Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

2017 Nebraska Water Leaders Academy - Final Report, Mark E. Burbach, H. Reiners-Hild

Conservation and Survey Division

Twenty participants completed the 2017 Water Leaders Academy bringing the total number of graduates to 101 since the inception of the program in 2011. Assessment of participants’ transformational leadership skills, champion of innovation skills, water knowledge and engagement, civic capacity, and entrepreneurial leadership behaviors showed a significant increase over the course of the year, from both participants’ and their raters’ perspectives. Feedback from participants was highly positive and constructive. Participant concerns were addressed, and only minor changes are planned for the 2018 Academy curriculum. Results of the program assessment indicate that the curriculum is meeting Academy objectives. Most importantly, Alumni …

Probiotic Strain Stenotrophomonas Acidaminiphila Bj1 Degrades And Reduces Chlorothalonil Toxicity To Soil Enzymes, Microbial Communities And Plant Roots, Qingming Zhang, Muhammad Saleem, Caixia Wang

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

Chlorothalonil, a non-systemic and broad-spectrum fungicide, is widely used to control the pathogens of agricultural plants. Although microbial degradation of chlorothalonil is known, we know little about the colonization and degradation capacity of these microbes in the natural and semi-natural soil environments. Therefore, we studied the colonization and detoxification potential of a chlorothalonil degrading Stenotrophomonas acidaminiphila probiotic strain BJ1 in the soil under green conditions. The results from polymerase chain reaction-denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis demonstrated that probiotic strain BJ1 successfully colonized the soil by competing with the native biota. Moreover, the bacterial inoculation stimulated some members of indigenous soil microbial …

Integrating Herbivore Population Dynamics Into A Global Land Biosphere Model: Plugging Animals Into The Earth System, Shree R. S. Dangal, Hanqin Tian, Chaoqun Lu, Wei Ren, Shufen Pan, Jia Yang, Nicola Di Cosmo, Amy Hessl

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

Mammalian herbivores are an essential component of grassland and savanna ecosystems, and with feedbacks to the climate system. To date, the response and feedbacks of mammalian herbivores to changes in both abiotic and biotic factors are poorly quantified and not adequately represented in the current global land surface modeling framework. In this study, we coupled herbivore population dynamics in a global land model (the Dynamic Land Ecosystem Model, DLEM 3.0) to simulate populations of horses, cattle, sheep, and goats, and their responses to changes in multiple environmental factors at the site level across different continents during 1980–2010. Simulated results show …

Aquifers Of Nebraska Ii: The Niobrara Aquifer, Dana Divine, Robert Matthew Joeckel, Sue Olafsen Lackey

Conservation and Survey Division

The marine shale, chalk, marl, and chalky limestone of the Niobrara Formation directly underlie Quaternary sediments in 23 counties from south-central to northeastern Nebraska. Nevertheless, the formation serves as an aquifer only in and around Cedar, Madison, and Nuckolls counties. Niobrara aquifer wells mostly supply irrigation, domestic, and livestock needs. Two hundred of the approximately 230 active registered wells in Nebraska that are screened entirely in the Niobrara aquifer are in Cedar County and environs. About another 200 wells in this area are screened in both the Niobrara aquifer and overlying Quaternary sediments. Wells screened entirely in the Niobrara aquifer …

Understanding Cigarette Butt Littering Behavior On A Public Beach: A Case Study Of Jekyll Island, Maranda R. Miller, Mark E. Burbach

Conservation and Survey Division

Conservation of natural resources and promotion of family-friendly tourism activities are vital to Jekyll Island. As it is stated in the Jekyll Island Authority (JIA) Master Plan “Jekyll Island is a unique, state-owned barrier island that balances conserving and preserving natural, historic, and cultural resources with providing accessible, affordable recreation, vacation, and education opportunities for the people of Georgia and beyond” (Jekyll Island Authority, 2014b, p. 4). The JIA has reported approximately 1 million people visit the island annually (Jekyll Island Authority, 2015). As such, tourism is instrumental to Jekyll Island’s economy, and that tourism contributes to the overall economy …

Land Capability Assessment For Expanding Irrigated Horticulture Around Myalup, Department Of Agriculture And Food, Western Australia, Dafwa

Resource management technical reports

The Department of Primary Industry and Regional Development (DPIRD, formerly Department of Agriculture and Food, Western Australia), assessed the suitability of land for expanding irrigated horticulture around Myalup, Western Australia. The assessment builds upon existing soil-landscape mapping produced by van Gool and Kipling (1992), and Barnesby and Proulx-Nixon (2000). This report provides guidance to decision-makers and investors about areas with potential for irrigated horticulture.

