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Selenate Uptake By Symphyotrichum Ascendens Western Aster, Nathan Hankes

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Symphyotrichum ascendens is a native forb species responsible for selenium poisoning of livestock grazing on mine wastes in the American Intermountain West. While S. ascendens has long been assumed to be a Se accumulator species, this report details the first investigation into its Se uptake, affinity, partitioning, and growth in response to selenate fertilization. The study was performed in a hydroponic growth environment at selenate concentrations of 0.1, 0.25, 0.5, and 1.0 mM selenate. Symphyotrichum ascendens absorbed selenate in percentage concentrations, with the highest tissue concentration of 3.6% Se. Symphyotrichum ascendens exhibited signs of stress, producing 69.2% less biomass at …

Utah Lotus: North American Legume For Possible Use In Rangeland Revegetation In The Southern Great Basin Of The Western United States, Jason M. Stettler

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This thesis project explored the production and forage quality characteristics of Utah lotus (Lotus utahensis Ottley) and scrub lotus (L. wrightii (A. Gray) Greene) seed collections during a two-year period. The variation of 14 Utah lotus and five scrub lotus seed collections was evaluated by measuring important plant characteristics at three common garden sites in northern Utah. In addition, the genetic structure of the collections was determined by molecular biological techniques. Large variation was observed among collections for all phenotypic traits measured, with Utah lotus and scrub lotus being phenotypically quite different. Two collections of Utah lotus (LU-5 …

Establishment And Trends In Persistence Of Selected Perennial Cool-Season Grasses, Craig W. Rigby

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The choice of plant materials is an important factor in restoration or revegetation of disturbed rangelands. To better identify plant materials that could be adapted to increased competition from invasive grasses and fluctuations in temperature and precipitation, there is a need to understand potential seedling establishment, plant persistence, and dry-matter yield (DMY) as a measure of plant vigor in the newly developed varieties across a wide range of environmental conditions. Experiments were conducted on four semiarid range sites to compare these traits in 14 perennial cool-season grass species currently used for revegetation in the Western U.S.A. There were location differences, …

Salt Tolerance Of Forage Kochia, Gardner's Saltbush, And Halogeton: Studies In Hydroponic Culture, Joseph Sagers

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Halogeton (Halogeton glomeratus) is a halophytic, invasive species that displaces Gardner’s saltbush (Atriplex gardneri) on saline rangelands. Forage kochia (Bassia prostrata) is a potential species to rehabilitate these ecosystems. This study compared the salinity tolerance of these species and tall wheatgrass (Thinopyrum ponticum) and alfalfa (Medicago sativa). Plants were evaluated for 28 days in hydroponics where they were maintained at 0, 150, 200, 300, 400, 600, and 800 mM NaCl. Shoot growth and ion accumulation were determined. Alfalfa and tall wheatgrass were severely affected by salt with both species’ shoot …

Increasing The Sustainability Of Utah Farms By Incorporating Quinoa As A Novel Crop And Protecting Soil Health, Kristine R. Buckland

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Most of the western United States faces increasing water shortages in the coming years, that will present a major challenge for maintaining sustainable farms. Incorporating an alternative crop that is well adapted to projected changes in climate could be a successful approach to increasing the sustainability of farms in the region. Quinoa, Chenopodium quinoa Willd., may be an ideal alternative crop to meet the demands of the Intermountain West. Before widespread adoption of this novel crop can occur, best management strategies need to be documented. This paper provides research on cropping systems, irrigation rates, and weed competition with quinoa. Additionally, …

Soil Nutrient Cycling And Water Use In Response To Orchard Floor Management In Stone-Fruit Orchards In The Intermountain West, Catherine Mae Culumber

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

An organic peach orchard trial evaluated the effectiveness of different organic management approaches to enhance soil quality and conserve water without compromise to fruit tree growth and fertility. Two tree-row treatments: ‘straw mulch’ (Triticum aestivum L.) and ‘living mulch’ (Lobularia maritima (L.) Desv.) were tested in combination with two alleyway groundcovers: ‘grass’ (Festuca rubra L. with Lolium perenne L.) and a legume, ‘Birdsfoot trefoil’ (Lotus corniculatus L.). The novel treatments were compared with tillage and weed fabric tree-rows with grass alleyways. After mowing, cuttings from the trefoil alleyway were deposited into tree-rows, which provided additional N …

Agricultural Nitrogen Management Affects Microbial Communities, Enzyme Activities, And Functional Genes For Nitrification And Nitrogen Mineralization, Yang Ouyang

