Digital Commons Network^™

Raspberry Crown Borer [Pennisetia Marginata], Diane Alston

All Current Publications

This fact sheet described raspberry crown borer, a pest that attacks raspberry plants in northern Utah, causing cane-wilt and death. It includes life history, host injury, monitoring and thresholds, and management techniques.

Grass-Shrub Associations Over A Precipitation Gradient And Their Implications For Restoration In The Great Basin, Usa, Maike F. Holthuijzen, Kari E. Veblen

Wildland Resources Faculty Publications

As environmental stress increases positive (facilitative) plant interactions often predominate. Plant-plant associations (or lack thereof) can indicate whether certain plant species favor particular types of microsites (e.g., shrub canopies or plant-free interspaces) and can provide valuable insights into whether “nurse plants” will contribute to seeding or planting success during ecological restoration. It can be difficult, however, to anticipate how relationships between nurse plants and plants used for restoration may change over large-ranging, regional stress gradients. We investigated associations between the shrub, Wyoming big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata ssp. wyomingensis), and three common native grasses (Poa secunda, Elymus elymoides, and Pseudoroegneria spicata), …

Non-Suitable Habitat A Cause For Declining Bobolink Populations In Northern Utah, Bethany Q. Unger

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Bobolink, Dolichonyx oryxivories, populations are declining in Utah. I characterized the habitat conditions of known bobolink nesting sites in Utah and compared these conditions to those for nest sites in Wisconsin where bobolinks are abundant. My habitat assessment included identifying vegetation species, vegetation cover, pH, temperature, and precipitation at each site location. Vegetation cover different between Utah and Wisconsin nest sites. Precipitation varied for both locations with no correlation between water availability and bobolink presence. One possible driver for the reduction in bobolinks throughout Utah is the drastic increase in temperature. Other possible external factors include livestock grazing, edge distance, …

Short Term Effectiveness Of High Density Large Woody Debris In Asotin Creek As A Cheap And Cheerful Restoration Action, Reid Camp

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

In response to human impacts, river restoration and rehabilitation actions have become a priority in the United States. In the Pacific Northwest, most restoration actions are focused on repairing degraded freshwater habitat to increase or improve Pacific salmonid production. However, traditional river restoration actions remained largely unchanged for over 100 years despite a lack of definitive evidence that the actions were effective. More recently, there has been a surge in process-based restoration actions, which aim to reestablish the physical and biological processes that maintain fluvial and floodplain environments by targeting the root causes of degradation in a watershed. Cheap and …

The Utah Statesman, November 30, 2015, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

Master's Thesis Defense By Elizabeth Martinez | Biological Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

The Logan Lagoons, Logan City’s Wastewater Treatment Facility ensures 15 million gallons of wastewater are cleaned and filtered each day. With the implementation of new and stricter wastewater effluent standards, the city of Logan now has to guarantee the phosphorous concentration in the effluent is also reduced. Algal biomass produced and harvested from the lagoons has been proven to affect the way nitrogen and phosphorous are removed while having the potential to be converted to biofuels. Therefore, implementing a secondary type clarifier in the Logan Lagoons would produce clean treated water with a reduced phosphorous concentration, and algae feedstock for …

The Utah Statesman, November 23, 2015, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

2015 Graduate Researcher Of The Year Award | Biological Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

Lifu Xiao received a B.S. degree in Chemistry from Fudan University in China, 2011. He has been pursuing a Ph.D. degree in Biological Engineering since 2011 at Utah State University under the supervision of Dr. Anhong Zhou. He obtained a multidisciplinary background in chemistry, biology and engineering working in Dr. Zhou’s lab. His research focuses on developing new methods for sensing and imaging of human disease-related biomolecules and mammalian cells.

Lifu has published five papers in peer reviewed journals. One of his papers, published in Analytical Methods, was ranked as one of the top ten most accessed articles in Feb …

The Utah Statesman, November 19, 2015, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

Evaluating Vital Rate Contributions To Greater Sage-Grouse Population Dynamics To Inform Conservation, David K. Dahlgren

Wildland Resources Faculty Publications

Species conservation efforts often use short-term studies that fail to identify the vital rates that contribute most to population growth. Although the greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus; sage-grouse) is a candidate for protection under the U.S. Endangered Species Act, and is sometimes referred to as an umbrella species in the sagebrush (Artemisia spp.) biome of western North America, the failure of proposed management strategies to focus on key vital rates that may contribute most to achieving population stability remains problematic for sustainable conservation. To address this dilemma, we performed both prospective and retrospective perturbation analyses of a life cycle model based …

Faculty Senate Executive Committee Agenda, November 16, 2015, Utah State University

Faculty Senate & Faculty Senate Executive Committee

• EPC Items November 2015
• USUSA Report
• Retention and Student Success
• Athletic Council
• 401.4.3(4) and 402.3.1 FS Reapportionment Proposal(Second Reading)
• 405.6.2(2) PAC improve clarity & specificity
• 405.6 Mutual Agreement