The survey area for this assessment is east of Myalup, covering 37 800 hectares (ha). Johnston Road forms the northern boundary and the Brunswick River forms the southern boundary (Figure 1.1). The sandy soils of the …

Long-Term Antagonistic Effect Of Increased Precipitation And Nitrogen Addition On Soil Respiration In A Semiarid Steppe, Hongyan Han, Yue Du, Dafeng Hui, Lin Jiang, Mingxing Zhong, Shiqiang Wan

Biology Faculty Research

Changes in water and nitrogen (N) availability due to climate change and atmospheric N deposition could have significant effects on soil respiration, a major pathway of carbon (C) loss from terrestrial ecosystems. A manipulative experiment simulating increased precipitation and atmospheric N deposition has been conducted for 9 years (2005–2013) in a semiarid grassland in Mongolian Plateau, China. Increased precipitation and N addition interactively affect soil respiration through the 9 years. The interactions demonstrated that N addition weakened the precipitation-induced stimulation of soil respiration, whereas increased precipitation exacerbated the negative impacts of N addition. The main effects of increased precipitation and …

Geology Of Northeastern Nebraska And Environs: Cedar, Dakota, And Dixon Counties In Nebraska, And Plymouth And Woodbury County In Iowa, Robert Matthew Joeckel, Dana Divine, P.R. Hanson, Leslie M. Howard

Conservation and Survey Division

No abstract provided.

Insights Into Land Plant Evolution Garnered From The Marchantia Polymorpha Genome, John L. Bowman, Takayuki Kohchi, Katsuyuki T. Yamato, Jerry Jenkins, Shengqiang Shu, Kimitsune Ishizaki, Shohei Yamaoka, Ryuichi Nishihama, Yasukazu Nakamura, Frédéric Berger, Catherine Adam, Shiori Sugamata Aki, Felix Althoff, Takashi Araki, Mario A. Arteaga-Vazquez, Sureshkumar Balasubrmanian, Kerrie Barry, Diane Bauer, Christian R. Boehm, Liam Briginshaw, Juan Caballero-Perez, Bruno Catarino, Feng Chen, Shota Chiyoda, Mansi Chovatia, Kevin M. Davies, Mihails Delmans, Taku Demura, Tom Dierschke, Liam Dolan, Tomokazu Kawashima

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

The evolution of land flora transformed the terrestrial environment. Land plants evolved from an ancestral charophycean alga from which they inherited developmental, biochemical, and cell biological attributes. Additional biochemical and physiological adaptations to land, and a life cycle with an alternation between multicellular haploid and diploid generations that facilitated efficient dispersal of desiccation tolerant spores, evolved in the ancestral land plant. We analyzed the genome of the liverwort Marchantia polymorpha, a member of a basal land plant lineage. Relative to charophycean algae, land plant genomes are characterized by genes encoding novel biochemical pathways, new phytohormone signaling pathways (notably auxin), …

Silver Engineered Nanomaterials And Ions Elicit Species-Specific O2 Consumption Responses In Plant Growth Promoting Rhizobacteria, Ricky W. Lewis, Jason M. Unrine, Paul M. Bertsch, David H. Mcnear Jr.

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

Metal containing engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) are now commonly used in various industrial and commercial applications. Many of these materials can be transformed during waste water treatment and ultimately enter terrestrial ecosystems via agriculturally applied biosolids. It is unclear how agriculturally important soil microbes will be affected by exposure to environmentally relevant, sublethal concentrations of ENMs and their transformation products (i.e., ions, aggregates, etc.). A method was developed, which puts O₂ consumption responses in terms of viability, and tested by examining the toxic effects of Ag⁺, Zn²⁺, and Ni²⁺ ions on the plant growth promoting …

The Soybean Rfg1 Gene Restricts Nodulation By Sinorhizobium Fredii Usda193, Yinglun Fan, Jinge Liu, Shanhua Lyu, Qi Wang, Shengming Yang, Hongyan Zhu