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Improved understanding of nitrogen cycling in agriculture is essential for increasing fertilizer use efficiency and sustainable food production. The availability and mobility of nitrogen are largely determined by the processes of nitrogen mineralization and nitrification. Nitrification is mediated by ammonia oxidizing bacteria, ammonia oxidizing archaea, and nitrite oxidizing bacteria. Our understanding of the controls on the relative activity of these nitrifying organisms in soil is limited. A wide variety of soil microorganisms produce enzymes that mineralize nitrogen from organic matter, but we have limited knowledge about links between enzyme activity and the microbes that work in soil. The main objective …

Tallgrass Prairie Center News, Spring 2016, University Of Northern Iowa. Tallgrass Prairie Center.

Tallgrass Prairie Center Newsletter

Inside This Issue:

--Tallgrass Prairie Center News
--Tallgrass Prairie Center Plans for the Future
--Prairie On Farms Working Group Meeting
--The New Chapter of Biomass Energy Work at the Tallgrass Prairie Center
--Prairie on Farms 2015 Installed Prairie Strips
--Bring Back the Natives
--Staffing Transitions
--Iowa's Prairie Road 'Seeds'
--Prairie Roots Project
--2016 Restoration and Management Seminar Series
--The Prairie in Seed - NEW PUBLICATION!
--Student Profiles

Lipid Content And Biomass Analysis In Autotrophic And Heterotrophic Algal Species, Addie M. Lauder, Daniel P. Jones, Thomas E. Walker, Todd Allen

Montview Journal of Research & Scholarship

Biofuels are a form of renewable energy derived from living matter, typically plants. The push for biofuels began in order to decrease the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) released into the atmosphere, as biofuels are essentially carbon neutral. The idea is the same amount of CO2 the plants took in to perform photosynthesis will then be released in the burning of the biofuels. Algae is an excellent source of biofuels because it grows quickly and is versatile in terms of the type of fuel it can produce. The two most common mechanisms for algae growth are heterotrophic or photoautotrophic. Heterotrophically …

Investigation Of Parasympathetic Effects Of Lavender Essential Oil In Humans, Haakon Robert Nelson, Rachel Ann Burkhart, Daniel Morin, Nicole Grace Weissenfluh, Michael R. Korn

Montview Journal of Research & Scholarship

The purpose of this study will be to investigate the claim that administration of lavender (Lavandula angustifolia) essential oil (topically, orally, and/or respiratorily) produces a relaxative effect in human subjects. This investigation will theoretically be conducted in two stages. Stage one will focus primarily on determining the presence of therapeutic effects and the relative effectiveness of lavender in several application modalities. Stage two will proceed based on findings from stage one. If significant parasympathetic effects are observed in relation to one or more of the lavender oil modalities described above, a more focused investigation will be conducted in stage two …

Biology, Ecology, And Management Of Nonnative Ambrosia Beetles (Coleoptera: Curculionidae: Scolytinae) In Ornamental Plant Nurseries, Christopher M. Ranger, Michael E. Reding, Peter B. Schultz, Jason B. Oliver, Steve D. Frank, Karla M. Addesso, Juang Hong Chong, Blair Sampson, Christopher Werle, Stanton Gill, Charles Krause

Agricultural and Environmental Sciences Faculty Research

Xylosandrus germanus (Blandford) and Xylosandrus crassiusculus (Motschulsky) (Coleoptera: Curculionidae: Scolytinae) are two of the most damaging nonnative ambrosia beetle pests in ornamental plant nurseries. Adult females tunnel into the stems and branches of host plants to create galleries with brood chambers. Hosts are infected with symbiotic Ambrosiella spp. fungi that serve as food for the larvae and adults. Plants can also become infected with secondary opportunistic pathogens, including Fusarium spp. Both X. germanus and X. crassiusculus have broad host ranges, and infestations can result in “toothpicks” of extruded chewed wood and sap flow associated with gallery entrances, canopy dieback, stem …

Microbe-Id: An Open Source Toolbox For Microbial Genotyping And Species Identification, Javier F. Tabima, Sydney E. Everhart, Meredith M. Larsen, Alexaandra J. Weisberg, Zhian N. Kamvar, Mathew A. Tancos, Christine D. Smart, Jeff H. Chang, Niklaus J. Grünwald

