Category: Accolades

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Accolades Climate Change Faculty Spotlight Grants News Research

Five teams awarded GCC seed grants in fall 2020

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November 20, 2020

Each year, the Global Change Center (GCC) solicits proposals from GCC faculty to support interdisciplinary research that will lead to collaborative proposals submitted to extramural funding sources. Selected projects link multiple faculty programs and take advantage of unique combinations of expertise at VT, have societal implications and/or a policy component, deal with emerging global change issues that have regional significance, and have high potential to eventually leverage external resources.

The fall 2020 application cycle saw the highest number of proposals submitted to date, resulting in five teams awarded a cumulative total of $108K in seed grant funding from the Global Change Center, with support from the Fralin Life Sciences Institute.

Congratulations GCC faculty and collaborators![/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/4″][vc_single_image image=”52887″ img_size=”large” alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_shadow_border_circle_2″][/vc_column][vc_column width=”3/4″][vc_column_text]

Taking the Pulse of Global Shark Populations

INVESTIGATORS:

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Salty carbon: Testing the consequences of freshwater salinization on stream food web dynamics and ecosystem metabolism

INVESTIGATORS:

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Using a global weed to disentangle environment and host effects on plant-microbe interactions across nested spatial scales 

INVESTIGATORS:

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Do altered soil moisture patterns restructure soil microbial communities and their contributions to greenhouse gas emissions?

INVESTIGATORS:
  • Dr. Brian Strahm, Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation
  • Dr. Brian Badgley, School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
  • Dr. Durelle Scott, Biological Systems Engineering
  • Dr. Angela Possinger, Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation

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Developing a predictive model for in-stream embeddedness to link physical processes with biotic responses

INVESTIGATORS:

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Categories
Accolades Blog Interfaces of Global Change IGEP Outreach Science Communication Student Spotlight Video

IGC fellows win big in the 2020 Virtual Nutshell Games

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November 9, 2020

The 5th annual Nutshell Games took place over a new virtual format this past Saturday, November 7th. Bravo! to all graduate student presenters! Five prizes were awarded this year, four of which recognized IGC fellows: Amber Wendler, Abby Lewis, Bennett Grooms, and Sara Teemer Richards. Congratulations and way to impress, IGC!!

Read more and see the full list of presenters and awardees at: https://communicatingscience.isce.vt.edu/Announcements.html

Check out the IGC fellows’ videos! 

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Categories
Accolades Biodiversity Faculty Spotlight Food & Agriculture Grants News Research Sustainable Agriculture

Grant awarded to study how plants affect microbiomes

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VT News | October 6, 2020

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For centuries, scientists have worked above ground, studying plants and their effect on biodiversity. Lying below the scientists’ feet, though, is a world with even richer biodiversity — the soil.

There are an estimated 1 billion cells and thousands of species of microbes in a single gram of soil, making it an extremely complex microbiome.

To help understand the complexity of soil microbiomes and how cover crops can help manage them, a four-year $500,000 grant was awarded to a team of Virginia Tech interdisciplinary researchers by the United States Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

The project integrates key agricultural concepts of cover crops – the microbiome, biodiversity, yield, and soil health – to build a whole-system perspective. The project is being led by Brian Badgley, an associate professor of environmental microbiology, and Jacob Barney, associate professor of invasive plant ecology — both in the School of Plant and Environmental Sciences in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences; and Brian Strahm, an associate professor of forest resources and environmental conservation in the College of Natural Resources and Environment. All three are affiliated faculty members of the Global Change Center and Fralin Life Sciences Institute.

The soil microbiome has strong effects on how ecosystems function but is difficult to directly alter. The team is researching whether or not crop mixtures can be designed to change it indirectly with predictable outcomes and benefits.

The team will conduct their work at the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences’ Kentland Farm.

The underlying principle behind the work is to examine how plants affect soil microorganisms, which has mostly been researched looking at only how a single plant affects the soil.