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

Sinorhizobium fredii is a fast-growing rhizobial species that can establish a nitrogen-fixing symbiosis with a wide range of legume species including soybeans (Glycine max). In soybeans, this interaction shows a high level of specificity such that particular S. fredii strains nodulate only a limited set of plant genotypes. Here we report the identification of a dominant gene in soybeans that restricts nodulation with S. fredii USDA193. Genetic mapping in an F2 population revealed co-segregation of the underlying locus with the previously cloned Rfg1 gene. The Rfg1 allele encodes a member of the Toll-interleukin receptor/nucleotide-binding site/leucine-rich repeat class of …

Managing Nitrous Oxide Emissions In Agricultural Fields, Mark S. Coyne, Wei Ren

Plant and Soil Sciences Research Report

Agriculture is a major contributor to atmospheric nitrous oxide (N₂O) (Smith et al., 2014; Tian et al., 2015). Unfortunately, nitrous oxide destroys stratospheric ozone (O₃) which protects us from ultraviolet radiation (Cicerone, 1989) and it increases ground level O_3, whichis an air pollutant threatening human health and food production. Nitrous oxide is also 298 times more potent than an equivalent amount of carbon dioxide (CO₂) in terms of trapping and absorbing reflected solar radiation (Forster et al., 2007). Basic chemistry and physics assure us that increased levels of N₂O in the …

Holdrege: Nebraska's State Soil, University Of Nebraska - Lincoln

Conservation and Survey Division

No abstract provided.

Holdrege Nebraska State Soil, Nebraska Society Of Professional Soil Scientists

Conservation and Survey Division

No abstract provided.

Fruit Weight Is Controlled By Cell Size Regulator Encoding A Novel Protein That Is Expressed In Maturing Tomato Fruits, Qi Mu, Zejun Huang, Manohar Chakrabarti, Eudald Illa-Berenguer, Xiaoxi Liu, Yanping Wang, Alexis Ramos, Esther Van Der Knaap

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

Increases in fruit weight of cultivated vegetables and fruits accompanied the domestication of these crops. Here we report on the positional cloning of a quantitative trait locus (QTL) controlling fruit weight in tomato. The derived allele of Cell Size Regulator (CSR-D) increases fruit weight predominantly through enlargement of the pericarp areas. The expanded pericarp tissues result from increased mesocarp cell size and not from increased number of cell layers. The effect of CSR on fruit weight and cell size is found across different genetic backgrounds implying a consistent impact of the locus on the trait. In fruits, CSR …

Effects Of Cultivar And Maternal Environment On Seed Quality In Vicia Sativa, Rong Li, Lijun Chen, Yanpei Wu, Rui Zhang, Carol C. Baskin, Jerry M. Baskin, Xiaowen Hu

Biology Faculty Publications

Production of high quality seeds is of fundamental importance for successful crop production. However, knowledge of the effects of increased temperature resulting from global warming on seed quality of alpine species is limited. We investigated the effect of maternal environment on seed quality of three cultivars of the leguminous forage species Vicia sativa, giving particular attention to temperature. Plants of each cultivar were grown at 1700 and 3000 m a.s.l., and mass, germination, electrical conductivity (EC) of leakage and longevity were determined for mature seeds. Seeds of all three cultivars produced at the low elevation had a significantly lower …

Reducing Equifinality Using Isotopes In A Process-Based Stream Nitrogen Model Highlights The Flux Of Algal Nitrogen From Agricultural Streams, William I. Ford, James F. Fox, Erik Pollock

Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering Faculty Publications

The fate of bioavailable nitrogen species transported through agricultural landscapes remains highly uncertain given complexities of measuring fluxes impacting the fluvial N cycle. We present and test a new numerical model named Technology for Removable Annual Nitrogen in Streams For Ecosystem Restoration (TRANSFER), which aims to reduce model uncertainty due to erroneous parameterization, i.e., equifinality, in stream nitrogen cycle assessment and quantify the significance of transient and permanent removal pathways. TRANSFER couples nitrogen elemental and stable isotope mass‐balance equations with existing hydrologic, hydraulic, sediment transport, algal biomass, and sediment organic …

Soil Ecosystem Service Tradeoffs And Social-Ecological Resilience In The North Central Great Plains, Hannah E. Birge

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Humans seek to improve their wellbeing by altering ecological processes to maximize the output of specific ecosystem services, which often leave the system vulnerable to unintended and undesirable side effects. Ecosystem services emerge from complex interactions among ecological structures and processes occurring at multiple scales. The degree to which an ecosystem maintains a predictable range of structures and processes in the face of disturbance can be described as its resilience. The 1930s Dust Bowl of the North American Great Plains is an example of a system reconfiguration and loss of resilience that was ultimately driven by human optimization for a …

Geology And Paleontology Along Part Of The Niobrara River In Northern Nebraska, Robert Matthew Joeckel, S. T. Tucker, Leslie M. Howard

Conservation and Survey Division

No abstract provided.

