Researchers define limits of microbial life in undersea volcano

By some estimates, a third of the Earth’s organisms by mass live in our planet’s rocks and sediments, yet their lives and ecology are almost a complete mystery. This week, microbiologist James Holden and others report in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences the first detailed data about a group of methane-exhaling microbes that live deep in the cracks of hot undersea volcanoes.
 
Holden says, “Evidence has built over the past 20 years that there’s an incredible amount of biomass in the Earth’s subsurface, in the crust and marine sediments, perhaps as much as all the plants and

Veterinary scientists' research helps alpaca wool growers in Peru

This week at an international conference in Vancouver, British Columbia, researchers from Veterinary and Animal Sciences are presenting results of some of the first studies ever done in Peru and on campus to improve the success of alpaca farmers who rely almost entirely on these animals for their livelihood.
 
Professor Steve Purdy, veterinarian and director of the Camelid Studies Program, with recent graduates Weston Brown and Caitlin Donovan, will present three papers at the International Congress on Animal Reproduction’s camelid satellite meeting on Aug. 3-4 in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Polymer scientist Alejandro Briseño, Kinesiology alumna receive presidential early career awards

President Barack Obama has named polymer scientist Alejandro L. Briseño to receive the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), the highest honor bestowed by the federal government on science and engineering professionals in the early stages of their independent research careers. 
 
Briseño was cited for “outstanding research accomplishments in areas of organic semiconductor nanoelectronics and molecular crystals and breakthroughs in the fundamental understanding of organic interfacial crystallization.”
 
Joining Briseño among the 96 science and engineering

New Agricultural Learning Center will link past, present and future roles in agriculture

The university will develop a new Agricultural Learning Center on the former Wysocki Farm on North Pleasant Street to serve as a hands-on, living classroom for students to learn about farming and the horticultural, nursery and landscape industries. The center will also have small areas devoted to livestock, fruits, vegetables, turf and landscape crops.
 
The center is being created by the Center for Agriculture and the Stockbridge School and will open for classes in fall 2014. The project will be located on Wysocki field (40 acres) on the east side of North Pleasant Street.

Dining Services takes NACUFS grand prize for sustainability for permaculture project

It was a “green sweep,” so to speak, as Dining Services and the campus permaculture project won the grand prize for sustainability and the top award for Outreach and Education at the national conference of the National Association of College & University Food Services last week in Boston.
 
Matthew Biette, director of dining services at Middlebury College and chair of the NACUFS Sustainability Awards committee, said that the Dining Services sustainability program is “well known, involved just about everyone and best off, had the numbers to prove it.

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