf-level gas exchange measurements so we went into Bisby to look around. Bisby is an eccentric little artsy town full of old people and charm, though admittedly most things were closed at 6am. Bisby use to be a mining town, and its painfully apparent as there is the "Lavendar mine" right on the side of the road. This was Erin and my first experience using the leaf-level gas exchange instrument without anyone around to help us as Michelle had never used it before. (http://www.licor.com/env/Products/li6400/6400.jsp) We will see on Monday if we successfully completed our task (though we think we did).

In other Tucson news, the monsoon season has started and its amazing how much life comes into the system once its wet. The people I work with complain that it's much better if things are drier, but I'm kind of partial to the monsoon season...maybe its the new humidity?

Biosphere 2 Work

Today (7/7) Erin and I got to help a post-doc with her experiment in Biosphere 2. Travis Huxman tried really hard to get us out there and working on a project during our summer here, so it's neat to have the opportunity.

Our work was with a woman from the UK named Alex who is examining the effects of climate change on soil microbial systems. She is also studying how the microbial system may evolve in response to two different climate change scenarios: 1) periods of drought with short spurts of intense rainfall and 2) periods of drought with more frequent moderate rainfall. We did a lot of the prep work, which furthers the theme of the summer that most of the time for experiments is in the form of prep work.

Essential the experiment works like this:
- set out soil colonies from the Santa Rita experimental range in the desert biome
- after a certain amount of time select the 5 "best" (i.e. most productive) soil microbial systems
- allow those 5 systems to reproduce and set new colonies in desert biome
- repeat

Erin and I were working on the second generation mixing the soil from the reproductive systems into sterile soil. There seems to be a lot of assumptions in this experiment. One of the big assumptions that I have trouble with is the assumption that the 5 best colonies will reproduce in nature. According to Alex there is reason to believe it happens that way, but no one has studied it since soil microbial systems didn't really come in vogue until recently.

Another thing I found out that I do not enjoy: soil sampling. It's too meticulous and small scale for my taste. I also question how "sterile" the soil samples can actually be since even with the best of care there are still possibilities for contamination. I think I prefer to look at the ecosystem as a whole. But they say "don't miss the forest for the trees."

Have to love what you do.

Friday we did a pre-dawn at Lucky Hills/Walnut Gulch, which means we got out to our work site at 4:30am in order to take measurements on water potential in the plants before sunrise (i.e. we had 30 minutes to do 15 measurements). Erin and I did a few measurements and then realized the N2 was leaking really bad, so we switched the casing on the plant, in hopes the smaller casing would have less leakage. It worked, but we lost a significant amount of time on it. Russ and Eric said today they didn't think it would affect the numbers very much, but we are doing another pre-dawn at a different site (Santa Rita) this week and then next week are attempting Lucky Hills again to see if anything changed since the first rainfall. Pre-dawns aren't too bad, it definitely messes with your sleep schedule, but the actual measurements are kind of interesting so I can't complain and once a week isn't so bad. We did however also have to take leaf area measures and count stems and clip samples to take back to the lab. Once the sun rose we put on 5 sensors on the tar bush and got resistance ratings. I'm sure we would not have made it out there if there hadn't been 3 people as 30minutes is a lot to accomplish pre-dawns and sampling.

Today we spent time measuring leaf area on the samples we clipped Friday using another LI-COR insturment. The only tricky part was that the tar bush and creosote bush have leaves that were sticky and thus sticked to themselves and the conveyor belt of the insturment. Letting them air dry a bit made the whole process a little better. We did not measure any leaves from white thorn acacia since it had none.

Another thing Erin and I both noticed today was how much the people who work at ARS seem to dislike their job. Maybe it was just something in the air today, but many people were talking about how they can't wait to move out onto the next best thing. It's kind of scary how many people end up in jobs they hate and the most common reason seems to be for the money, especially in today's economy. I think that its important to like what you do at work since you spend so much time on it. Of course it also helps to like the people you work with, but as I have seen first hand with the Penn State Vegetation Management that doesn't necessarily equate to being happy in the workplace and often that lack of happiness is brought home to the personal life. I sincerely hope that I never have to be in a job I hate...

Sap Flow Installation and Walnut Gulch

Tuesday we went out to the Santa Rita experimental range land to install the sap flow sensors that we made in the lab. It was tedious work, as you have to wrap a small 10 meter wire (without overlaps or gaps) around the mesquite trees (which have thorns). Once the units were on the trees we took the stem diameter and wrapped the units in bubble wrap and tin foil so no bugs or moisture could ruin the sensor. In the end they look like a bunch of tacos in the trees.