Strain Hardening And Anisotropy During Tensile Testing Of Sheared Model Mozzarella Cheeses, Prateek Sharma, Peter A. Munro, Tzvetelin T. Dessev, Peter G. Wiles, E. Allen Foegeding

Nutrition, Dietetics, and Food Sciences Faculty Publications

We studied the tensile fracture properties of model Mozzarella cheeses with varying amounts of shear work input (3.3–73.7 kJ/kg). After manufacture, cheeses were elongated by manual rolling at 65°C followed by tensile testing at 21°C on dumbbell-shaped samples cut both parallel and perpendicular to the rolling direction. Strain hardening parameters were estimated from stress–strain curves using 3 different methods. Fracture stress and strain for longitudinal samples did not vary significantly with shear work input up to 26.3 kJ/kg and then decreased dramatically at 58.2 kJ/kg. Longitudinal samples with shear work input <30 kJ/kg demonstrated significant strain hardening by all 3 estimation methods. At shear work inputs <30 kJ/kg, strong anisotropy was observed in both fracture stress and strain. After a shear work input of 58.2 kJ/kg, anisotropy and strain hardening were absent. Perpendicular samples did not show strain hardening at any level of shear work input. Although the distortion of the fat drops in the cheese structure associated with the elongation could account for some of the anisotropy observed, the presence of anisotropy in the elongated nonfat samples reflected that shear work and rolling also aligned the protein structure.

Filtering With A Drill Pump: An Efficient And Cost Effective Method To Collect Suspended Sediment And Filtrate, Julia E. Kelso, Michelle A. Baker

Biology Faculty Publications

Water quality monitoring programs across multiple disciplines use total suspended solids (TSS), and volatile suspended solids (VSS), to assess potential impairments of surface water and groundwater. While previous methods for instream filtering have been developed, the need for rapid, cost-effective, high volume sampling has increased with the need to verify and supplement data produced by sondes and instantaneous data loggers. We present an efficient method to filter water instream with a portable drill pump that results in reduced sample processing time, and potentially reduced error associated with sample transportation, preservation, contamination, and homogenization. This technical note outlines the advantages of …

The Utah Statesman, November 12, 2015, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

The Utah Statesman, November 9, 2015, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

Dr. Allan Guymon Undergraduate Seminar | Biological Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

Photopolymerization has taken an increasing prominent role as a tool in providing unique properties for a wide array of advanced materials. The inherent spatial and temporal control allow great ability to tailor processing conditions and change ultimate properties. This talk will focus on two projects, including work from two Utah State alumni, in which photopolymerization enables directed structure both on the micron and nanometer size scale for unique functionality.

The Utah Statesman, November 5, 2015, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

Vision: An Engineer's Tool In The Fight Against Eye Disease | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

If you’ve seen the latest news headlines about Dr. Elizabeth Vargis, you’d think she was an ophthalmologist – a medical expert on vision-related disease and treatment. But Vargis is no physician. She’s an engineer – pure and simple.

Igem Vs. The Cheese Killer | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

Cheese manufacturing is under attack by a type of virus called bacteriophages. The viruses infect bacteria used in the dairy fermentation process that yields our beloved cheese and yoghurt. Utah State’s 2015 International Genetically Engineered Machines, or iGEM, team has been researching ways to fight back against the virus. The iGEM event is a competition that promotes student involvement in real world synthetic biology research.

Dr. Catherine E. Brewer Research Presentation | Biological Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

Biomass resources are available all around us and are frequently underutilized. These resources can come in the form of agricultural residues like pecan shells or cotton gin trash, forest residues, invasive species like tumbleweed and salt cedar, yard waste, organic materials and nutrients in wastewater, and even garbage on spacecraft. There are many opportunities to use these resources to meet our feed, water, and energy needs—with the right engineering. Thermochemical processes, namely pyrolysis, torrefaction, and hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL), provide platforms to convert low-value materials into heat, power, liquid fuels, adsorbents, fertilizers, and soil amendments. In this presentation, Dr. Brewer will …

The Utah Statesman, November 2, 2015, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.

Faculty Senate Agenda, November 2, 2015, Utah State University

Faculty Senate & Faculty Senate Executive Committee

• EPC Items October 2015
• Faculty Evaluation Committee Annual Report
• 405.8.3(1) Allow for Presidential exceptions to external reviewers when teaching Is the major role assignment (Second Reading)
• 401.4.3(4) and 402.3.1 FS Reapportionment Proposal (First Reading)
• 405.12.1 Review of Faculty annual review procedures
• 405.13 College Faculty Appeals Committee (CFAC)

Volume 69 Issue 1 (Fall/Winter 2015)

Utah Science

2 Awareness, Appreciation, Conservation

The sage-grouse is an iconic bird that inhabits vast seas of sagebrush in western North America and has been the focus of extensive discussion and concern among wildlife managers, ranchers, mineral extraction and energy companies, land developers and others in the west and beyond. Why all the discussion about a 2-to 5-pound bird?

