UMass and the Environment

Deep-sea microbes may offer a glimpse of what life could be like on a Jupiter moon

(12/18/08) Hovering in a tiny submarine 1.4 miles beneath the Pacific Ocean, microbiologist James Holden felt as if he were in a time machine, witnessing the ancient past, or a scientist’s fantasy future. Just inches away, an undersea volcanic vent called a “black smoker” spewed superheated water, hot gases and heavy-metal precipitates out of the Earth’s crust. (More)

Geoscientists drill for ancient climate secrets in Siberia

(12/18/08) In the next few days, a convoy of bulldozers and trucks will set out from a remote airport in Siberia, heading for a frozen lake 62 miles north of the Arctic Circle, but the trip isn’t a holiday visit to the North Pole. Instead, the trucks will deliver core-drilling equipment for a study of sediment and meteorite-impact rocks that should provide the longest time-continuous climate record ever collected in the Arctic. (More)

A Clean Water Act: Donation Helps Researchers Find Contamination in Drinking Water

(12/05/08) Scientists from UMass Amherst are finding solutions to the latest threat to drinking water—contamination from over-the-counter and prescription drugs.David Reckhow, a professor in environmental engineering, and Kathleen Arcaro, a faculty member in veterinary and animal science, are testing public water sources for the presence of drugs and determining how to eliminate them. (More)

DiMasi meets with clean energy researchers

(12/5/08) Visiting campus for the Academy for New Legislators, House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi met this week with campus faculty members involved in clean energy research.

DiMasi, who has championed several pieces of legislation focused on clean energy policy and research, toured George Huber’s lab, where the Chemical Engineering researcher discussed his efforts to turn biomass into "green gasoline" through a chemical conversion process. (More)

CEE student builds device to treat perchlorate in water

(12/4/08) An engineering student has built a device that could prove to be a better way to remove perchlorate contamination from water. Robert McKeever, a senior in the Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) Department, has designed and built a pilot bioreactor that uses common soil bacteria to “eat” perchlorate, an anion used in rocket fuel, fireworks, defense manufacturing and other industries. McKeever’s pilot bioreactor is being tested at the Massachusetts Military Reservation (MMR) in Bourne, which has been using the current state-of-the-art technique for removing perchlorate from drinking water, a method known as “ion exchange.” (More)

Mass. conservation department seeking ways to keep gulls away from Quabbin Reservoir

(12/4/08) BELCHERTOWN - Naturalists are asking for the public's help in a program designed to shoo ring-billed gulls from the Quabbin Reservoir - a drinking water source for more than 2 million people.

State Department of Conservation and Recreation employees are asking people to report any gull they see with a fluorescent tag on its wing. Employees captured, tagged and released more than 200 gulls found roosting at Quabbin Reservoir and the Wachusett Reservoir, which is to the east and linked to the Quabbin by water pipes. (More)

As U.S. Eyes New Bridges and Roads, Planners Must Take Climate Change Into Account,Say UMass Amherst Researchers

(12/2/08) If the coming century continues to unfold as the “age of climate change,” it’s clear to University of Massachusetts Amherst land use planner Elisabeth Hamin and colleagues that cities and towns should begin right now to assess such predicted impacts as warmer winters, more severe storms and more intense rainfall. Because if we’ve learned only one lesson already, she says, it’s that we’re going to be surprised by what’s to come. (More)

Local planners must take predicted climate change into account, say land use researchers

(12/1/08) If the coming century continues to unfold as the “age of climate change,” it’s clear to land use planner Elisabeth Hamin and colleagues that cities and towns should begin right now to assess such predicted impacts as warmer winters, more severe storms and more intense rainfall. Because if we’ve learned only one lesson already, she says, it’s that we’re going to be surprised by what’s to come. (More)

Obama urged to create 'Green New Deal'

(11/24/08) The worldwide economic crisis is prompting a growing number of countries to back away from pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions and invest in clean energy, just a week before the start of talks in Poland on a new worldwide climate change treaty. (More)

Campus Energy Conservation Paying Off, Say Officials

(11/24/08) Energy conservation measures adopted four years ago are saving the campus more than $5 million per year and have cut consumption of steam, electricity and water, according to Joyce Hatch, vice chancellor for Administration and Finance. In a Nov. 20 presentation to the Faculty Senate, Hatch, Physical Plant director Pat Daly and Craig Ruberti of Environmental Health and Safety discussed a range of campus efforts to promote sustainability and conserve energy. (More)

New Video: George Huber, Biofuels Researcher, Shows Off His Green Gasoline in UMass Amherst Lab

