University of Texas at Austin PhD Student Wins EPA Grant for Water Quality Study

From the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency:

University of Texas at Austin PhD Student Wins EPA Grant for Water Quality Study

Contact: Joe Hubbard or Jennah Durant at 214-665-2200 or r6press@epa.gov  

DALLAS – (Sept. 12, 2016) Today the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a University of Texas at Austin student has been awarded a Science to Achieve Results (STAR) Graduate Fellowship. Arley F. Muth is one of 52 graduate students across the nation to receive the grants to further their education while conducting research in environmental fields of study.

“As one of the nation’s premier research universities, UT-Austin can be proud of the work of its students and for fostering the next generation of leaders in environmental science,” said EPA Regional Administration Ron Curry. “Congratulations to the future Dr. Muth and to all of this year’s STAR fellows.”

Muth is pursuing a PhD and researching water quality in estuaries and along coasts. The STAR grant of $132,000 was awarded for Muth’s project on ocean acidification, “Algal and Invertebrate Assemblages in Varying Oceanographic Conditions: Effects of Ocean Acidification on Recruitment, Early Succession, and Grazing along the Pacific Coast of the U.S. and Chile.”

This class of STAR Graduate Fellows was selected from a large number of applications in a highly competitive review process and is as impressive as it is diverse. The graduate students are studying and conducting research at 37 U.S. universities in disciplines such as atmospheric chemistry, green energy, hydrogeology and predictive toxicology. Master’s students are awarded a maximum funding of $88,000 over two years and doctoral students are awarded up to $132,000 for three years to support their graduate research and studies.

Since the program began more than 20 years ago, graduate students from the STAR Fellowship Program have engaged in innovative research opportunities leading some to become prominent leaders in environmental science. The program has awarded nearly 2000 students a total of more than $65 million in funding since 1995. This year’s STAR Fellows are poised to become the next generation of environmental professionals who can make significant impacts in environmental science and beyond.

As part of a federal-wide reorganization of programs supporting science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), the funding for EPA’s STAR and Greater Research Opportunities (GRO) fellowship programs has been consolidated this year with the National Science Foundation (NSF) fellowship programs. This reorganization strategically increases federal resources for STEM undergraduate and graduate education into one agency allowing more students fellowship opportunities. EPA is also a partner with the NSF through the Graduate Research Internship Program (GRIP), which has a number of federal agencies as partners. This program expands opportunities for NSF Graduate Research Fellows to enhance their professional development through an internship at EPA where they can participate in research experience and receive mentoring from scientists, all while focusing on the protection of human health and the environment.

Learn more about the STAR fellows: https://www.epa.gov/research-fellowships/star-graduate-and-gro-undergraduate-fellowship-recipient-list#star

Learn more about EPA’s fellowship opportunities: https://www.epa.gov/research-fellowships
 

Connect with EPA Region 6:

On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eparegion6  

On Twitter: https://twitter.com/EPAregion6 

Activities in EPA Region 6: http://www2.epa.gov/aboutepa/epa-region-6-south-central

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2012 Carbon Cycle 2.0 Symposium

Video Published on Mar 6, 2012

Feb 10, 2012. Berkeley Lab Associate Laboratory Director for Energy & Environmental Sciences Don DePaolo introduces the Symposium with an overview of the Carbon Cycle 2.0 initiative and highlights of programmatic developments over the past year. 

Climate Change Science: Dr. Paul Alivisatos, Berkeley Lab Director

Video Published on Mar 6, 2012

Jan 31, 2011. As a director of a national laboratory, I'm sometimes asked about the scientific underpinnings of climate change issues and their relationship to human activities. I imagine that some of you have also been asked these questions. Government officials want to know that their policy and spending decisions are based on sound science, and ordinary citizens want to know why so much emphasis is being placed on "clean" and "green" energy. I've developed a brief exploration of the basic science of carbon dioxide's influence on the temperature of the planet, along with some of the empirical evidence behind scientists' concerns about the long-term impacts of anthropogenic carbon emissions.

