Hey, great job, everyone! The poster session last Friday was a great success. It was neat to meet so many of your parents, PI's, and mentors. I'm so glad to hear that so many of you enjoyed your summer research experiences.
Thanks so much to all of those who kept posting to the blog throughout the summer. I think it was an overall success, and we'll be adding it as a requirement to next year's program.
Once again, great job everyone! Please keep us updated about your career goals and where you end up for college! Good luck this next year and enjoy the rest of the summer!
Showing posts with label Erica. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Erica. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Monday, June 25, 2007
We'll be visiting your labs!
This week Robin and I are going to start doing lab visits. We'll come by each of your labs to see how you're doing, meet your mentor, and give you a chance to tell us more about your project. This is an informal meeting and will last 15-30 mins. We're eager to hear more about your lab experiences and to literally see what you're doing in the lab! We'll send out individual scheduling info later.
Saturday, June 16, 2007
parasitic insight
I thought since we ran out of time this week for my research talk, I'd give a short synopsis of my thesis project.
My project concerns how biological communities respond to climate change. As the climate changes, the habitable areas of a species will shift, and in many cases species distributions will have to move 100's of kilometers to avoid extinction. For instance, American beech, Fagus grandifolia, (a large component of eastern hardwood forests, a common tree here in the Triangle) is predicted to be almost completely extirpated from its range in the U.S. and will find hospitable habitat mostly in Canada. But will this tree species be able to migrate fast enough to its new habitat? We're interested not only in this one tree species' survival but also with other components of this forest community. How will the entire community respond to global warming? As a clue to the migration capacity of different forest components, we look at how a host tree and an understory parasitic plant responded to a past era of global warming that occurred following the last ice age. We're working on tracing the post-glacial colonization routes of the parasitic plant, Epifagus virginiana, and comparing it with the migration history of its host tree, the American beech.
The photo shows an Epifagus virginiana infection. Epifagus are the brown stick like things poking up from the ground. They have no chlorophyll or leaves and get all their food and nutrients from the beech tree they're connected to. Notice how they appear to be in a line; this colony happens to be connected to a large beech root near the soil surface.
My project concerns how biological communities respond to climate change. As the climate changes, the habitable areas of a species will shift, and in many cases species distributions will have to move 100's of kilometers to avoid extinction. For instance, American beech, Fagus grandifolia, (a large component of eastern hardwood forests, a common tree here in the Triangle) is predicted to be almost completely extirpated from its range in the U.S. and will find hospitable habitat mostly in Canada. But will this tree species be able to migrate fast enough to its new habitat? We're interested not only in this one tree species' survival but also with other components of this forest community. How will the entire community respond to global warming? As a clue to the migration capacity of different forest components, we look at how a host tree and an understory parasitic plant responded to a past era of global warming that occurred following the last ice age. We're working on tracing the post-glacial colonization routes of the parasitic plant, Epifagus virginiana, and comparing it with the migration history of its host tree, the American beech.
The photo shows an Epifagus virginiana infection. Epifagus are the brown stick like things poking up from the ground. They have no chlorophyll or leaves and get all their food and nutrients from the beech tree they're connected to. Notice how they appear to be in a line; this colony happens to be connected to a large beech root near the soil surface.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
1st Blog Assignment
Please post two things by the end of this week:
1. Introduce yourself to the group! Let us know who you're working with this summer and a little about your project. If possible, include some photos of yourself, your lab mates, etc. in the lab. We'd love to see you in action.
2. Reflect on this first week in the lab. Describe a new experience you had, or tell us about something you've learned, or write about anything you found interesting in the lab this week. Stuck for ideas? Check out our sister program's blog.
1. Introduce yourself to the group! Let us know who you're working with this summer and a little about your project. If possible, include some photos of yourself, your lab mates, etc. in the lab. We'd love to see you in action.
2. Reflect on this first week in the lab. Describe a new experience you had, or tell us about something you've learned, or write about anything you found interesting in the lab this week. Stuck for ideas? Check out our sister program's blog.
Blogging guidelines
Have fun with the blog! We genuinely want to hear about your adventures (and misadventures) in the lab this summer. Please post regularly about the things you're learning, any new experiences, and, especially, your reactions to those things. Also, be supportive of each other and comment on other people's posts.
General blog guidelines:
1. Please include labels in all of your posts. One of the labels must be your name (written the same way each time).
2. All students are welcome to play around with the template and style of the blog. Please do!
3. Remember this is a public blog. Please, no inappropriate content.
General blog guidelines:
1. Please include labels in all of your posts. One of the labels must be your name (written the same way each time).
2. All students are welcome to play around with the template and style of the blog. Please do!
3. Remember this is a public blog. Please, no inappropriate content.
Monday, June 11, 2007
How to post something on the blog!
1. Make sure you are logged in. You will need a google account to do so. Get one! It's free!
2. Make sure you have access to the blog. I need to give you permission to get access to posting. You should have received an email with a link to start posting. Follow the email's directions.
3. Once logged in and having access, you can now start posting! In the top right corner it should say 'New Post' click there. (If it doesn't say that, it probably says 'sign in', so do that first).
4. It will bring you to a screen where you fill in the Title and Body of your post. For newbies, stick to the 'compose screen'. If you know some html, click on 'edit html'. From the compose tab there are some basic formatting functions like bold, italics, etc.
5. Be sure to add a label to this post. Labels are just tags or keywords that describe what the post was generally about. Also, please always put your name as a label so that we can easily group all an individual's posts together. For instance, labels could be "Erica", "instructions", "introductions", "PCR", "Harry Potter". Just put something that could be useful in the label field. A post can have multiple labels, just separate them with commas.
6. You can preview your post, but when you're ready, click 'Publish Post', and you're done!
2. Make sure you have access to the blog. I need to give you permission to get access to posting. You should have received an email with a link to start posting. Follow the email's directions.
3. Once logged in and having access, you can now start posting! In the top right corner it should say 'New Post' click there. (If it doesn't say that, it probably says 'sign in', so do that first).
4. It will bring you to a screen where you fill in the Title and Body of your post. For newbies, stick to the 'compose screen'. If you know some html, click on 'edit html'. From the compose tab there are some basic formatting functions like bold, italics, etc.
5. Be sure to add a label to this post. Labels are just tags or keywords that describe what the post was generally about. Also, please always put your name as a label so that we can easily group all an individual's posts together. For instance, labels could be "Erica", "instructions", "introductions", "PCR", "Harry Potter". Just put something that could be useful in the label field. A post can have multiple labels, just separate them with commas.
6. You can preview your post, but when you're ready, click 'Publish Post', and you're done!
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