DJ and Audrey Are Movie Stars!

With Travis Gannon's group from Crop Science at NC State, we have been working on a publication for the Journal of Visualized Experiments, describing field methods for analysis of chemicals applied to soils. The exciting thing about JoVE is that along with a written publication, the journal professionally produces a movie about your work! We recently completed the video footage, and Audrey and DJ got to show off their exceptional on-camera skills. Some pictures of the shoot are below...and be sure to check back soon to see the final video!

We did the shoot at the Sandhills Research Station and had to start pretty early to get the field area prepared.

Audrey prepares to give her introductory remarks...which, of course, she delivered with precision.

DJ demonstrates lysimeter installation.

Audrey and DJ get ready to install some porewater samplers. The videographer liked to do most everything with his jacket on his head.

Preparing for vacuum filtration...

DJ makes a pas over the field area to create some footage for general field 'maintenance'.

The final shot: DJ cuts open and sections the lysimeters.

From now on, DJ and Audrey can be contacted through their talent agents.

Christine and Allison present at the NC State Undergraduate Research Symposium!

Christine and Allison presented their research at NC State's Undergraduate Research Symposium!

Christine's poster was entitled "Quantifying the Arsenic Adsorption Capacity of Alcan AAFS50 for Its Use in Household Treatment of Well Water".

Allison's poster was entitled "Characterizing the Aqueous Chemistry of Aquifers with Low and High Manganese in the North Carolina Piedmont".

Both did a fantastic job describing their research and answering questions. Way to go ladies!!!

Fall is for football......or greenhouse work

DJ has been working in the greenhouse since last August to wrap up his final research project!

With the help of Terri Williams, columns were prepped for experimentation.

Soil was packed; bermudagrass plugs were pulled and planted.

 
 

After all was said it done, it turned out quit nice!

 

 

 



 

He made a great decision for this project……………he saved his lab work for the winter!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now on to the thesis!

Liz finishes her well sampling (...or does she?)

It was a cold January morning near the NC Zoo as Liz finished the last of her winter well sampling!

We were lucky to have the help of Shuying Wang, Winston-Salem Region Hydrogeologist and well-sampler extraordinaire from the NC Division of Water Resources:

Liz takes some good notes:

Hey...focus!

Getting the gear working:

Hooray for being done (...well, except for that thesis...)!

Rockin' it in Tampa

This post is a bit overdue, but in November, Liz, Audrey and I (Matt) delivered several presentations at the Soil Science Society of America annual meeting in Tampa.

Here's Liz at her poster:

And Audrey at her poster:

Liz, I, and a few others from the department ran in the 5k (with one derelict participant forgetting to register and not getting a race bib):

Owen Duckworth, biogeochemist extraordinaire, was the speed demon of the group.

The run brought out some SSSA magic, and Owen and I shared a touching scenic sunrise:

Fun all around!

Matt's pics from the beam

Greetings, it's Matt here, with a few more pictures from the APS, to supplement Audrey's post.

First off, Audrey wasn't just blogging while we were here...she was working hard:

She and DJ spent a lot of time analyzing and discussing data:

The tricycles are definitely a nice option for late-night transportation:

And here are Audrey and DJ, each sitting on a small hippo (with a couple of confused onlookers...):

 

Well, that about sums it all up!

Fun at the Argonne National Laboratory?

Greetings from Chicago (sort of)! Matt, DJ and I (Audrey) are at the Argonne National Laboratory using the synchrotron for our Cambodia sediments and the MSMA turfgrass project. If you aren't well versed in the synchrotron, you can find information here. Don't worry, we're still learning more about it ourselves (well, except for Matt). Here is an aerial view of the whole system:

*photo courtesy of the APS*

As you can see, it is quite the setup. Here are some additional pictures from our trip so far:

Work Station-yes, we use around 8 monitors

 This is actually where we put the sample in. We don't get to see this room very often and it closes with authority. The beam goes through the metal that transects the room. There are also cameras, mirrors, and other really scientific stuff that happens in here that perhaps Matt can explain more.

Here is DJ loading a sample into a magnetic tray that will move the sample around (the beam doesn't move)

Loaded sample with a camera and detector shooting on it. Just look at those coarse sediments!

This place is so big that we need tricycles to get around. Yes, I'm serious. Here we are going to get lunch at the cafe down the path.

Anyway, this is just a quick post to show you what we've been doing. Matt, Liz and I will be attending the SSSA conference from Nov. 3-7 so I think you'll get another blog post soon. 

*Audrey*