Digital Commons Network^™

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: Aquatic Invasion!, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

In the exercise, students will investigate aquatic invasive species. They will choose one aquatic invasive species, investigate its distribution, life history, and possible solutions or management practices to control the species and/or its impacts.

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: Missing Macroinvertebrates, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

In this exercise, students will collect macroinvertebrates from a stream site, sort and identify them, and use their fi ndings to identify current and past impacts to the quality of the water. They will also make predictions of how the impacts to the water quality contributed to the localized extinction of some types of macroinvertebrates.

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: Riparian Review, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

In this exercise, students will identify and observe biotic factors in a riparian ecosystem, which is the green strip of vegetation alongside a waterbody; they will measure the types of vegetation at the water’s edge, the function of plants as ground cover and canopy cover, and observe the wildlife in the area.

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: That’S Predictable, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

In this exercise, students will be asked to research and report on ecosystem changes that occur as a result of changes in an aquatic environment

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: Biodiversity Debate, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

In this exercise, students will hold a debate about the construction of a dam in terms of the biological, aesthetic, ethical, social and economic arguments with regard to maintaining biodiversity. Students will be assigned different roles to argue either for or against the dam.

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: Water Management, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

In this exercise, students will be assigned roles as community members, develop questions and positions, and participate in a mock “community meeting” to discuss the development of a water use plan that addresses water shortages, distribution, and water quality.

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: When Things Heat Up, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

In this exercise, students will measure the temperature and dissolved oxygen of a stream (or use their fi ndings from the activity What’s in the Water?) and discuss what this information can tell us about possible pollution problems.

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: Wetlands Versus Stream Macroinvertebrates, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

In this exercise, students will use their data from the activity Who Lives in the Water? or Missing Macroinvertebrates and compare it to a macroinvertebrate sample collected from a wetland site.

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: Nitrogen Cycle, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

Students will learn about the nitrogen cycle through discussion and the construction of a diagram. They will also measure the nitrate levels in various water samples and discuss how humans affect nitrate content in the water.

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: Where’S The Water?, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

Students will use 10 liters (approximately 2.5 gallons) of water to represent all the water on the earth. They will be given the percentage for each water source in relation to the total amount, and asked to divide the 10 liters of water to demonstrate this.

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: Who Lives In The Water?, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

In this exercise, students will collect and observe macroinvertebrates in an aquatic system. They will record and summarize their findings.

Stream Side Science Lesson Plan: What’S In The Water?, Nancy Mesner

All Current Publications

In this exercise, students will observe and list abiotic factors in an aquatic system and measure four of them (pH, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, and temperature).

Ruminant Self-Medication Against Gastrointestinal Nematodes: Evidence, Mechanism, And Origins, Juan J. Villalba, James Miller, Eugene D. Ungar, Serge Y. Landau, John Glendinning

Wildland Resources Faculty Publications

Gastrointestinal helminths challenge ruminants in ways that reduce their fitness. In turn, ruminants have evolved physiological and behavioral adaptations that counteract this challenge. Ruminants display anorexia and avoidance behaviors, which tend to reduce the incidence of parasitism. In addition, ruminants appear to learn to self-medicate against gastrointestinal parasites by increasing consumption of plant secondary compounds with antiparasitic actions. This selective feeding improves health and fitness. Here, we review the evidence for self-medication in ruminants, propose a hypothesis to explain self-medicative behaviors (based on post-ingestive consequences), and discuss mechanisms (e.g., enhanced neophilia, social transmission) that may underlie the ontogeny and spread …

Testing Predictions Of The Janzen–Connell Hypothesis: A Meta-Analysis Of Experimental Evidence For Distance- And Density- Dependent Seed And Seedling Survival, Liza S. Comita, Simon A. Queenborough, Stephen J. Murphy, Janelle L. Eck, Kaiyang Xu, Meghna Krishnadas, Noelle G. Beckman, Yan Zhu

Biology Faculty Publications

1. The Janzen–Connell hypothesis proposes that specialist natural enemies, such as herbivores and pathogens, maintain diversity in plant communities by reducing survival rates of conspecific seeds and seedlings located close to reproductive adults or in areas of high conspecific density. Variation in the strength of distance- and density-dependent effects is hypothesized to explain variation in plant species richness along climatic gradients, with effects predicted to be stronger in the tropics than the temperate zone and in wetter habitats compared to drier habitats.
2. We conducted a comprehensive literature search to identify peer-reviewed experimental studies published in the 40+ years since the hypothesis …

Economic Analysis Of Greenhouse Lighting: Light Emitting Diodes Vs. Intensity Discharge Fixtures, Jacob A. Nelson, Bruce Bugbee