(11/17/08) AMHERST,Mass. - George Huber, a chemical engineering researcher at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, is a national leader in the development of "green gasoline." Earlier this fall, he was one of three experts invited to speak in Washington at a National Science Foundation briefing on how to make the alternative fuel from plant material. In this video, he explains the process biofuels conversion process that he has developed at UMass Amherst. (More)

Insect Virus Lab Studies Ways to Keep Bees Healthy

(11/14/08) The Insect Virus Lab was founded approximately 20 years ago by John Burand, Associate Professor of Entomology. Today, Burand and several other researchers use the lab to study ways to keep bees healthy. They also study viruses that cause diseases in insects. Many of these "insect pathogenic viruses" offer a safe and environmentally sound alternative to chemical insecticides. (More)

Susan Leschine of Microbiology Discovers Q Microbe That Produces Ethanol

(11/1/08) Seventy-five miles west of the State House, between Worcester and Springfield, a huge reservoir built in the 1930s holds the water that ultimately gushes from Boston's showerheads every morning. On the western shore of this 39-square-mile lake, the Quabbin, near the town of Pelham, there stands a forest of hemlocks and beeches. Running through the forest is a small tributary that feeds into a stream that empties into the Quabbin. And at the bottom of that tributary is a muck of partially decayed leaves and sticks. In 1996, UMass Amherst microbiologist Thomas Warnick waded into the muck, leaned down, and dug up a tablespoonful. He scooped the black slop into a jar and sealed the lid tightly. He was holding what just might be the Holy Grail of microbiology. (More)

Stephen Herbert and Susan Leschine of UMass Amherst are researching local crops that can be used for biofuel

(10/22/08) It's not quite as easy as collecting lawn clippings and yard waste and converting and distilling them in the garage into ethanol to run the family sedan - but it's close.While professor Stephen J. Herbert of the Plant, Soil and Insect Sciences Department at the University of Massachusetts is comparing different varieties of a once-abundant prairie grass as a source of biomass for conversion to ethanol, professor Susan B. Leschine, senior faculty member and microbiologist, is working with a microbe, called simply the Q microbe and found in soil near Quabbin Reservoir, to make that conversion a one-step process. (More)

Study pushes appearance of Northern Hemisphere ice sheets back 22 million years

(10/3/08) Climatologist Robert DeConto of the Geosciences Department and colleagues at four institutions reported in the Oct. 2 issue of the journal Nature that their latest climate model of the Northern Hemisphere suggests conditions would have allowed ice sheets to form there for the last 25 million years, or about 22 million years earlier than generally assumed. Their research has implications for the evaluation of global climate change. (More)

Sociologist’s Interdisciplinary Focus Results in Diverse Research Grants

(8/18/08) Professor Doug Anderton (sociology), who is also Associate Dean for Research Affairs in the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences and director of SADRI, the Social and Demographic Research Institute on campus, works on many projects with very different connections: 19th century disease and death, nanotechnology, environmental justice, breast cancer and more. “What unites them all in my framework,” Anderton says, “is social demography and the interaction of populations, organization, environment and technology: a classic demographic focus on interdisciplinarity called the POET scheme, or sometimes Duncan’s Diamond. This simple framework emphasizes what we all should know: any real social science has to cut across disciplines to reflect complex realities. The most common mistake of social analysis or model building is to place unrealistic and artificial boundaries on social science.” (More)

Researchers Awarded New Federal Funds for Wetlands Studies
(8/7/08) Two Natural Resources Conservation researchers working on wetlands monitoring and assessment projects around the state have received a new round of funding from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The agency is providing $300,000 for a research and extension project led by Kevin McGarigal and Scott Jackson, who are using computer software to create a comprehensive statewide wetlands monitoring and assessment program. (More)

Hurricane Frequency in Boston Tied to Ocean Surface Temperatures
(8/5/08) The frequency of hurricanes striking the Boston area has varied widely over the last millennium, with periods of lowest activity corresponding to cooler surface temperatures in the tropical North Atlantic Ocean, according to newly published research from the Climate System Research Center. (More)

Joseph Elkinton of Plant, Soil & Insect Sciences Finds That a 1989 Fungus is Taking a Major Toll on Gypsy Moths

(8/4/08) Cape trees were largely spared the scourges of that voracious triumvirate - the winter moth, forest tent, and gypsy moth caterpillars - this summer."There were some localized pockets, but there wasn't any widespread defoliation," said Roberta Clark of the Cape Cod Cooperative Extension. But that doesn't signal an end to the plague. Next year, given favorable weather conditions, the pests could be back in greater numbers. (More)