Department of Plant Pathology: Faculty Publications

Development of tools to identify species, genotypes, or novel strains of invasive organisms is critical for monitoring emergence and implementing rapid response measures. Molecular markers, although critical to identifying species or genotypes, require bioinformatic tools for analysis. However, user-friendly analytical tools for fast identification are not readily available. To address this need, we created a web-based set of applications called Microbe-ID that allow for customizing a toolbox for rapid species identification and strain genotyping using any genetic markers of choice. Two components of Microbe-ID, named Sequence-ID and Genotype-ID, implement species and genotype identification, respectively. Sequence-ID allows identification of species by …

Origins And Relationships Of The Mixed Mesophytic Forest Of Oregon-Idaho, China, And Kentucky: Review And Synthesis, Jerry M. Baskin, Carol C. Baskin

Biology Faculty Publications

The Arcto-Tertiary Geoflora concept of Ralph Chaney, that the Mixed Mesophytic Forest of eastern Asia and eastern North America are relicts of a Northern Hemisphere high-latitude circumglobal deciduous forest of the Late Cretaceous–Early Tertiary that migrated south to the temperate zone as an intact unit, was shown by Wolfe and others to be invalid. To explain the origin and development of these disjunct forests, Wolfe and Tiffney developed the boreotropical hypothesis. Accordingly, a paratropical (near-tropical) rainforest flora containing a mixture of tropical, paratropical, and temperate genera developed at several places in the middle latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere in the …

Effects Of Germination Season On Life History Traits And On Transgenerational Plasticity In Seed Dormancy In A Cold Desert Annual, Juan J. Lu, Dun Y. Tan, Carol C. Baskin, Jerry M. Baskin

Biology Faculty Publications

The maternal environment can influence the intensity of seed dormancy and thus seasonal germination timing and post-germination life history traits. We tested the hypotheses that germination season influences phenotypic expression of post-germination life history traits in the cold desert annual Isatis violascens and that plants from autumn- and spring-germinating seeds produce different proportions of seeds with nondeep and intermediate physiological dormancy (PD). Seeds were sown in summer and flexibility in various life history traits determined for plants that germinated in autumn and in spring. A higher percentage of spring- than of autumn-germinating plants survived the seedling stage, and all surviving …

Unique Nucleic Acid Promoter Formed From Two Or More Promoter Sequences, Indu B. Maiti, Nrisingha Dey

Kentucky Tobacco Research and Development Center Faculty Patents

Non-naturally occurring DNA promoters, include MSGT-PFlt, PFlt-UAS-2X and FSgt-PFlt. The MSGT-PFlt was developed and has expression shown to be equivalent to that of CaMV35S promoter. DNA promoters PFlt-UAS-2X and FSgt-PFlt were developed and tested in transient and transgenic system and found to be stronger than the CaMV35S promoter.

Managing Drought Stress In California Agricultural Systems, Gregory D. Brittain Jr.

Doctor of Plant Health Program: Dissertations and Student Research

California is currently facing a historic drought, and this has led many farmers in the state to severely cut back on irrigation. Optimal use of water for irrigation requires a comprehensive understanding of how plants respond physiologically to water stress (Chapter 1). By monitoring water requirements in crops and managing irrigation to meet those requirements, growers can significantly reduce water use (Chapter 2). This can be done through improving application efficiency of irrigation technology as well as increasing the water use efficiency of the crops themselves. Deficit irrigation practices can be used to manipulate the physiology of water use in …

Antifungal Activity Of Essential Oils On Aspergillus Parasiticus Isolated From Peanuts, Mina M. Yooussef, Quyen Pham, Premila Achar, Marikunte Yanjarappa Sreenivasa

Faculty Articles

Aspergillus parasiticus is one of the most common fungi which contaminates peanuts by destroying peanut shells before they are harvested and the fungus produces aflatoxins. The aim of this study was to evaluate the antifungal activities of seventeen essential oils on the growth of the aflatoxigenic form of A. parasiticus in contaminated peanuts from commercial outlets in Georgia. The agar dilution method was used to test the antifungal activity of essential oils against this form of A. parasiticus at various concentrations: 500; 1,000; 1,500; 2,000; 2,500 ppm. Among the seventeen essential oils tested, the antifungal effect of cinnamon, lemongrass, clove …

Automated Mini-Channel Platform For Studying Plant Root Environments, Kevin F. Kreis

Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Plants are crucial to our lives; they provide us with building materials, oxygen, and food. A season’s crop yield can be significantly affected by local environmental factors. Farming practices currently focus on using fertilizer, pesticides, monitoring water availability, and genetic modification of the plant to increase crop yield. Improving fundamental understanding of plant root interactions with their local soil environment, or rhizosphere, will help improve crop yield. Studying such interactions is challenging because roots are underground, making it difficult to observe interactions and to manipulate the local soil environment.