The research team will conduct their work on soil microbiomes at Kentland Farm. Photo credit: Olivia Coleman
The research team will conduct their work on soil microbiomes at Kentland Farm. Photo credit: Olivia Coleman

 

“We don’t have a really good understanding of the aggregate effect on soil microorganisms when we combine multiple plant species,” Badgley said. “By investigating underlying rules about how that happens, we hope to better understand how those effects scale up as you add more plant diversity.”

Cover crops make an excellent model for that because a cover crop mixture could comprise up to five plant species, which, when compared to a giant field of nothing but corn, is quite a bit of diversity.

“On the other hand, cover crop systems are still relatively simple plant communities that will, hopefully, make it easier to see some of these important signals about which parts of the soil microbiome are changing,” Badgley said. “What we learn about cover crops and agricultural sustainability has the added benefit to farmers of direct application in the field. However, by identifying the underlying relationships, we hope that results will also have applied benefits in other contexts, such as ecosystem restoration and potentially even landscaping and gardening.”

Each of the researchers brings a unique perspective into the mix, allowing them to analyze the whole complex system.

“In the end, we want to design mixtures that maximize plant diversity in different ways – either plant characteristics or the diversity of soil microorganisms that they recruit – based on results from individual plants,” Badgley said. “We then hope to understand whether different types of plant diversity ultimately change how the whole system will function.”

If that’s achieved, the research team could mix plants in the field for particular effects on soil microorganisms.

To better support the research, the grant will fund two Ph.D. candidates during its four-year run.

— Written by Max Esterhuizen

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CONTACTS:

Zeke Barlow

540-231-5417

Max Esterhuizen

540-231-6630

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Suzanne Irby

Michael Stowe
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Categories
Accolades Announcements Biodiversity Geology Research

Sterling Nesbitt receives NSF CAREER award to study the evolution of vertebrate communities during the Triassic Period

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VT News | August 24 2020

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Approximately 252 million years ago, 95 percent of all life on Earth was destroyed in what was the largest mass extinction in Earth’s history. But not long after, there was a sudden surge of reptilian diversity that coursed throughout the land, in the oceans, and in the skies.

After receiving a five-year Faculty Early CAREER Development Program award totaling $622,222 from the National Science Foundation, Sterling Nesbitt, an associate professor of geobiology in the Department of Geosciences in the College of Science, and a team of researchers are gearing up for a new field project to learn more about how extinction events — and time itself — drive evolution in vertebrate communities.

“Do communities persist for millions of years? Are the communities that we see outside our very windows always in this state of change or are they pretty stable and it takes a lot of pushing from a natural disaster to move them to a new state?,” asks Nesbitt, an affiliated faculty member of the Fralin Life Sciences Institute and the Global Change Center.

To answer these questions, Nesbitt has chosen to explore a critical time in Earth’s history: the Triassic Period. This time period faced a multitude of catastrophic events, but it was also during this time when key groups of present-day vertebrates — including mammals, turtles, lissamphibians, and squamates — originated.

Associate Professor Sterling Nesbitt poses for. photograph inside Hahn Hall North
Associate Professor Sterling Nesbitt

Nesbitt and his team will focus their efforts on the Petrified Forest National Park. Located in northeastern Arizona, the park is renowned for its giant fossilized trees that date back to the Late Triassic period. Among the trees, paleontologists have found entire fossil communities that have lasted for at least 15 to 20 million years, making this the perfect place to find fossils for their research.

With a team of undergraduate and graduate students, and fellow faculty, Nesbitt will be excavating new fossils from areas within and around Petrified Forest National Park. In addition to collecting new data, the team will visit museums and institutions that already have information from this area, such as the University of California, Berkeley and the American Museum of Natural History.

“As paleontologists, our work is almost detective-like, and our hypotheses about how animals lived and interacted can only be based on the fossils, and therefore, the data we collect,” said Michelle Stocker, an assistant professor of geobiology in the Department of Geosciences, and also an affiliated faculty member of the Fralin Life Sciences Institute and the Global Change Center.

“By focusing on the interconnectivity of these precise locations and time periods, and collecting both large and small fossil remains, we will be able to construct a much richer and more accurate idea of the types or lack of changes that occurred during the Triassic,” Stocker added.