Tags: human activity, carbon dioxide, Fourier, heat transfer, Keeling, oxygen, glaciation, warming, Arrhenius, feedback

USDA Collection Preserves Garlic's Genetic Diversity

USDA Blog Post:

Posted by Jan Suszkiw, USDA Agricultural Research Service Information Staff, on March 25, 2014 at 2:00 PM

“This group of diverse garlic germplasm represents all the types that might be found at a farmer’s market.” Photo courtesy of Barbara Hellier, ARS

This post is part of the Science Tuesday feature series on the USDA blog. Check back each week as we showcase stories and news from the USDA’s rich science and research portfolio.

Raw or dehydrated, garlic is a staple ingredient in dishes the world over. This herb, Allium sativum, is also the focus of medical research investigating the health-imparting properties of allicin, a compound that gives garlic its pungent aroma and flavor.

Americans consumed 2.3 pounds of garlic per person in 2010. Perhaps most familiar to consumers is the large white bulb commonly sold in supermarkets. But there’s more diversity there than meets the eye, or the taste buds, says USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS) horticulturist Barbara Hellier.

It’s no exaggeration to say Hellier knows her garlic—and her leeks, chives, shallots, and wild onions, for that matter.

Hellier is curator of the National Plant Germplasm System’s Allium Collection at the ARS Western Regional Plant Introduction Station in Pullman, Wash. She oversees the maintenance, description, and distribution of 293 garlic specimens, 16 primitive garlics, 207 leeks, 44 chives, and 579 wild, ornamental and native Allium species.

“What we see in supermarkets is generally one type—a white softneck type and elephant garlic, which isn’t really garlic, but rather a type of leek,” Hellier says. Garlic lovers with a taste for something a bit more diverse might try a farmer’s market, for example, or place an order with a specialty grower. “At a farmer’s market, shoppers are likely to come across more of the true diversity of garlic, like the hardneck purple to purple-stripe types; small, pearly white silverskins; creole-type hardneck with red clove skin; or  white hardnecks with fiery hot taste.”

The Pullman collection includes garlic specimens acquired from around the world—but especially Central Asia, the crop’s point of origin—and serves as a backup to varieties grown commercially in the United States.

Today’s garlic is vegetatively propagated, meaning it’s grown from cloves, not seed. However, “There is no potential for breeding new varieties with vegetatively produced plants,” notes Hellier.  Recently, she and ARS colleague Phil Simon have been assisting small-scale growers seeking to reverse that trend using several of the collection’s seed-producing garlics.

“It will be interesting to watch what comes from the efforts of these growers trying to produce true seed,” she says. “They have passion for garlic and are looking for novel traits.”

Press release:

EPA fine particulate proposal not grounded in sound science

Carlton Carroll | 202.682.8114 | carrollc@api.orgShareThis

WASHINGTON, July 17, 2012 – API Director of Regulatory and Scientific Affairs Howard Feldman told an EPA hearing in Philadelphia today that the agency’s scientific analysis for its proposal on fine particulate air standards was inadequate and could not justify tightening them. He said continued implementation of the existing standards would further improve air quality:

“EPA has not proven a ‘cause and effect’ between PM 2.5 below the current standards and health effects…. Taken as a whole, the scientific studies cut in different directions…. There is no need to move the goalposts now.

“I am encouraged by the progress our nation has made in reducing fine particle emissions in our skies. The concentration of PM2.5 in the nation’s air has declined by 24 percent between 2001 and 2010. The U.S. oil and natural gas industry has significantly contributed to these improvements by developing and manufacturing ultra-clean fuels that can be used in the new very low emission diesel and gasoline engines.

“More good news is that the improvements will continue…. When announcing this proposal, EPA stated that it has issued a number of rules already that will continue to make significant strides toward reducing fine particle emissions in the years ahead. These future improvements are independent of whether any action is taken to change these standards.”

API represents more than 500 companies involved in all aspects of the oil and natural gas industry, leaders of a technology-driven industry that supplies most of America’s energy, supports 9.2 million U.S. jobs and 7.7 percent of the U.S. economy, delivers more than $86 million a day in revenue to our government, and, since 2000, has invested more than $2 trillion in U.S. capital projects to advance all forms of energy, including alternatives.

