Tags: Earth


Refining your research

Along with a couple of dozen colleagues from campus, I was involved in a day-long workshop back in the fall on the subject of communicating research: how to accurately condense descriptions of research for public consumption. It's not inevitable that we always can, but we do try. And now, Columns reports that workshops to assist faculty on this subject will soon be repeated:  A team of UGA faculty and staff is beginning a new program to…

priomordial soup
Public discussions on science

If anyone was wondering whether there would be any interest in public lectures on big scientific questions, and relatedly, what a packed Chapel for such a discussion would look like, here you are: The Origins Lecture Series continues on Wednesday Feb. 27,  when Claiborne Glover will discuss the origins of biomolecules. Again, arriving early is a good idea. Image: Clumsy author photo and Photoshop job, but you get the idea.

earth origins
Origin of the Earth

The Origins Lecture Series continues on Wednesday, Feb. 6 at 7 p.m. in the Chapel with Ray Freeman-Lynde from the department of geography: In the early 19th Century, geologists, using simple principles to determine the relative ages of rocks, came to understand the great age of the earth and to establish a relative geologic time scale. Following the discovery of radioactivity at the end of the 19th Century, geochronologists developed techniques…

Tan and Mohnen in the lab
New Plant structure may improve biofuel processing

Great new work from Debra Mohnen and Li Tan in the BioEnergy Science Center: When Li Tan approached his colleagues at the University of Georgia with some unusual data he had collected, they initially seemed convinced that his experiment had become contaminated; what he was seeing simply didn’t make any sense. Tan was examining some of the sugars, proteins and polymers that make up plant cell walls, which provide the structural support and…


Shepherd and Yager challenge 'Zombie theories' on climate change

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration provides public-access data confirming “average temperature in the United States for 2012 was ... 3.2 degrees Fahrenheit above the 20th-century average, and 1.0 degree above 1998, the previous warmest year” in the United States. It is also well-documented that over the last several decades, we have experienced far more record-high temperatures than record-low temperatures. Up to the early…


NASA DEVELOP at UGA

Students and faculty in the department of geography have pioneered a terrific new collaboration with NASA set to begin this summer: University of Georgia's department of geography will partner with NASA through DEVELOP, a national student internship program created to enhance training and development in Earth science. The UGA collaboration is only the second housed strictly at a university in the U.S. Initial UGA projects include analyzing the…

Pan with colleagues and LED
Scientists unveil new LED material

It often seems as though major developments in energy efficiency or conservation are so elusive that the entire pursuit may appear to be futile. But we are surrounded by smaller steps forward, almost on a daily basis. UGA researchers report today on one small step with major implications: University of Georgia scientists have fabricated what is thought to be the world's first LED that emits warm white light using a single light emitting material…


Students help in the shift toward sustainability on campus

According to its own waste characterization study in 2006, the state of Georgia estimates that each year it spends $100 million to throw away $300 million worth of recyclables. Now the UGA Office of Sustainability is enlisting, and rewarding, students across campus in the effort to cut down on the waste: The University of Georgia Office of Sustainability has awarded $26,000 to seven student projects as part of its annual Campus Sustainability…


Origins Lecture Series

The Franklin College of Arts and Sciences and the the division of biological sciences will host a new lecture series on the UGA campus this spring: The Origins Lecture Series Since mankind’s earliest days the story of our origins has been one of fascination and inspiration.  In an effort to share that story six of UGA’s leading scientists have come together to present the latest scientific findings on everything from our humble beginnings…


3000 years of human occupation

The department of anthropology will host a very interesting public lecture on January 18, one that brings guest lecturer Scott Fitzpatrick from the University of Oregon to campus to discuss human activity and biological diversity on the Western Caroline Islands of Micronesia: The Palauan archipelago--considered to be on of the most ecologically diverse regions of the world-- is located in the northwest tropical Pacific and consists of hundreds…


The biofuels equation: public opinion

From time to time we've mentioned the long-term investments at UGA in people and research on the issue of developing renewable energy sources. The university has cultivated a wide range of expertise on the subject that goes back decades. And all of that research on everything from fermentation of sugars in plant lignin to biodiesel and drought resistant strains of switchgrass would not be complete without also looking at public support for…


UGA scientific divers discover 36,000-year-old gray whale fossil

This story has been cropping up several places, even before we could get the press release out. But it is, ahem, a whale of a story: While the Atlantic gray whale was hunted to extinction by the 1700’s, the Pacific or California gray swims today with a population near its pre-whaling levels. University of Georgia scientists have published their discovery of an Atlantic gray whale fossil off the Georgia coast that has re-enlivened…