A Virginia Tech team of paleontologists -- composed of undergraduates and graduate students, and faculty -- excavate a rich fossil site from the Triassic Period at Petrified Forest National Park. In the photo, the fossil diggers have their backs to the camera as they work on rocky terrain under a blue sky. Photo courtesy of Sterling Nesbitt.
A Virginia Tech team of paleontologists — composed of undergraduates and graduate students, and faculty — excavate a rich fossil site from the Triassic Period at Petrified Forest National Park. Photo courtesy of Sterling Nesbitt.

The team will also conduct an extension of the Discoveries in Geosciences (DIG) Field School, a K-12 education program created by University of Washington, which brings STEM teachers out to Petrified Forest National Park, where they work alongside researchers. Then they can apply what they have learned to paleontology-related activities in the classroom.

Most teachers from the original program represent the northwestern United States. In an effort to increase diversity, the team will be recruiting teachers from the southeastern United States and Native American groups throughout the southwest, specifically the Zuni and the Navajo Nesbitt said.

“Our hypothesis is that the communities are actually really similar for a really long period of time. In the Triassic, it was essentially the same community again and again but with slightly different species. They looked really similar and probably had similar ecological roles,” said Nesbitt.

-Written by Kendall Daniels of the Fralin Life Sciences Institute.

Related stories

Virginia Tech paleontologist finds, names new 3-foot-tall relative of Tyrannosaurus rex

Two College of Science faculty members receive 2019 SCHEV Outstanding Faculty Award

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Categories
Accolades Blog Drinking water Global Change News Newsletter Student Spotlight Undergraduate Experiential Learning

My Virtual Summer Internship with the EPA, by GCC Science Policy Fellow Kerry Desmond

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[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]While Kerry’s participation in the Washington Semester Program with the School of Public and International Affairs was cancelled due to COVID-19, her summer internship with the US Environmental Protection Agency continued remotely. Kudos to Kerry for successfully completing her summer internship and for her resiliency and adjustment to the remote and virtual experience. We wish her the best in her senior year![/vc_column_text][vc_separator][vc_column_text]

August 27, 2020

by Kerry Desmond, winner of the Global Change Center’s 2020 Science Policy Fellowship 

After completing the end of my junior year virtually, I was both eager and hesitant to begin a virtual internship with the Environmental Protection Agency. Although I am a civil engineering student with a focus in environmental and water resources engineering, I have always been interested in environmental and public health policy and was so excited to get involved in work that combined both fields. My specific placement within the EPA was in the Water Enforcement Division (WED) of the Office of Civil Enforcement (OCE). The priority of WED is to enforce the Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act, and the division is divided into two branches: Industrial and Municipal. Through the projects I worked on, I had the opportunity to work with engineers, scientists, and attorneys from both branches (along with EPA personnel in other HQ offices, regional EPA personnel, and consultants). Despite my initial hesitation, my experience working remotely proved to be just as exciting and stimulating as I had hoped it would be.

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_single_image image=”51198″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes” alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_border”][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]The main project I worked on during the summer was helping improve the functionality of an Address Comparison Tool (ACT) for facilities with stormwater permits. Essentially, ACT takes a known permittee list from EPA’s Enforcement and Compliance History Online (ECHO) database and compares it to a list of facilities that should theoretically have a stormwater permit (typically provided by a state or an outside database). The goal is to find disparities among the two lists and discover facilities that don’t have permits so that they can be targeted and become candidates for federal enforcement. Since ACT compares two facilities at a time and determines a score for them, I was tasked with conducting analysis to determine a numerical threshold for the scoring system. This threshold would be used to differentiate duplicate addresses from unique addresses. This required a lot of deliberation with my mentor and an outside consultant, as well as a lot of analysis within ACT and Excel, but I thoroughly enjoyed the challenge of trying to figure out the complexities of ACT and its scoring system.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Along with this project, I had the opportunity to conduct a research project with another intern for a National Compliance Initiative (NCI) under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Specifically, we were tasked with coming up with a recommendation as to whether there is a need for public water system-specific inspector training for risk communication and community involvement. This project was especially interesting because we had the chance to interview EPA personnel from all across the Agency and hear about current and past projects that necessitated this type of communication and involvement. I also had the chance to work on another NCI, which focused on National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Significant Noncompliance (SNC) facility targeting. SNC encompasses the highest priority NPDES permit violations such as significantly exceeding pollutant effluent limits, or not submitting a discharge monitoring report for multiple quarters. The goals of the targeting plan were to determine the highest priority corporations with multiple facilities in various states and the highest priority individual facilities in any state. I conducted the analysis by looking at criteria within ECHO to evaluate these target facilities and characterize the type of violations and scope of enforcement actions already taken.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