From the National Science Foundation

March 12, 2012

Threats to Freshwater Mussels and the Consequences for Ecosystems

Catastrophic decline in freshwater mussels may impact water quality, other species

At the University of Oklahoma's Aquatic Research Facility in Norman, zoologist Caryn Vaughn shows off freshwater mussels that she's recently collected from rivers in the southeastern part of the state. One river alone may have as many as 30 species of mussels.

"They have very colorful names. This is the pistol grip, because you can hold it in your hand like a pistol," says Vaughn. There are also mussels commonly known as the rabbitsfoot, bankclimber, pigtoe, pimpleback, and fatmucket. Vaugn is in a good location to do her research. Oklahoma is home to 55 mussel species all together, out of the approximately 300 mussel species found across North America.

These invertebrates play a crucial role in river ecosystems.

"I've had colleagues call them 'fuzzy rocks' because algae grow on them, but they're really important filter feeders. They're very important ecologically and they're actually very interesting as well," she says.
With support from the National Science Foundation (NSF), Vaughn studies mussels' role in their environment. "Almost 70 percent of the species are considered threatened in some way. They're the most globally threatened freshwater organism there is," she says.

Vaughn works with the mussels in large bathtub-sized tanks where she and her team have recreated the stream environment. But, in this lab setting, they can control such factors as temperature and flow rate.
Mussels need plentiful water to thrive, and healthy fish to reproduce. Vaughn explains their unusual reproductive strategy.

"Freshwater mussels can't move very far. So the way they get around is by sticking their larvae on a fish. And the fish takes it to a new habitat," she says.

Vaughn showed some underwater video shot by biologist Christopher Barnhart of Missouri State University, which shows how mussels lure their fish host.

"The flesh of the mussel looks like a little minnow. It waves in the water. When a predator fish bites down on that, the glochidium (larval mussels) will be dispersed and infect the fish gills. Just one of the many little tricks mussels use for attracting fish hosts," continues Vaughn. "There are elaborate strategies for attracting the right kind of host, and then after they attach to the fish and grow into a juvenile, then you have to fall into the right habitat and riverbed to grow up into an adult. So, it's really a complex lifecycle, which is not well adapted to things humans are doing to the landscape."

Most mussels look pretty rough on the outside. But for decades, the beautiful iridescence of their inner shells caused them to be harvested to make fancy buttons. Their shells were also used to make the small beads that were put in freshwater oysters to seed pearls. The availability of cheap plastic and other synthetic materials finally put an end to most mussel harvests for those products.

The human need for water is now the biggest danger to mussels. Habitat destruction, fragmentation from dams, and more recently an intense drought in the southern plains have all contributed to destruction of mussel beds.

"This one river that we've been working in for over 20 years, we probably lost a third of the mussels in that river because of water levels. We probably could have saved a lot of them if we had better water management practices in place at the time of the drought. So we really need to take what we know and use that to help them manage the resources, so we can keep the mussel populations, while meeting human needs. That's a difficult thing to do," says Vaughn.

In the rivers she studies, there are often dozens of different species of mussels together in beds. That diversity, she's found, makes all the animals healthier.

There are 35 species in the Little River in southeastern Oklahoma, and perhaps 20 different species may live very close together.

"When the fatmucket and the bankclimber are together, do they do something different than mussels when they are just by themselves? They're definitely in better condition when they're in more diverse beds," says Vaughn.

The almost constant water filtering done by freshwater mussels provides a benefit for humans as well.
"Most of their bodies are these big gills, and they're filtering particles out of the water column, so they're filtering water and taking impurities out of it," explains Vaughn.

"So, the direction that we're trying to go next in our research is to put monetary values on these services that mussels are providing. We know how many mussels are out there, we know the rates at which different species filter water. So we ought to be able to compare the biofiltration of mussels to how much it costs for us to treat water, like in a water treatment plant. And hopefully show that, if you leave the mussels in the river or if you restore mussels to the densities that they used to have, then it will save you this much money in water treatment," says Vaughn.

Believe it or not, mussels can live 30 to 50 years! Because of their longevity, and the current threats to their habitat, Vaughn and her team don't keep the mussels they take from the field.