Engineers Study Boosting Production of Cheaper Biofuel Using Microwave
(7/10/08) A team of Engineering researchers has received a $440,000 grant from the National Science Foundation for research that will speed up the production of biofuels while slashing production costs. The research will focus on converting natural products, such as vegetable oil, wood and grasses, to liquid fuels. (More)

Climate Change Could Threaten Costa Rican Cloud Forests, Say Scientists
(7/10/08) While melting Arctic sea ice and glaciers have become a symbol of climate change, new research indicates that highland forests in Costa Rica could also be seriously affected by future changes in climate, reducing the number of species in a region famous for its biodiversity.. (More)

Ecotourism in Belize Is Causing Damage to Environmentally Sensitive Sites, Says UMass Amherst Landscape Architect
(6/12/08) Belize is an unforgettable mix of tropical waterfalls, ancient Mayan ruins and deep limestone caves, making it one of the world’s most popular destinations for ecotourists. Peter Kumble of the University of Massachusetts Amherst is working with the government of Belize to limit the environmental impact of ecotourism on these sensitive natural wonders. (More)

Plastics Containing ‘Smart Elements’ Can Reliably Detect Mercury in Drinking Water, Say UMass Amherst Researchers
(6/12/08) Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have developed plastics containing “smart elements” that can instantly detect the presence of mercury at or below the drinking water standard set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, even when other metals are present in the solution.(More)

Plants That Can Make Golf Courses ‘Greener’ By Filtering Pesticides and Herbicides Identified At UMass Amherst
(6/12/08) Perfectly maintained areas of turfgrass that make the game of golf possible require the constant use of pesticides, herbicides and fungicides, which are often washed into adjacent waterways by rainfall. Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have identified plants that can be used to create “living filters” known as vegetative filter strips at the edge of golf courses to remove harmful pesticides from the environment. (More)

Clues to how plants form cell walls could aid biofuels, nanotechnology, says Cannon
(2/27/08) When plant cells divide, they assemble molecular building blocks into new cell walls made of carbohydrate and protein, but scientists know almost nothing about how this process occurs. A team of researchers including Biochemistry professor Maura Cannon has found that the first step in building new plant cell walls is the assembly of a scaffold made of structural proteins, a process similar to using a metal or wood scaffold to construct the walls of a building.(More)

Nanopores that can recognize, separate proteins and small molecules developed
(2/26/08) Nanopores, holes less than one-thousand the width of a human hair, are capable of isolating strands of DNA or therapeutic drugs from a solution, based mostly on the size of the pores. Now, chemist S. “Thai” Thayumanavan has created nanopores that can recognize and interact with certain molecules, actively controlling their movement across synthetic membranes. Results were published online Feb. 3 in Nature Nanotechnology. (More)

Research aimed at US climate policy wins Baker $430k CAREER award
(2/14/08) Erin Baker, assistant professor in Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, has received a five-year, $430,000 award from the National Science Foundation CAREER program to continue research designed to influence the government’s future investments in the most cost-effective energy technologies for carrying out the nation’s climate-change policies. (More)

UMass Amherst Geoscientists to Host One of 11 Exhibits at the National Science Foundation Open House Feb. 4
(1/30/08) Geoscientists Julie Brigham-Grette and Robert Deconto of the University of Massachusetts Amherst have been invited to host one of 11 exhibits at the National Science Foundation Open House on Monday, Feb. 4 in Arlington, Va. The team will represent an international group of scientists recovering a complete 3.6 million-year record of the arctic climate from a remote Siberian lake. (More)

UMass Amherst scientists link natural gas formation by bacteria to climate change and renewable energy
(1/27/08) Natural gas reservoirs in Michigan’s Antrim Shale are providing new information about global warming and the Earth’s climate history, according to a recent study by Steven Petsch, a geoscientist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. The study is also good news for energy companies hoping to make natural gas a renewable resource. Results were published in the February 2008 issue of Geology. (More)

Researcher engineers genetic switches to enhance production of proteins, pharmaceuticals
(1/23/08) Bacteria have evolved complex mechanisms called quorum sensing systems that provide for cell-to-cell communication, an adaptation that allows them to wait until their population grows large enough before mounting an attack on a host or competing for nutrients. Chemical engineer Lianhong Sun has engineered one of these systems to create genetic switches that could lower the cost of producing therapeutic proteins and pharmaceuticals. (More)

Resource economists to assess welfare of farmers, food producers, retailers and consumers
(1/23/08) When Wal-Mart introduces superstores or several meat packers merge to form a large corporation, they create changes that affect the entire agricultural goods market. Nathalie Lavoie and Christian Rojas of the Resource Economics Department have won a $168,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to document the effects of these changes on the welfare of farmers, consumers, retailers and processors. (More)