Plants, Soils, and Climate Faculty Publications

Lighting technologies for plant growth are improving rapidly, providing numerous options for supplemental lighting in greenhouses. Here we report the photosynthetic (400-700 nm) photon efficiency and photon distribution pattern of two double-ended HPS fixtures, five mogul-base HPS fixtures, ten LED fixtures, three ceramic metal halide fixtures, and two fluorescent fixtures. The two most efficient LED and the two most efficient double-ended HPS fixtures had nearly identical efficiencies at 1.66 to 1.70 micromoles per joule. These four fixtures represent a dramatic improvement over the 1.02 micromoles per joule efficiency of the mogul-base HPS fixtures that are in common use. The best …

Students’ Digital Photography Behaviors During A Multiday Environmental Science Field Trip And Their Recollections Of Photographed Science Content, Victor R. Lee

Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences Faculty Publications

Taking photographs to document the experiences of an educational field trip is becoming a common activity for teachers and students alike. Considering the regular creation of photographic artifacts, our goal in this paper is to explore students’ picture taking behavior and their recollections of science content associated with their photographs. In this study, we partnered with a class of fifth-grade students in the United States and provided each student with a digital camera to document their experiences during an environmental science field trip at a national park. We report the frequency of photography behaviors according to which activities were most …

General Catalog 2014-2015 (Summer, Fall 2014), Utah State University

University Catalogs

This catalog contains information on the Academic Departments and Programs as well as Course Descriptions for the above school year at Utah State University. To avoid large file downloads, the Academic Departments and Programs information is located in this file. The Course Description information is located in the secondary file.

Whole-Lake Experiments Trace Added Terrestrial Particulate Organic Carbon In Benthic Food Webs Of Shallow Lakes, K. Scharnweber, J. Syvaranta, S. Hilt, M. Brauns, M. J. Vanni, Soren Brothers, J. Kohler, J. Knezevic-Jaric, T. Mehner

Watershed Sciences Faculty Publications

Lake ecosystems are strongly linked to their terrestrial surroundings by material and energy fluxes across ecosystem boundaries. However, the contribution of terrestrial particulate organic carbon (tPOC) from annual leaf fall to lake food webs has not yet been adequately traced and quantified. In this study, we conducted whole-lake experiments to trace artificially added tPOC through the food webs of two shallow lakes of similar eutrophic status, but featuring alternative stable regimes (macrophyte rich vs. phytoplankton dominated). Lakes were divided with a curtain, and maize (Zea mays) leaves were added, as an isotopically distinct tPOC source, into one half of each …

Native And Domestic Browsers And Grazers Reduce Fuels, Fire Temperatures, And Acacia Ant Mortality In An African Savanna, Duncan M. Kimuyu, Ryan L. Sensenig, Corinna Riginos, Kari E. Veblen, Truman P. Young

Wildland Resources Faculty Publications

Despite the importance of fire and herbivory in structuring savanna systems, few replicated experiments have examined the interactive effects of herbivory and fire on plant dynamics. In addition, the effects of fire on associated ant–tree mutualisms have been largely unexplored. We carried out small controlled burns in each of 18 herbivore treatment plots of the Kenya Long-term Exclosure Experiment (KLEE), where experimentally excluding elephants has resulted in 42% greater tree densities. The KLEE design includes six different herbivore treatments that allowed us to examine how different combinations of megaherbivore wildlife, mesoherbivore wildlife, and cattle affect fire temperatures and subsequent loss …

A Heterogenous Thermal Environment Enables Remarkable Behavioral Thermoregulation In Uta Stansburiana, Maria Goller, Franz Goller, Susannah S. French

Biology Faculty Publications

Ectotherms can attain preferred body temperatures by selecting specific temperature microhabitats within a varied thermal environment. The side-blotched lizard, Uta stansburiana may employ microhabitat selection to thermoregulate behaviorally. It is unknown to what degree habitat structural complexity provides thermal microhabitats for thermoregulation. Thermal microhabitat structure, lizard temperature, and substrate preference were simultaneously evaluated using thermal imaging. A broad range of microhabitat temperatures was available (mean range of 11°C within 1–2 m2) while mean lizard temperature was between 36°C and 38°C. Lizards selected sites that differed significantly from the mean environmental temperature, indicating behavioral thermoregulation, and maintained a temperature significantly above …

Dust Mediated Transfer Of Phosphorus To Alpine Lake Ecosystems Of The Wind River Range, Wyoming, Usa, Janice Brahney, Ashley P. Ballantyne, P. Kociolek, Sarah A. Spaulding, Megan Otu, T. Porwoll, Jason C. Neff

Watershed Sciences Faculty Publications

Alpine lakes receive a large fraction of their nutrients from atmospheric sources and are consequently sensitive to variations in both the amount and chemistry of atmospheric deposition. In this study we explored the spatial changes in lake water chemistry and biology along a gradient of dust deposition in the Wind River Range, Wyoming. Regional differences were explored using the variation in bulk deposition, lake water, sediment, and bedrock geochemistry and catchment characteristics. Dust deposition rates in the Southwestern region averaged 3.34 g m−2 year−1, approximately three times higher than deposition rates in the Northwestern region (average 1.06 g m−2 year−1). …

