News Article

The director of NSF EPSCoR, Dr. Denise Barnes, took time before attending the iUTAH External Advisory Board Meeting and Summer Symposium in Midway to familiarize herself with the iUTAH project.

Dr. Barnes spent the better part of Wednesday, July 15, in informal interactions with a range of iUTAH participants. After meeting with Education, Outreach and Diversity Coordinator Ellen Eiriksson and Assistant Director and Project Administrator Andy Leidolf at iUTAH’s satellite office on the University of Utah campus, Dr. Barnes had lunch with iUTAH undergraduate and graduate students and postdocs to learn about iUTAH’s efforts in building the next generation of our state’s STEM workforce.

In the afternoon, she was treated to a comprehensive tour of Red Butte Creek organized by iUTAH facilities lead Jim Ehleringer and researchers Paul Brooks and Rachel Gabor. At four different stops along a route covering the length of the mountain-to-urban transition and ending in the heart of the Red Butte Research Natural Area, 13 iUTAH researchers, the majority of them students, shared their work on how social and urban landscape processes are connected to changes in biogeochemistry, hydrology, and microbiology; the integration of social and biophysical neighborhood typologies that influence hydrology and biogeochemistry; and the coupling of slope and riparian landscapes to better understand the biogeochemistry and ecohydrology of montane systems.

In addition, Jim Ehleringer provided perspectives on the future of iUTAH vis-à-vis planned urban and montane NEON sites. Dr. Barnes appreciated the effort put forth by iUTAH in hosting her for this visit, calling it “informative, productive, and very enjoyable.”

Doug Jackson-Smith, Allison Chan, Paul Brooks, Samantha Weintraub, Billy Brazelton, Denise Barnes, Rachel Gabor, Margaret Wolf, Philip Stoker, Mallory Millington, Alexei Perelet, and Dave Eiriksson