I had a bit of time to get adjusted to a remote environment, but I knew it would be different to work in a virtual office setting rather than a virtual class setting. I was especially weary because, as an intern or new hire, you’re often filled with questions and need assistance with the little nuances of a new company. I was really lucky to have two engineering mentors that were always willing to talk over the phone, video call, or even answer a quick IM or email that I would send. Along with the ease of contacting people, it was also easy to hop onto virtual meetings, which allowed me to quickly get a feel for the type of work WED does.

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Categories
Accolades Announcements Blog

Bill Hopkins named associate executive director of Fralin Life Sciences Institute

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From VT News  |  August 11, 2020

William Hopkins will join the Fralin Life Sciences Institute at Virginia Tech as associate executive director, effective immediately.

In his new role, Hopkins will assist Matt Hulver, executive director, and his leadership team as they develop and implement the vision and strategic directions for the Fralin Life Sciences Institute to tackle grand life science challenges at the interface of the environment and the human condition.

Hopkins will assist Hulver in identifying strategic opportunities that leverage and capitalize on existing expertise and infrastructure at Virginia Tech. Hopkins is also the founding director of the Global Change Center and the director of the Interfaces of Global Change Interdisciplinary Ph.D. program.

“Hopkins is a dynamic and compelling leader whose passion for the institute’s research and expertise in tackling global change will energize faculty, students, and staff, ” said Hulver.

The Fralin Life Sciences Institute at Virginia Tech a strategic university investment committed to improving the human condition by supporting life sciences research, education, and outreach across Virginia Tech and the world.

“Since joining Virginia Tech about 15 years ago, I have witnessed the positive impact that our investment institutes have on the research enterprise, experiential learning, graduate training, and translational outcomes.  I’ve seen these impacts firsthand, as the Fralin Life Sciences Institute has had a tremendous influence on my own career and the careers of dozens of my colleagues,” said Hopkins. “I am excited to take on this new role where I can give back and help support an organization focused on some of the most pressing global challenges of our time, such as climate resiliency, invasive species, and infectious diseases, with the institute’s talented faculty and staff.”

Hopkins’ specific duties will also include identifying opportunities for fostering an inclusive environment and attracting faculty from diverse backgrounds to the life sciences at Virginia Tech, fostering faculty collaborations within and among the centers as well as with other faculty teams, pursuing philanthropic opportunities with the Advancement office, and serving as a member of the Fralin Life Sciences Institute Stakeholders Committee.

Hopkins’ research program at Virginia Tech, which focuses on physiological ecology, conservation, and wildlife ecotoxicology, will be moving to Steger Hall. Hopkins studies how wildlife respond physiologically and behaviorally to global threats, including climate change, habitat loss, pollution, and pathogens. His current active extramural research funding exceeds $2.2 million and current sources include the National Science Foundation, multiple state and federal agencies, and foundation grants.

Hopkins has published nearly 200 peer-reviewed manuscripts and book chapters on subjects pertaining to wildlife conservation, pollution, and physiological ecology.

The Global Change Center will also be moving to be administratively housed at Steger Hall. This will consolidate current operations from Latham Hall, Fralin Hall, and Litton Reaves to greatly enhance the center’s efficiency.

At Virginia Tech, Hopkins has taught undergraduate courses in Wildlife Biology; Tropical Ecology and Conservation; and Ecology, Evolution, & Conservation in the Galapagos. At the Graduate level, he has taught Vertebrate Physiological Ecology, the Global Change Seminar courses, and the Global Change Capstone course.