Fate Of Estrogens And Illicit Drugs During Urine Separation And Treatment, Pei Huang, Ramesh Goel

Utah Space Grant Consortium

The presence and their subsequent treatment of nutrient in municipal wastewater is still at the front end of environmental engineering despite several decades of successful research and applications. In recent times, the source separation followed by the treatment of urine or resource recovery from human urine has evolved as emerging management strategies albeit mostly at research stage. Human contributes about 80% of the nitrogen, 70% of the potassium and up to 50% of the total although the urine only contributes 1% of the total volume of the wastewater. It is also a known fact that many of the micropollulatnts get …

Effect Of Flapping Frequency And Leading Edge Profile On Airfoil Leading Edge Vortical Structures, Wesley Fassmann, Scott Thomson

Utah Space Grant Consortium

By varying leading edge geometry to wing profiles during flapping flight, Ozen and Rockwell observed a pattern of alternating spanwise vortices which minimized spanwise flow. As a follow up study to [1], this investigation explored the effect of flapping frequency on these previously observed streamwise vortical structures. By increasing the flapping frequency, the alternating streamwise vortices resulting from a sinusoidal leading edge became stretched in the path of the wing due to an increase of wing cross-radial velocity. The streamwise vortices are shown to minimize spanwise flow even after being stretched. Instabilities were formed at higher flapping frequencies (f = …

Liquid-Core Arrow Platform For Organic Particle Detection, Thomas Wall, Aaron Hawkins

Utah Space Grant Consortium

The Liquid-Core ARROW platform, which can be used for single bioparticle detection, is outlined. The platform has been used successfully for detecting individual H3N2 viruses. These results clearly illustrate the ARROW platform’s capability to function as the go-to platform for a mission to Mars whose goal is to detect organic polymers in the soil. A presence of organic polymers would be a strong sign of past life on the planet. The ARROW is ideal for such a mission not only because of its capabilities in detection, but also because it is light weight, cheap to produce, and requires only low …

Genetic Origins Of Mercury Resistance In Great Salt Lake Microorganisms, Ashtyn Smith, Austin Wood, Chelsea Lam, Jaimi Butler, Bonnie Baxter

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Extremophiles are a diverse group of organisms, typically Bacteria and Archaea, that can inhabit extreme environments, such as geysers, deserts, and saline lakes. Their abilities to withstand extremely dry, hot, salinic, acidic, and mercuric conditions have made these microorganisms admirable astrobiological models for life on other planets¹.

Soil Moisture And Temperature Conditions Related To Cheatgrass Establishment Failure, Lauren Ducas

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

Cheatgrass, a widespread invasive plant, has taken over many rangelands in the Intermountain West. Restoration efforts have not met with much success. Early in cheatgrass’ growth period, if air temperatures fall too low and soils too dry, growth may be disrupted to the point of death of the cheatgrass plants. In this case, cheatgrass stands may revert to bare ground, providing opportunities for other invasive plants to establish, or possible restoration of native perennials. We conducted a computer modeling and observational field study to determine if air temperature and soil moisture conditions below its tolerance are associated with failure of …

Sagestep News, Spring 2014, No. 24, Sagestep

Newsletters

Seasonal newsletter of SageSTEP.

Utah State University Commencement, 2014 – Main Campus, Utah State University

Commencement Programs

127^th Annual Commencement of Utah State University.

Tremblings, May 2014, Western Aspen Alliance

Tremblings

Restoring Aspen in Rocky Mountain National Park

Therese Johnson

In 2008, when Rocky Mountain National Park’s Elk and Vegetation Management Plan (EVMP) was approved, aspen stands on primary elk range had not recruited new tree-sized stems for at least 35 years as a result of heavy elk browsing. Research showed that the distribution and abundance of aspen in the park declined during the 20th century, and modeling indicated that a continuation of high elk densities could result in the complete loss of aspen clones in high elk use areas. Aspen are rare in the park, but are important because they …

Weir-Baffled Culvert Hydrodynamics Evaluation For Fish Passage Using Particle Image Velocimetry And Computational Fluid Dynamic Techniques, Mohanad A. Khodier

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Due to a recent increase in environmental awareness regarding fish passage through hydraulic structures, including culverts, an evaluation of passage of wild brown trout through a weir-baffled, prototype-scale culvert, was conducted under a variety of culvert slopes and discharge conditions. The influence of the fish sample population and the lengths of the individual fish on passage rates were investigated. The data showed that the fish sample size of 25 per test was sufficiently large to minimize sample size dependency. Fish behavior, including resting/staging zone locations, while traversing the culvert was observed and reported. Two preferable resting zones for the fish …