Event Type: Science Seminar
Location: Virtual
Event Details:
Three graduate students from the MW CASC network will present on their research during our October Science Seminar. Featured speakers include Joe Young of Michigan State University, Miao He of the University of Minnesota, and Holly Kundel of the University of Minnesota.
Panelists:
 | Miao He Miao He (she/they) is a PhD student in the Ecology, Evolution and Behavior program at University of Minnesota. About their research: Nitrogen enrichment is a pervasive global change that has a strong impact on the biodiversity and functioning of our ecosystems. Miao explored the cumulative effects of nitrogen enrichment and found that positive interactions between plants played a diminishing role in driving positive biodiversity-productivity relationships over time, while dominance of a few productive species played an increasing role. These changes may lead to less resilient communities that are more vulnerable to future climate change. |
 | Holly Kundel Holly Kundel (she/her) is a master's student in the University of Minnesota's Conservation Sciences program, studying Fisheries and Aquatic Biology. About her research: To allow for broad-scale analyses of inland fisheries data, Holly's team developed a data management, filtering, and combining workflow that processes raw data files provided by fisheries agencies monitoring data to make data comparable across systems. Their approach allows users to apply their own filters and standards, and create custom aggregations that can meet multiple analytical needs. The tools they developed standardize, combine, and manage broad-scale recreational fisheries monitoring data, allowing researchers to better understand landscape-level drivers and responses of fish to novel stressors, and increase the scale of adaptive management from single lakes to entire landscapes. |
 | Joe Young Joe Young is a master's student in Michigan State University's College of Agriculture & Natural Resources, Department of Forestry. About his research: Joe's research looks at ecophysiology of jack pine (Pinus banksiana) in the Northern Great Lakes region. Specifically, he works with mature trees and forests to understand how fundamental principles of tree physiology such as hydraulic limitation, carbon allocation, and morality may respond to a changing climate, and how these principals can inform forest management. |
Registration is also open for the next seminar in our fall series: Fire in the Apostle Islands Lakeshore.