The goal of this thesis is to develop an automated mini-channel …

Ecological Risks Of The Conventional Insecticide/Fungicide Seed Treatment Mixture Of Thiamethoxam And Mefenoxam In Soybean On Beneficial Insects, Carolina Camargo

Department of Entomology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The impact of neonicotinoid seed treatments on beneficial insects has been a controversial topic during the last years. While neonicotinoids are usually used as mixtures with systemic fungicides, few studies have examined the impact of the mixtures on beneficial insects. Pesticide mixtures can have synergistic, additive, or antagonistic effects on the toxicity of neonicotinoids on non-target species.

Thiamethoxam with mefenoxam is the most used neonicotinoid insecticide/fungicide mixture applied to soybean. Based on the systemic nature of thiamethoxam and mefenoxam, residues of this insecticide/fungicide mixture can be present in soybean vegetative and floral tissue with potential impacts to beneficial insects. This …

"Patterns In The Abundance Of Benthic Algae In Streams", Courtney Wright

Honors Theses

Benthic, microscopic algae are the main drivers of primary productivity in streams. The relationship between the abundance and productivity of benthic algae in streams and lakes and the availability of limiting nutrients, especially soluble reactive phosphorus (SRP), has been extensively studied (reviewed in Allan and Castillo 2007, Larned 2010). However, nearly all of this research has been conducted on the periphyton assemblage found on hard substrates (e.g., stones, wood), while very little work has addressed the factors affecting the abundance of epipelic algae (i.e., the algae associated with depositional (soft) sediments such as sands and silts). One of the few …

Undergraduate Research Projects Help Promote Diversity In The Geosciences, De'etra Young, Shannon R. Trimboli, Rick S. Toomey, Thomas Byl

Mammoth Cave Research Symposia

No abstract provided.

Modeling Activity Of The Indiana Bat (Myotis Sodalis) At Mammoth Cave National Park Using Remotely-Sensed Descriptors Of Forest Canopy Conditions, Luke E. Dodd, N, S. Skowronski, M. B. Dickinson, L. K. Rieske, M. J. Lacki

Mammoth Cave Research Symposia

No abstract provided.

Natural Resource Condition Assessment For Mammoth Cave National Park, Cate Webb, Chris Groves, Katie Algeo

Mammoth Cave Research Symposia

No abstract provided.

What Data Analytics Can Do For You!, Leyla Zhuhadar, J. Kirk Atkinson, Albert Meier, Ouida Meier

Mammoth Cave Research Symposia

No abstract provided.

Use Of Multiphysics Simulation To Model Environmental Conditions Associated With Bat Hibernacula Including Preliminary Indication Of Impacts On Saltpeter Vats In Mammoth Cave, Aaron Bird, Rick Olson, Rick Toomey, Aaron Addison, Rachel Bosch

Mammoth Cave Research Symposia

No abstract provided.

An Overview Of The Reverse Flow Patterns Of River Styx In Mammoth Cave, Kentucky: 2009-2012, Shannon R. Trimboli, Kim Weber, Susan Ryan, Rick S. Toomey

Mammoth Cave Research Symposia

No abstract provided.

A Comparative Study Of The Flora And Soils Of Great Duck And Little Duck Islands, Maine, Usa, Luka Negoita, Matthew Dickinson, Glen H. Mittlehauser, N. Rajakaruna

Biological Sciences

Strong environmental gradients and varied land-use practices have generated a mosaic of habitats harboring distinct plant communities on islands on the coast of Maine. Botanical studies of Maine’s islands, however, are generally limited in number and scope. Baseline studies of Maine’s islands are necessary for assessing vegetation dynamics and changes in habitat conditions in relation to environmental impacts imposed by climate change, rising sea levels, invasive species, pests and pathogens, introduced herbivores, and human disturbance. We conducted a survey of the vascular plants and soils of forest, field, and ocean-side communities of Great Duck and Little Duck Islands, ME. These …

Ongoing Geographic Documentation Of The Mammoth Cave System And Related Caves, Pat Kambesis, Bob Osburn

Mammoth Cave Research Symposia

No abstract provided.

Strip Adaptive Cluster Sampling With Application To Cave Crickets, Kurt Lewis Helf, Tom Philippi, Bill Moore, Lillian Scoggins

Mammoth Cave Research Symposia

No abstract provided.

Evaluating The Energetic Value Of Lepidoptera Using Bomb Calorimetry, Shelby A. Fulton, Luke E. Dodd, Lynne K. Rieske

Mammoth Cave Research Symposia

No abstract provided.