8 Recreation Ecology in National Parks and Protected Areas

People love national parks, but managing a growing numbers of visitors with a mandate to preserve natural conditions in perpetuity is a challenge. Recreation ecologists are providing park managers with good science to help …

Thermal Patterns Constrain Diurnal Behavior Of A Ground-Dwelling Bird, J. Matthew Carroll, Craig A. Davis, R. Dwayne Elmore, Samuel D. Fuhlendorf, Eric T. Thacker

Wildland Resources Faculty Publications

Recently, gaining knowledge about thermal refuges for vulnerable species has been a major focal point of ecological studies, and this focus has been heightened by predicted temperature increases associated with global climate change. To better understand how organisms respond to thermal landscapes and extremes, we investigated the thermal ecology of a gallinaceous bird species (northern bobwhite; Colinus virginianus, hereafter bobwhite) during a key life history period. Specifically, our study focused on the brood-rearing period of precocial bobwhite chicks associated with brood-attending adults. We measured site-specific black bulb temperatures (Tbb) and vegetation characteristics across 38 brood tracking days and 68 random …

Hydroshare: Sharing Diverse Environmental Data Types And Models As Social Objects With Application To The Hydrology Domain, Jeffery S. Horsburgh, Mohamed M. Morsy, Anthony M. Castronova, Jonathan L. Goodall, Tian Gan, Hong Yi, Michael J. Stealey, David G. Tarboton

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

The types of data and models used within the hydrologic science community are diverse. New repositories have succeeded in making data and models more accessible, but are, in most cases, limited to particular types or classes of data or models and also lack the type of collaborative and iterative functionality needed to enable shared data collection and modeling workflows. File sharing systems currently used within many scientific communities for private sharing of preliminary and intermediate data and modeling products do not support collaborative data capture, description, visualization, and annotation. In this article, we cast hydrologic datasets and models as “social …

Riparian Plant Isotopes Reflect Anthropogenic Nitrogen Perturbations: Robust Patterns Across Land Use Gradients, Steven J. Hall, Rebecca L. Hale, Michelle A. Baker, David R. Bowling, James R. Ehleringer

Biology Faculty Publications

Riparian plants incorporate nitrogen (N) from aquatic, terrestrial, and atmospheric sources, and their stable isotope compositions (δ¹⁵ N) may reflect land use impacts on N sources and transformations over scales of sites to watersheds. We surveyed leaf δ¹⁵ N values of 11 common riparian tree, shrub, and herbaceous species from 20 streams and rivers spanning three fifth-order watersheds in northern Utah, USA (n - 255 sites and 819 leaf samples). Streams spanned undeveloped montane forests to suburban, urban, and agricultural lands. Mean species-specific differences in leaf δ¹⁵N values were relatively small within sites (1.2 ± 2.2‰), …

Tackling Salinity In The Colorado River One Ion At A Time | Biological Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

10/27/2015 - It’s one of the most overtaxed waterways on the planet, and its shrinking flow is only part of the problem.

The Colorado River travels 1,500 miles through seven U.S. states before reaching the Gulf of California. Throughout its long journey the river supplies water for approximately 40 million people and is used to irrigate more than five million acres of land in the Western U.S. and Mexico.

Restoration Handbook For Sagebrush Steppe Ecosystems With Emphasis On Greater Sage-Grouse Habitat—Part 1. Concepts For Understanding And Applying Restoration, David A. Pyke, Jeanne C. Chambers, Mike Pellant, Steven T. Knick, Richard F. Miller, Jeffrey L. Beck, Paul S. Doescher, Eugene W. Schupp, Bruce A. Roundy, Mark W. Brunson, James D. Mclver

Reports

Sagebrush steppe ecosystems in the United States currently occur on only about one-half of their historical land area because of changes in land use, urban growth, and degradation of land, including invasions of non-native plants. The existence of many animal species depends on the existence of sagebrush steppe habitat. The greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) is a landscape-dependent bird that requires intact habitat and combinations of sagebrush and perennial grasses to exist. In addition, other sagebrush-obligate animals also have similar requirements and restoration of landscapes for greater sage-grouse also will benefit these animals. Once sagebrush lands are degraded, they may require …

Process Optimization To Enhance Quality And Quantity Of Transiently Expressed Proteins | Biological Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

Transient transfection is a method to introduce foreign DNA into a healthy cell population. Transient transfection can be accomplished by chemical, mechanical, and electrical delivery. Although foreign DNA is not incorporated into the host cell genome, host cell machinery is used to transcribe and translate the gene of interest. This presentation will illustrate the enhancement of transgene production through reagent optimization and feeds and show benefits of transient work, such as, eliminating the need for generation of a stable engineered cell line; allowing the process scaleability; and decreasing the time for generation of comparable amounts of product.

The Utah Statesman, October 22, 2015, Utah State University

The Utah Statesman

Weekly student newspaper of Utah State University in Logan.