Scientists to speak at SEC renewable energy symposium

A three-day SEC-sponsored event in February to discuss the future of renewable energy will feature two Franklin researchers with wide experience in our region's quest for renewable fuels: The SEC Symposium theme, “Impact of the Southeast in the World’s Renewable Energy Future,” will explore the spectrum of renewable energy technologies, including bioenergy, solar, wind, wave/flow and nuclear.  ... Researchers from all 14 member schools will…


NSF renews coastal research grant

The UGA Marine Institute on Sapelo Island was founded in 1953 and has been at the center of ecological research on salt-marsh coastal ecoystems ever since. That work, lead by our department of marine sciences, continues apace with the renewal of an important NSF grant: A consortium of universities headed by the University of Georgia will continue ecological field research on the marshes and estuaries of the Georgia coast following the renewal of…


Holland elected Paleontological Society president

Image of Lars G. Ljungdahl
4th Annual Ljungdahl Lecture features JPL's Russell

on planets. Open free to the public, the lecture is named in honor of a long-time and much-honored UGA faculty member, Lars G. Ljungdahl. Russell is a member of the Planetary Chemistry Astrobiology Group at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., and on the faculty at the California Institute of Technology. His research interests focus on the emergence of life and oxygenic photosynthesis in the context of hydrothermal systems on…


Shepherd and Knox opine on Sandy and forecasting in the AJC

How do we understand the potential of a megastorm like Sandy, currently battering the East coast of the U.S.? Geography professors Marshall Shepherd and John Knox explain in an Op-ed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Advances in numerical weather forecasting during the past several decades have extended our ability to see into the future. In September 1938, before all of these advances, a hurricane devastated Long Island and much of New…


"Object in Focus: The Orpheus Relief Project" brings together art, sciences

 

woman with weather map
'Good Morning America' meteorologist Ginger Zee

The student chapter of the UGA American Meteorological Society welcomes weekend 'Good Morning America' meteorologist Ginger Zee to campus on Tuesday, Oct. 17 at 4:30 p.m. in room 102 of the Miller Learning Center: Zee is the Emmy Award-winning weather anchor of the "Good Morning America" weekend edition, which is broadcast from the ABC News studios in Manhattan, N.Y. She also reports on weather-related topics from around the country during the…


UGA Observatory Open House Oct. 19

Reach for the stars, or merely gaze upon them from the rooftop of the physics building: The University of Georgia department of physics and astronomy in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences will host its monthly observatory open house Oct. 19 from 8-9:30 p.m. on the fourth floor of the physics building.   The double cluster of Perseus, which is comprised of two nearby groups of thousands of stars, and the pale blue planet Uranus will…

snowy mountain book cover
Physicist and adventurer Francis Slakey

The department of physics and astronomy will host a lecture this week with Georgetown University's Francis Slakey: Slakey will describe the decade-long journey that led him to become the first person to summit the highest mountain on every continent and surf every ocean during a University of Georgia lecture on Oct. 11 at 4 p.m. in room 202 of the physics building.   Slakey's talk, "Science and the Journey of Extremes," is hosted by the…


Alum returns to present geology colloquium

Franklin College alumnus Ed Moritz (B.S., Geology, '82) returns to campus next week to give a talk about his work on oil and gas projects in Afghanistan. His talk, "Afghanistan's Mineral Endowment: Example Projects from the Hydrocarbon and Mining Sectors," will be held at 3:30 pm on Thursday, October 11 in room 200A of the Geography and Geology Building. The talk is free and the public is invited to attend. Mr. Moritz joined Gustavson Associates…


'The Future of Food' workshop, Oct.1

As world population stretches past seven billion, many questions come to the fore about how to support so many people. For example, what if everyone elsewhere in the world consumed meat at the rate of the developed world? Does growing crops for transportation fuel put pressure on food crops? To address these questions and more, The University of Georgia Center for Integrative Conservation Research will host a free workshop to explore the links…

cell structure graphic on greg background
Cell signaling iBook features faculty partnership from across campus

 


Doctoral Graduate Earns Young Chemist Award

  Judy I-Chia Wu, a recent doctoral graduate from the department of chemistry, was one of six young chemists recently honored by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry. Wu, who earned her doctorate in 2011, was awarded the IUPAC Prize for her Ph.D. thesis work titled “Quantification of Virtual Chemical Properties: Strain, Hyperconjugation, Conjugation, and Aromaticity.” She was chosen from more than 40 applicants from 19…
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