Hopkins is a professor in the Department of Fish and Wildlife Conservation  in the College of Natural Resources and Environment at Virginia Tech. He holds additional adjunct associate professor appointments with the University of Georgia’s Odum School of Ecology, the University of Tennessee, and Purdue University.  He has received the Alumni Award for Excellence in Research, the Outstanding Graduate Mentor Award from the Graduate School, and twice received the Outstanding Faculty Award for undergraduate teaching, mentoring, and advisement from his home department.

Hopkins is passionate about using the best available science to inform public policy and sound decision-making. He has served as a member of three National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine committees on contentious issues related to coal mining, water resources, and rural health in Appalachia.  And, Hopkins recently chaired a fourth National Academies committee focused on data quality in the federal government.

He has been a key scientific contributor to five of the U.S. Department of Interior’s Natural Resource Damage Assessment and Restoration (NRDAR) cases, including those surrounding the B.P. oil spill, the T.V.A. ash spill (Kingston, Tennessee), the Olin Superfund site (Saltville, Virginia), the South River mercury spill (Waynesboro, Virginia), and the Los Alamos National Lab in New Mexico. In all five NRDAR cases, he worked effectively with multiple stakeholder groups, including industry, state government, federal government, local concerned citizens, NGOs, private consultants, and other academic institutions. He also regularly serves in advisory capacities at the local, state, national, and international levels on issues pertaining to waste management, water resources, sustainability, and the global decline of amphibians.


CONTACT:
Kristin Rose Jutrus
(540) 231-6614

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Categories
Accolades Announcements Faculty Spotlight

Five GCC affiliates receive 2020 promotions

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]June 8, 2020

Congratulations to five GCC affiliated faculty members who have earned tenure and promotion in June 2020 as a result of their outstanding achievements in teaching, research, and service. Tenure and promotion marks an important milestone in their academic careers, so please join us in congratulating our colleagues!

Zachary Easton, now professor, Biological Systems Engineering

Leah Johnson, now associate professor with tenure, Statistics

Ryan Stewart, now associate professor with tenure, School of Plant and Environmental Sciences

Kevin McGuire, now professor, Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation

Sterling Nesbitt, now associate professor with tenure, Geosciences

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Categories
Accolades Announcements IGC Interfaces of Global Change IGEP

Cristina Marcillo wins the 2020 Randolph L. Grayson Outstanding CALS Diversity Scholar Award

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May 12, 2020

Congratulations to recent IGC alumna Dr. Cristina Marcillo, who just received a 2020 Randolph L. Grayson Outstanding VT-CALS Diversity Scholar Award! Throughout her four-year graduate career at Virginia Tech, Cristina has displayed her devotion to issues of justice and inclusion in her research, service, and professional activities. In addition to her dissertation work examining potential disparities in water quality and access here in Virginia and abroad in Guatemala, Cristina worked for the Center for the Enhancement of Engineering Diversity to mentor students in the college’s National Society of Black Engineers chapter and to assist in community college students’ transition to the university through the Pre-College Initiative. She also provided tutoring and STEM demos at rural K-12 schools through the Virginia Tech PEERS volunteer program (Partnering with Engineers and Educators in Rural Schools) and served as graduate student representative on the BSE department’s diversity committee for three years.

Congrats Dr. Marcillo on this prestigious, well-deserved award for your accomplishments!

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Categories
Accolades Announcements IGC Interfaces of Global Change IGEP

Congratulations to Recipients of the 2020-21 IGC Fellowship!

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May 8, 2020

The Interfaces of Global Change IGEP awards four 12-month Ph.D. fellowships every academic year, each covering tuition and stipend. These graduate research assistantships are awarded based on the student’s professional credentials, the student’s level of engagement in the IGC IGEP, pertinence of the student’s research to global change, the interdisciplinary nature of the work, and the student’s plan for using the one-year fellowship.