Effects Of Climate Warming On Net Primary Productivity In China During 1961–2010, Fengxue Gu, Yuandong Zhang, Mei Huang, Bo Tao, Rui Guo, Changrong Yan

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

The response of ecosystems to different magnitudes of climate warming and corresponding precipitation changes during the last few decades may provide an important reference for predicting the magnitude and trajectory of net primary productivity (NPP) in the future. In this study, a process-based ecosystem model, Carbon Exchange between Vegetation, Soil and Atmosphere (CEVSA), was used to investigate the response of NPP to warming at both national and subregional scales during 1961–2010. The results suggest that a 1.3°C increase in temperature stimulated the positive changing trend in NPP at national scale during the past 50 years. Regardless of the magnitude of …

Assessing Coastal Plain Risk Indices For Subsurface Phosphorus Loss, Amy L. Shober, Anthony R. Buda, Kathryn C. Turner, Nicole M. Fiorellino, A. Scott Andres, Joshua M. Mcgrath, J. Thomas Sims

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

Phosphorus (P) Index evaluations are critical to advancing nutrient management planning in the United States. However, most assessments until now have focused on the risks of P losses in surface runoff. In artificially drained agroecosystems of the Atlantic Coastal Plain, subsurface flow is the predominant mode of P transport, but its representation in most P Indices is often inadequate. We explored methods to evaluate the subsurface P risk routines of five P Indices from Delaware, Maryland (two), Virginia, and North Carolina using available water quality and soils datasets. Relationships between subsurface P risk scores and published dissolved P loads in …

The Application Of Aem To Mapping The Aquifer And Groundwater Characteristics Of The La Grange Groundwater Area, Wa, David Annetts, Tim Munday, Richard J. George Dr, Nicholas J. Wright, Gregory Paul Raper, Kevin Cahill

Natural resources commissioned reports

This report describes the interpretation of a large airborne electromagnetic data survey that was designed to aid characterisation of groundwater systems in the La Grange groundwater allocation area which lies south of Broome, Western Australia. Characterisation of these systems is critical to developing policy around water use in the region, especially for the development of agriculture. This report is the second of two reports and it is designed to refine surfaces which are used as inputs to groundwater models. The volume defined by these surfaces viz. the seawater intrusion in the west, the top of the Jarlemai siltstone and the …

An Overview Of Secondary Aquifers In Nebraska, Dana Divine, Steven S. Sibray

Conservation and Survey Division

No abstract provided.

Conservation Farming And Changing Climate: More Beneficial Than Conventional Methods For Degraded Ugandan Soils, Drake N. Mubiru, Jalia Namakula, James Lwasa, Godfrey A. Otim, Joselyn Kashagama, Milly Nakafeero, William Nanyeenya, Mark S. Coyne

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

The extent of land affected by degradation in Uganda ranges from 20% in relatively flat and vegetation-covered areas to 90% in the eastern and southwestern highlands. Land degradation has adversely affected smallholder agro-ecosystems including direct damage and loss of critical ecosystem services such as agricultural land/soil and biodiversity. This study evaluated the extent of bare grounds in Nakasongola, one of the districts in the Cattle Corridor of Uganda and the yield responses of maize (Zea mays) and common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) to different tillage methods in the district. Bare ground was determined by a supervised multi-band …

Seedling Tolerance To Cotyledon Removal Varies With Seed Size: A Case Of Five Legume Species, Xiao Wen Hu, Rui Zhang, Yan Pei Wu, Carol C. Baskin