"We bring them into the lab, we tag them, we use them in our experiments and then we take them back and set them free, basically because they're so long-lived, we don't want to cause any undue mortality," she says.
Mussel shells also shelter and nurture insect larvae and other tiny creatures. Another reason, Vaughn says, to help these mussels stay strong!

Miles O'Brien, Science Nation Correspondent

Haskell Indian Nations University & EPA Announce Partnership

News release from EPA Region 7:

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 7

901 N. Fifth St., Kansas City, KS 66101

Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and Nine Tribal Nations

Haskell Indian Nations University and EPA Announce Partnership Agreement to Promote Environmental Careers

Contact Information: Kris Lancaster, 913-551-7557, lancaster.kris@epa.gov

Environmental News

NEWS MEDIA ADVISORY

(Kansas City, Kan., Jan. 26, 2012) - EPA and Haskell Indian Nations University officials next week will gather in Lawrence, Kan., to announce a partnership agreement to support American Indian students pursuing careers in environmental and scientific fields.

The agreement will update an existing program of activities that will enhance Haskell University’s research and educational capabilities. EPA wants to increase Haskell University’s awareness of federal opportunities while helping to create an environmentally conscious campus through student-led initiatives. The agreement also focuses on student employment and volunteer programs, research participation, lectures and seminars on environmental issues, and community outreach.

WHO: EPA Region 7 Administrator Karl Brooks, Haskell Indian Nations University President Chris Redman, and Haskell Historian Theresa Milk

WHAT: Signing of the partnership agreement and remarks

WHERE: Stidham Union, Main Hall, Haskell Indian Nations University, 155 Indian Avenue, Lawrence, Kan. 66046

WHEN: 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. Wednesday, February 1

Haskell Indian Nations University is a land grant institution located in Lawrence, Kan. For more than 117 years, American Indians and Alaska Natives have been sending their children to Haskell, and Haskell has responded by offering an innovative curriculum oriented toward American Indian and Alaska Native cultures. Haskell has an average enrollment of more than 1,000 students each semester.

Haskell University offers a rich resource to address the problem of underrepresentation of American Indians in science, finance, mathematics, information technologies and environmental specialist fields, in addition to the participation of these minorities in national environmental programs.

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Lincoln University and EPA Agree to Promote Environmental Careers

From the U.S. EPA, Region 7:

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 7

901 N. Fifth St., Kansas City, KS 66101

Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and Nine Tribal Nations

Lincoln University and EPA Announce Partnership Agreement to Promote Environmental Careers

Contact Information: Kris Lancaster, 913-551-7557, lancaster.kris@epa.gov

Environmental News

NEWS MEDIA ADVISORY

(Kansas City, Kan., Jan. 23, 2012) - EPA and Lincoln University officials this week will gather in Jefferson City, Mo., to announce a partnership agreement to promote environmental careers.

The agreement will update an existing program of activities that will enhance Lincoln University’s research and educational capabilities, while simultaneously assisting EPA in achieving its community outreach mission.

EPA wants to increase Lincoln University’s awareness of federal opportunities while helping to create an environmentally conscious campus through student-led initiatives. Of utmost importance, both organizations share a goal of sufficiently preparing African-American students for future careers in environmental and scientific fields. The agreement also focuses on student employment and volunteer programs, research participation, lectures and seminars on environmental issues, and community outreach.

WHO: EPA Region 7 Administrator Karl Brooks and Lincoln University President Carolyn Mahoney

WHAT: Remarks and signing of the partnership agreement

WHERE: Inman E. Page Library, Teleconference Center, 712 Lee Drive, Jefferson City, Mo. 65101

WHEN: 1 p.m. Friday, January 27

Lincoln University is a historically black college located in the capital city of Missouri, Jefferson City. Lincoln was founded in 1866 by the men of the 62nd and 65th United States Colored Infantries and their white officers, for the special benefit of freed African-Americans. Lincoln University serves the needs of its diverse student body through a tradition of offering innovative programs that makes the college experience special.

Lincoln offers a rich resource to address the problem of under representation of African- Americans in science, finance, mathematics, information technologies and environmental specialist fields, in addition to the participation of these minorities in national environmental programs.

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