Congratulations to the following recipients of this year’s IGC Fellowships![/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_separator][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]

Stephen DeVilbiss

School of Plant & Environmental Sciences

[/vc_column_text][vc_single_image image=”42500″ img_size=”250×250″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_shadow_circle”][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]”My dissertation research addresses the impacts of freshwater salinization on bacterial water quality and ecology. Increased salt runoff in freshwater systems is caused by numerous global change issues including agriculture, resource extraction, urbanization, and climate change. While salinization impairs freshwater ecosystems, the activities causing it are vital to human wellbeing; thus, it is not feasible to eliminate the production and use of salts in the environment. Given the wicked nature of this issue, it is critical to identify target salinity ranges that preserve ecosystem services and inform smarter salt management strategies that consider water quality, ecosystem services, and societal needs.”

The IGC fellowship will enable Steve to dedicate 100% of his time to research in his final year, as well as allow him the time to grow existing collaborations with GCC faculty, conduct additional research to enhance his doctoral thesis, and increase the impact of his work.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_separator][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]”I am studying the foraging behavior of brown-headed nuthatches, and the situational drivers that cause them to join large and diverse multi-species flocks during nonbreeding season. I am observing these multi-species flocks on Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune (MCBL), which is required via the Department of Defense to conserve biodiversity on this federal property. To be effective in an applied manner, my study requires field ecologists to collect data, policy makers to determine management efforts, and habitat managers to implement policy. By working with MCBL wildlife management to incorporate non breeding season factors into the base’s avian management plans, I hope to create an interdisciplinary framework for analyzing and managing bird habitat that can be utilized by other federal properties across the pine savanna regions of the southeast.”[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]

Noah McNeill

Biological Sciences

[/vc_column_text][vc_single_image image=”33937″ img_size=”250×250″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_shadow_circle”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]The IGC Fellowship funding will allow Noah to vastly expand his time in the field in the upcoming year. He’s also working with Pulaski Middle School teachers to develop an in-class outreach program to demonstrate primary aspects of bird biology, and this secured funding will permit him additional time to develop and implement this program in educational settings.[/vc_column_text][vc_separator][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]

Isaac VanDiest

Biological Sciences

[/vc_column_text][vc_single_image image=”44719″ img_size=”250×250″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_shadow_circle”][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]”I’m interested in understanding how community dynamics impact an individual’s physiology and fitness. My research specifically focuses on how urbanization alters arthropod communities and may therefore compromise songbird physiology and fitness. Urbanization is expanding world-wide and understanding its consequences for wildlife and ecosystem function requires thinking and working across levels of biological organization. Through my research I am working with people in the entomology, wildlife, animal sciences, and biological sciences departments to develop these perspectives.

Conservation plans tend to look purely at vital rates when making decisions, but are starting to come around on using other forms of information, such as genetics and stress physiology, to protect species before their numbers crash. My dissertation work focusing on nutrition as a vital physiological indicator of wellbeing nested among larger scale ecological data is a great opportunity to proactively implement legislation to prevent population drops that cannot be predicted with only vital rates.”[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]The IGC Fellowship opportunity will allow Isaac to double down on the extensive laboratory work needed over the coming year, as well as free up time for additional field projects and a continued dedication to mentoring undergraduate science students.[/vc_column_text][vc_separator][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]”My research bridges gaps between the extant and the extinct by using microevolutionary methods applied to macroevolutionary timescales, particularly during periods of extensive global change. In a nutshell, I study both living and long dead animals by looking at the evolution of tooth shape across evolutionary time. To pursue this research, I aim to reconstruct the evolutionary history of diet of 41 extant and extinct species of lemurs. Lemurs are an ideal system for investigating the evolution of diet and its relationship with extinction, as there are many recently extinct species with a robust fossil record, as well as many more currently declining species. I am collaborating with an interdisciplinary research group of anthropologists, mathematicians, and statisticians at Duke University, working together to develop new methodologies for characterizing and quantifying tooth shape. Although lemurs are in decline, they are charismatic species and are relatively well-known to the general public. I aim to expand public interest in both lemurs and evolution by building outreach tools to teach the public how morphology influences ecology and how these together influence extinction.”[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_column_text]