Biology Faculty Publications

It is generally accepted that seedlings from large seeds are more tolerant to defoliation than those from small seeds due to the additional metabolic reserves present in the large seeds. However, information on the effects of amount of seed reserves (cotyledon removal) from seedlings resulting from large vs. small seeds on seedling growth and long-term survival in the field is limited. Five legume species with different sizes of seeds were sown in the field and none, one, or both cotyledons removed 7 days after seedling emergence. Seedling biomass, relative growth rate (RGR) and survival were determined at different time. Cotyledon …

Divergence In Life History Traits Between Two Populations Of A Seed-Dimorphic Halophyte In Response To Soil Salinity, Fan Yang, Jerry M. Baskin, Carol C. Baskin, Xuejun Yang, Dechang Cao, Zhenying Huang

Biology Faculty Publications

Production of heteromorphic seeds is common in halophytes growing in arid environments with strong spatial and temporal heterogeneity. However, evidence for geographic variation (reflecting local adaptation) is almost nonexistent. Our primary aims were to compare the life history traits of two desert populations of this halophytic summer annual Suaeda corniculata subsp. mongolica and to investigate the phenotypic response of its plant and heteromorphic seeds to different levels of salt stress. Dimorphic seeds (F₁) of the halophyte S. corniculata collected from two distant populations (F₀) that differ in soil salinity were grown in a common environment under …

Global Land Carbon Sink Response To Temperature And Precipitation Varies With Enso Phase, Yuanyuan Fang, Anna M. Michalak, Christopher R. Schwalm, Deborah N. Huntzinger, Joseph A. Berry, Philippe Ciais, Shilong Piao, Benjamin Poulter, Joshua B. Fisher, Robert B. Cook, Daniel Hayes, Maoyi Huang, Akihiko Ito, Atul Jain, Huimin Lei, Chaoqun Lu, Jiafu Mao, Nicholas C. Parazoo, Shushi Peng, Daniel M. Ricciuto, Xiaoying Shi, Bo Tao, Hanqin Tian, Weile Wang, Yaxing Wei, Jia Yang

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

Climate variability associated with the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and its consequent impacts on land carbon sink interannual variability have been used as a basis for investigating carbon cycle responses to climate variability more broadly, and to inform the sensitivity of the tropical carbon budget to climate change. Past studies have presented opposing views about whether temperature or precipitation is the primary factor driving the response of the land carbon sink to ENSO. Here, we show that the dominant driver varies with ENSO phase. Whereas tropical temperature explains sink dynamics following El Niño conditions (r TG,P = 0.59, p …

Noncanonical Alternative Polyadenylation Contributes To Gene Regulation In Response To Hypoxia, Laura De Lorenzo, Reed Sorenson, Julia Bailey-Serres, Arthur G. Hunt

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

Stresses from various environmental challenges continually confront plants, and their responses are important for growth and survival. One molecular response to such challenges involves the alternative polyadenylation of mRNA. In plants, it is unclear how stress affects the production and fate of alternative mRNA isoforms. Using a genome-scale approach, we show that in Arabidopsis thaliana, hypoxia leads to increases in the number of mRNA isoforms with polyadenylated 3′ ends that map to 5′-untranslated regions (UTRs), introns, and protein-coding regions. RNAs with 3′ ends within protein-coding regions and introns were less stable than mRNAs that end at 3′-UTR poly(A) sites. …

Interpretive Geologic Cross Sections Across Lower Platte North Natural Resources District, Nebraska (Ccs-20), Dana Divine

Conservation and Survey Division

No abstract provided.

Nutrient Addition Shifts Plant Community Composition Towards Earlier Flowering Species In Some Prairie Ecoregions In The U.S. Central Plains, Lori Biederman, Brent Mortensen, Philip Fay, Nicole Hagenah, Johannes Knops, Kimberly La Pierre, Ramesh Laungani, Eric Lind, Rebecca L. Mcculley, Sally Power, Eric Seabloom, Pedro Tognetti

Plant and Soil Sciences Faculty Publications

The distribution of flowering across the growing season is governed by each species’ evolutionary history and climatic variability. However, global change factors, such as eutrophication and invasion, can alter plant community composition and thus change the distribution of flowering across the growing season. We examined three ecoregions (tall-, mixed, and short-grass prairie) across the U.S. Central Plains to determine how nutrient (nitrogen (N), phosphorus, and potassium (+micronutrient)) addition alters the temporal patterns of plant flowering traits. We calculated total community flowering potential (FP) by distributing peak-season plant cover values across the growing season, allocating each species’ cover to only those …