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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences

Climate Change Impacts On Atmospheric Ammonia And Implications For Human Health, Casey Olson, Connor Snow, Bridger Jorgensen Dec 2021

Climate Change Impacts On Atmospheric Ammonia And Implications For Human Health, Casey Olson, Connor Snow, Bridger Jorgensen

Fall Student Research Symposium 2021

According to national data Cache Valley has the highest concentrations of atmospheric ammonia in the nation. This study aims to answer the questions of whether climate variables and events such as precipitation, averaged winds, geopotential height, and teleconnections can be used to predict the behavior of pollutants and how human biology is potentially affected. Data from the Utah Climate Center shows that the 3rd yearly quartile has the highest levels of airborne ammonia due to the high levels of fertilizer use and livestock emissions in the farming industry in Cache Valley. After data analysis, there seems to be a connection …


Understanding How Changes In Precipitation Intensity Will Affect Vegetation In The Western U.S., Cristina Chirvasa Dec 2021

Understanding How Changes In Precipitation Intensity Will Affect Vegetation In The Western U.S., Cristina Chirvasa

Fall Student Research Symposium 2021

Precipitation events are becoming more intense as the atmosphere warms, but it remains unclear how precipitation intensification will affect plant growth in arid and semiarid ecosystems. There is conflicting evidence suggesting that larger precipitation events may either increase or decrease plant growth. Here, we report the growth responses of herbaceous and woody plants to experimental manipulations of precipitation intensity in a cold, semi-arid ecosystem in Utah, USA. In this experiment, precipitation was collected and redeposited as fewer, larger events with total annual precipitation kept constant across treatments. Results from the first two growing seasons revealed that more intense events ‘pushed’ …


Chemical Analysis Of Aerosol Particle Surfaces, Hillary Woolf Dec 2018

Chemical Analysis Of Aerosol Particle Surfaces, Hillary Woolf

Fall Student Research Symposium 2018

Aerosol particles are thought to impact climate properties. The ability to probe aerosols to understand their chemical properties has been difficult due to a lack of appropriate analytical techniques. Here we present interface-specific SHS techniques to allow for in situ analysis of aerosol particles. Transportation of aerosols from their collection site to the laboratory disturbs their chemical and physical properties thus making it difficult to take accurate measurements of aerosol particles. We show that using a CCD detector is a more effective option for producing more sensitive results and can greatly reduce sampling time and could possibly detect measurements from …