Wednesday we went back out to check and see how many of the sensors were working properly. Out of the 15 we put up, only 2 were not working. We will be taking those down next week and replacing them. However, still more may not work because we can't tell if they are getting a reading until it rains, hopefully sometime this week. But hey 2/15 ain't bad.

We also visited the Walnut Gulch site where Melissa had done some of her master's work so the sensors were already on the shrubs. We did pick another species of shurb (tar bush) so we removed 5 sensors from the white thorn acacia and creosote bush. Ultimately we will have 5 on each of the 3 species.

On Friday we will be measuring pre-dawn water potential (i.e. 3am) and putting on the sensors for the tar bush at Walnut Gulch. I'm not looking forward to having my sleep schedule messed up, but in the name of science....

Field Work

Today was our first day in the field. We visited a mesquite forest and studied 5 types of vegetation cover (with grasses and completely without). At each plot we took readings of evapotranspiration using a tent contraption made of PVC pipe and lining. After a reading was taken for photosynthesis, a solar blanket was placed on the top of the tent to get a reading of respiration. These measurements were then followed by two more procedures to measure evapotranspiration.

Needless to say it was a long day. We spent 5 hours doing field work (plus two hours of driving) and then went back to ARS and looked at some of the data that was collected. I'm excited to get to start analyzing the data tomorrow using Excel. For now, its the only familiar territory I have until I become better at using the equipment.

First day of Research

Today Erin and I went to meet Russ and the team we will be working with for the summer. We will be working with two other employees of ARS (Agricultural Research Service): Michelle and Erik.

Michelle just received her Master's from the U of A and decided to stick around for the rest of the summer. She did her work on plant respiration using sap flow as her main indicator. The project we will be doing this summer is very similar to her Master's work. We will be studying two sites, a mesquite savanna and a shrub land and measuring the sap flow (both horizontally and vertically). The idea behind this is that the sap is composed mostly of water thus knowing the movement of the sap allows us to determine transpiration from the plant.

Erik comes with 8 years of experience teaching at Rutgers, and decided to move out to Arizona to join the ARS team. He studies gas exchange on an individual plot scale (i.e. small scale). We spent far less time with Erik so I don't know as much about the work we will be doing with him, but I will say he kind of reminds me of the professor from "Back to the Future" in the way he thinks, so I'm kind of looking forward to that.

Today Michelle, Erin, and I worked on prepping the sensors for the field, i.e. a lot of repetition. Essentially, we had to strip small wires, twist the wires together, and then solder them. Once the wires were ready, we attached them to a piece of foam that will be wrapped around the base of the plant and three wires will be connected to the plant (one to the stem, one to the root, and one horizontal with the system we created on the foam). This is what we will use to measure transpiration.

Tomorrow will be very similar to today (i.e. more prep work), but we will be out in the field on Thursday. Right now the goal is to be in the field 1 day a week, at ARS 2-3 days a week, and working on a project(s) at the Biosphere 2 the rest of the time. We are also hoping to meet Dr. Huxman later this week, but I have a feeling it might be put off till early next week.

Also, I keep hearing about this elusive Arizona monsoon...so I'm definitely looking forward to actually seeing that. Apparently there are some really spectacular thunderstorms that come in the area.

Welcome to Tucson!

So I officially made it to Tuscon after 10 days of traveling with my brother to see some of the "classic" sites of America. We visited Mount Rushmore, Yellowstone, Yosemite, the Badlands, as well as 3 relatively close friends along the way- not to shabby for starting out in Newark, Delaware and taking 10 days!

This is definitely the farthest West I have ever been (besides for our stop in Berkeley, CA) and there are a few things I noticed about Tucson, Arizona right away. First, the change in weather/climate and thus the vegetation and landscape. So far the locals tell me it has been a "mild" June, as it has yet to hit triple digits. I can't say I'm looking forward to that even if it is a "dry heat." The sun also stays out for most of the day, however when it set it sets quickly and soon after everything is pitch dark.

Besides the obvious cacti and brown landscapes, the other thing that struck me about Tucson is the amount of people biking. It seems like for every 1 person walking there is at least 5 people biking. I can see why Tucson is considered one of the most bike-friendly places in America. Though it is definitely "construction time" and a lot of the main roads have detours and orange signs.

I start research with Dr. Russ Scott and Dr. Travis Huxman on Tuesday. There is one other undergraduate working with them, her name is Erin. I have yet to meet her, but will be meeting up with her and Dr. Jim Washburne, the Director of SAHRA, on Sunday at the Biosphere 2. So for now I'm just waiting and taking in the community. I guess you could say the calm before the storm....