Life Sciences Commons^™

Global Patterns And Predictions Of Seafloor Biomass Using Random Forests, Chih-Lin Wei, Gilbert T. Rowe, Elva Escobar-Briones, Antje Boetius, Thomas Soltwedel, M. Julian Caley, Yousria Soliman, Falk Huettmann, Fangyuan Qu, Zishan Yu, C. Roland Pitcher, Richard L. Haedrich, Mary K. Wicksten, Michael A. Rex, Jeffrey G. Baguley, Jyotsna Sharma, Roberto Danovaro, Ian R. Macdonald, Clifton C. Nunnally, Jody W. Deming, Paul Montagna, Mélanie Lévesque, Jan Marcin Weslawski, Maria Wlodarska-Kowalczuk, Baban S. Ingole, Brian J. Bett, David S. M. Billett, Andrew Yool, Bodil A. Bluhm, Katrin Iken, Bhavani E. Narayanaswamy

Biology Faculty Publication Series

A comprehensive seafloor biomass and abundance database has been constructed from 24 oceanographic institutions worldwide within the Census of Marine Life (CoML) field projects. The machine-learning algorithm, Random Forests, was employed to model and predict seafloor standing stocks from surface primary production, water-column integrated and export particulate organic matter (POM), seafloor relief, and bottom water properties. The predictive models explain 63% to 88% of stock variance among the major size groups. Individual and composite maps of predicted global seafloor biomass and abundance are generated for bacteria, meiofauna, macrofauna, and megafauna (invertebrates and fishes). Patterns of benthic standing stocks were positive …

Burning Manure As An Economical Energy Source, Ron Machado

Dairy Science

The dairy industry is under pressure from increasing environmental regulations, falling prices, as well as very aggressive foreign competition. Manure management and electrical costs are one area dairymen can look to cut costs. My objective for this project was to determine how cost effective biomass gasification of manure is at generating electricity. The proposed project was designed for a manure production equal to a 3,000 cow herd. I used standard capital budgeting techniques to determine the efficiency of the project, primarily focusing on the net present value, internal rate of return, and payback period.

University Of Maine Integrated Forest Product Refinery (Ifpr) Technology Research, Hemant P. Pendse

University of Maine Office of Research Administration: Grant Reports

This project supported research on science and technology that forms a basis for integrated forest product refinery for co-production of chemicals, fuels and materials using existing forest products industry infrastructure. Clear systems view of an Integrated Forest Product Refinery (IFPR) allowed development of a compelling business case for a small scale technology demonstration in Old Town, ME for co-production of biofuels using cellulosic sugars along with pulp for the new' owners of the facility resulting in an active project on Integrated Bio-Refinery (IBR) at the Old Town Fuel & Fiber. Work on production of advanced materials from woody biomass has …

Genome Sequence Of The Model Mushroom Schizophyllum Commune, Robin A. Ohm, Jan F. De Jong, Luis G. Lugones, Andrea Aerts, Erika Kothe, Jason E. Stajich, Ronald P. De Vries, Eric Record, Anthony Levasseur, Scott E. Baker, Kirk A. Bartholomew, Pedro M. Coutinho, Susann Erdmann, Thomas J. Fowler, Allen C. Gathmen, Vincent Lombard, Bernard Henrissat, Nicole Knabe, Ursula Kues, Walt W. Lily

Biology Faculty Publications

Much remains to be learned about the biology of mushroom-forming fungi, which are an important source of food, secondary metabolites and industrial enzymes. The wood-degrading fungus Schizophyllum commune is both a genetically tractable model for studying mushroom development and a likely source of enzymes capable of efficient degradation of lignocellulosic biomass. Comparative analyses of its 38.5-megabase genome, which encodes 13,210 predicted genes, reveal the species's unique wood-degrading machinery. One-third of the 471 genes predicted to encode transcription factors are differentially expressed during sexual development of S. commune. Whereas inactivation of one of these, fst4, prevented mushroom formation, inactivation of another, …

Drought Response Of Populus Transformed With Stress Response Transcription Factors, Alina S. Campbell

Masters Theses

The economic feasibility of producing biomass-based fuels requires high-yielding feedstocks to supply biomass to biorefineries. Populus trees are a potential biomass feedstock due to their high yield, but their high water requirement limits productivity under drought conditions.

The number of genes controlling drought tolerance, and the long generation time for perennial species, slows cultivar development. Accelerated domestication proposes using the sequenced Populus genome to quickly incorporate target traits into productive clones by transgenesis.

