IMAGE OF THE WEEK
Alumnus Ron Bilham (online GIS Certificate ’03) sent this photo of his grandson Declan, enjoying the snow on September 8, 2014 in Calgary, Canada.
GOOD NEWS
Ann Myatt James passed her dissertation defense on Wednesday (September, 3 2014). The dissertation is titled: “Feeding Hungry People: An Investigation of US Food Assistance Programs.”
Alan Taylor received a grant from the USDA Forest Service “Self-reinforcing patterns of fire severity in the northern Sierra Nevada, USA.
Rachel Isaacs has had an article accepted for publication in Ecosphere “Ice storms generate spatially heterogeneous damage patterns at the watershed scale in forested landscapes.”
NEWS
September 19 Coffee Hour: Laurel Larsen “Structural and functional connectivity of complex aquatic landscapes”
- 3:30 to 5:00 p.m.
- Refreshments are offered in 319 Walker Building at 3:30 p.m.
- The lecture begins in 112 Walker Building at 4:00 p.m.
- Coffee Hour To Go
Structural connectivity is often hailed as critical for aquatic ecosystem function. Channel-floodplain connectivity promotes nutrient and sediment redistribution and water-purification reactions such as denitrification, while longitudinal connectivity provides corridors for transport of organic matter and organisms. Large-scale connectivity can also enhance resilience by facilitating transport and replenishment of organisms, sediment, and/or nutrients lost during a disturbance. However, connectivity can also promote the spread of catastrophe to large scales through the communication of information (e.g., as in popular forest fire models in terrestrial systems).
EMS freshmen bond in nature, overcome jitters through orientation program
Everyone has heard of — or experienced — the freshman jitters. But throw in campfires and s’mores, boating and swimming, cooking challenges and scavenger hunts, add faculty, staff, upperclassmen and alumni to the mix and you have a freshmen orientation experience designed to overcome those jitters — the Total Orientation Trip for Earth and Mineral Sciences. Otherwise known as TOTEMS, it is a three-day orientation program for first-year students in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences (EMS).
RECENTLY (or soon to be) PUBLISHED
Book Review: An introduction to landscape by Peter J. Howard
By Kirby Calvert in The Canadian Geographer
The intention of the book is clear and well executed: to offer a broad overview of the concept of landscape that is intelligible and useful to interdisciplinary research(ers) studying environment-society relations. Issue-oriented information capsules and chapter-by-chapter work exercises bring depth to the material and make it easier for the reader to extend the concepts discussed in the text beyond the covers of the book.
DOG OF THE WEEK
The previous mystery dog was Michaela, companion to Clio Andris. Guido Cervone was the first to respond with the correct answer.
Send your answer to geography@psu.edu along with a photo of your dog for our mystery dog of the week!