Brenen Wynd

Geosciences

[/vc_column_text][vc_single_image image=”49397″ img_size=”250×250″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_shadow_circle”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Brenen will utilize the IGC fellowship to dedicate time directly to his research, including plans to spend a full month at Duke University working with collaborators. He’s also aiming to develop an outreach project based on his research and using 3D printing or online modules that will create a toolkit to be shared on morphosource.com to be used by educators, researchers and the public.[/vc_column_text][vc_separator][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Categories
Accolades Interfaces of Global Change IGEP Research Science Communication

IGC Fellows win awards at 2020 Graduate Student Association Research Symposium

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]April 24, 2020

The 36th annual VT Graduate Student Association Research Symposium was held virtually on March 25th, 2020. The GSARS is a unique opportunity for graduate and advanced undergraduate students to bring together ideas and research findings from different disciplines and showcase their scholarly pursuits and achievements.

The GSA Research Symposium and Exposition provides a platform for an animated exchange of ideas and invigorating interactions, and also provides for valuable networking between participants, faculties, departments, and research entities as well as corporate bodies, which could pave the way for interdisciplinary research discussion and future collaboration.

This year, three IGC fellows won awards for their presentations! Congratulations, Ernie, Chloe, and Sarah![/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/3″][vc_single_image image=”49160″ img_size=”275×355″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_border”][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/3″][vc_single_image image=”49161″ img_size=”275×355″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_border”][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/3″][vc_single_image image=”49174″ img_size=”275×355″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_border”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/3″][vc_column_text]

Ernie Osburn

1st place

15 minute oral presentation “Myths and Mysteries Unravelled” category

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Chloe Moore

3rd place

Flash talk
“Myths and Mysteries Unravelled” category

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Sarah Kuchinsky

2nd place

15 minute oral presentation “Myths and Mysteries Unravelled” category

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“Forest disturbance has long-term effects on soil bacterial and fungal communities in Appalachian ecosystems”

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“Does commonness confer connectivity? A genomics
case study of a backyard frog”

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“Assessing susceptibility to Usutu virus in avian models”

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/3″][vc_column_text]Ernie Osburn is a graduate student in Biological Sciences working with Dr. Jeb Barrett. He is studying the impacts of Rhododendron removals on soil microbial communities and nitrogen cycling in Appalachian forests. For this presentation, he used DNA sequencing to investigate soil microbial communities in forests that had experienced a range of different disturbances (e.g., logging, conversion to agriculture) several decades previously. He found some consistent differences in microbial taxa between disturbed and undisturbed forests, including higher bacterial diversity and higher abundance of mycorrhizal fungi in soils from disturbed sites. These findings indicate that human disturbance of forests has long-lasting effects on soil microbial communities with potential long-term implications for forest ecosystem functioning.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/3″][vc_column_text]Chloe Moore is a graduate student in Biological Sciences working with Dr. Meryl Mims. She is interested in studying the connections between species traits, population genetics, and landscapes, especially in areas with high levels of anthropogenic land-use. For this presentation, she studied the common “backyard” amphibian, the spring peeper (Pseudacris crucifer). Despite the species’ commonness throughout the eastern United States, little is known about its ability to survive, or even maybe thrive, in heavily-modified environments. She presented her research on assessing drivers of the spring peeper’s persistence in modified landscapes by investigating the relationship between environmental differentiation, i.e. modified versus unmodified habitats, and genetic variation and connectivity.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/3″][vc_column_text]Sarah Kuchinsky is a graduate student who combines wildlife research with traditional veterinary medicine by pursuing a veterinary science, PhD/DVM dual degree program.  Her research at Virginia Tech seeks to understand the pathogenesis, transmissibility, and disease dynamics of Usutu Virus (USUV). For her presentation, she discussed her investigation on the susceptibility of domestic and wild avian species to USUV, in order to determine an appropriate model to study this virus. She found that cells derived from American robin, house sparrow, and song sparrow were susceptible to multiple USUV strains, while cells derived from American crow were not. She also did experimental inoculations of USUV in 2-day-old chickens and wild caught house sparrows. She found that both the 2-day-old chickens and house sparrows developed viremia, suggesting that these bird models can serve as appropriate animal models to further evaluate USUV pathogenesis and transmission.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_separator style=”shadow”][/vc_column][/vc_row]