Six putative drought tolerance transcription factors: DREB2A, DREB2B, AtMYB, AREB1/ABF2, MYB, and NAC, had been previously identified and manipulated in eastern cottonwood (Populus deltoides). Three …

Constraint-Based Model Of Shewanella Oneidensis Mr-1 Metabolism: A Tool For Data Analysis And Hypothesis Generation, Grigoriy E. Pinchuk, Eric A. Hill, Oleg V. Geydebrekht, Jessica De Ingeniis, Xiaolin Zhang, Andrei Osterman, James H. Scott

Dartmouth Scholarship

Shewanellae are gram-negative facultatively anaerobic metal-reducing bacteria commonly found in chemically (i.e., redox) stratified environments. Occupying such niches requires the ability to rapidly acclimate to changes in electron donor/acceptor type and availability; hence, the ability to compete and thrive in such environments must ultimately be reflected in the organization and utilization of electron transfer networks, as well as central and peripheral carbon metabolism. To understand how Shewanella oneidensis MR-1 utilizes its resources, the metabolic network was reconstructed. The resulting network consists of 774 reactions, 783 genes, and 634 unique metabolites and contains biosynthesis pathways for all cell constituents. Using constraint-based …

Slides: Celebrating Flpma: Land Use Planning At The Blm, Marcilynn Burke

The Past, Present, and Future of Our Public Lands: Celebrating the 40th Anniversary of the Public Land Law Review Commission’s Report, One Third of the Nation’s Land (Martz Summer Conference, June 2-4)

Presenter: Marcilynn Burke, BLM Deputy Director - Programs and Policy, U.S. Dept. of the Interior, (Washington, D.C.)

30 slides

Identifying Alternative Waste Conversion Technologies For Use At California Polytechnic State University San Luis Obispo, Matthew R. Bono

BioResource and Agricultural Engineering

This project was undertaken to identify and study alternative technologies for converting waste streams available on the Cal Poly San Luis Obispo campus into energy. As a large campus on the Central Coast of California Cal Poly not only produces lots of waste, but has limited options for its disposal. Furthermore, the campus is in the midst of an on-going green initiative, and more efficient use of its waste products would be a welcome development for the entire campus community. This report gathers information on waste streams originating at Cal Poly and information about waste to energy conversion technologies. The …

The Study Of Plant Cell Walls Deconstruction Using Electron Beams Irradiation, Jetana Kittisenee

Masters Theses

Plant cell walls compose the largest source of sugars on earth and are a potential source after conversion for liquid transportation fuels. However, the crystalline region of cellulose and the lignin that incases it present significant obstacles for enzymes to digest. This lowers the sugar yield, which ultimately decreases the production efficiency of bioethanol. A pretreatment that could help lowering the amount of crystallinity; meanwhile, breakdown the matrix of lignin and polysaccharides that cover cellulose fibers would be ideal. Here we propose a physical pretreatment strategy of electron beam irradiation that could potentially decrease cellulose crystallinity as well as unzip …

Monitoring And Analyzing Process Streams Towards Understanding Ionic Liquid Pretreatment Of Switchgrass (Panicum Virgatum L.), Rohit Arora, Chithra Manisseri, Chenlin Li, Markus D. Ong, Henrik Vibe Scheller, Kenneth P. Vogel, Blake A. Simmons, Seema Singh

United States Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service / University of Nebraska-Lincoln: Faculty Publications

Fundamental understanding of biomass pretreatment and its influence on saccharification kinetics, total sugar yield, and inhibitor formation is essential to develop efficient next-generation biofuel strategies, capable of displacing fossil fuels at a commercial level. In this study, we investigated the effect of residence time and temperature during ionic liquid (IL) pretreatment of switchgrass using 1-ethyl-3-methyl imidazolium acetate. The primary metrics of pretreatment performance are biomass delignification, xylan and glucan depolymerization, porosity, surface area, cellulase kinetics, and sugar yields. Compositional analysis and quantification of process streams of saccharides and lignin demonstrate that delignification increases as a function of pretreatment temperature and …

The Effects Of Biogas Slurry On The Production And Quality Of Maize Fodder, Md. Rafiqul Islam, Syed Mohammad Ehsanur Rahman, Md. Mukhlesur Rahman, Deog Hwan Oh, Chang Six Ra

Turkish Journal of Agriculture and Forestry

The present study examined the effectiveness of biogas slurry (liquor from anaerobic digestion process) as a nitrogen source for the production of maize fodder (Zea mays). Maize fodder was cultivated as a control (T_0: 0 kg of slurry N ha^{-1}) and with 3 different levels of biogas slurry-T_1 (60 kg of slurry N ha^{-1}), T_2 (70 kg of slurry N ha^{-1}), and T_3 (82 kg of slurry N ha^{-1})-in a randomized block design. The parameters studied were plant height, stem circumference, number of leaves, leaf area, dry matter yield, and nutrient contents in maize fodder. Maize plant height and stem …

Descriptions Of Life-Stages Of Blastobasis Repartella (Lepidoptera: Gelechioidea: Coleophoridae: Blastobasinae) And Observations On Its Biology In Switchgrass, D. Adamski, P. J. Johnson, A. A. Boe, Jeffrey Bradshaw, Alan Pultyniewicz

Panhandle Research and Extension Center

Blastobasis repartella (Dietz) is a borer in the proaxis and basal nodes and internodes of above ground stems of Panicum virgatum L. (Poaceae). The adult and immature stages are described herein, including diagnoses of the adult and larva, as this insect may be easily confused with a closely related grass-feeding congener, Blastobasis graminea Adamski, which is also known to occur in the United States. The biology of B. repartella is described. Figures of the adult, illustrations of the male and female genitalia, wing venation, the chaetotaxy of the larva (supplemented with scanning electron micrographs), and pupa are provided. Bassus difficilis …

Laboratory Measurements Of Trace Gas Emissions From Biomass Burning Of Fuel Types From The Southeastern And Southwestern United States, I R. Burling, R J. Yokelson, David W. Griffith, T J. Johnson, P Veres, J.M. Roberts, Carsten Warneke, S P. Urbanski, J Reardon, D R. Weise, W M Hao, Joost A. De Gouw

Faculty of Science - Papers (Archive)

Vegetation commonly managed by prescribed burning was collected from five southeastern and southwestern US military bases and burned under controlled conditions at the US Forest Service Fire Sciences Laboratory in Missoula, Montana. The smoke emissions were measured with a large suite of state-of-the-art instrumentation including an open-path Fourier transform infrared (OP-FTIR) spectrometer for measurement of gas-phase species. The OP-FTIR detected and quantified 19 gas-phase species in these fires: CO2, CO, CH4, C2H2, C2H4, C3H6, HCHO, HCOOH, CH3OH, CH3COOH, furan, H2O, NO, NO2, HONO, NH3, HCN, HCl, and SO2. Emission factors for these species are presented for each vegetation type burned. …

Linking Measured Carbon Dioxide Exchange By Sugarcane Crops And Biomass Production, O T Denmead, B.C.T. Macdonald, I. White, David W. Griffith, G Bryant, Travis A. Naylor, Stephen R. Wilson, W J. Wang

Faculty of Science - Papers (Archive)

CARBON TRADING and the growing interest in biofuel production from sugarcane necessitate the ability to measure gains and losses of soil organic C which may occur as a result. Modelling and soil sampling suggest that changes in soil C are likely to be < 1 t C/ha/y. Published accounts indicate that confirming such small changes by traditional soil sampling is error-prone and requires investigations of > 10 years. The paper explores the possibility of calculating soil gains or losses by subtracting the carbon stored in the crop biomass from the carbon gained by the crop through the uptake of carbon dioxide supplied by the atmosphere and processes in the soil. Although uptake and storage very nearly balanced each other in one–year measurements in …

Benthic Ecology From Space: Optics And Net Primary Production In Seagrass And Benthic Algae Across The Great Bahama Bank, Heidi M. Dierssen, Richard C. Zimmerman, Lisa A. Drake, David J. Burdige

OES Faculty Publications

Development of repeatable and quantitative tools are necessary for determining the abundance and distribution of different types of benthic habitats, detecting changes to these ecosystems, and determining their role in the global carbon cycle. Here we used ocean color remote sensing techniques to map different major groups of primary producers and estimate net primary productivity (NPP) across Great Bahama Bank (GBB). Field investigations on the northern portion of the GBB in 2004 revealed 3 dominant types of benthic primary producers: seagrass, benthic macroalgae, and microalgae attached to sediment. Laboratory measurements of NPP ranged from barely net autotrophic for grapestone sediment …

Cellulosic Ethanol In Louisiana: A Three Part Economic Analysis Of Feedstocks, Pricing Strategies And Location Strategies, Tyler B. Mark

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The development of an efficient biomass supply chain is pivotal for the cellulosic ethanol industry. The Louisiana Sugarcane Belt, and energy cane are the focus of this study. From both the producer and processor perspectives, cost of production, competitiveness of cellulosic ethanol, biomass pricing, changes in crop mix, and the optimal location for cellulosic ethanol processing facilities are the critical factors evaluated. Educating potential energy cane producers on production costs and agronomic practices is the first step in the biomass supply chain. This study finds that for energy cane producers to breakeven, processors need to pay producers at least $30 …