Farmworkers unions in CA

College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences

The poster will be on a research project I am currently working on involving the legacy of farmwork in California and their lack of support in regards to forming labor unions.

Fast Fashion

Laquita Agwiak, Wildlife Undergraduate Student

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

Our creative project from our Wildlife 309 class: Case Studies in Environmental Ethics, focuses on the ethics of the fashion industry. With our outfits made from trash or found objects along with our posters, we are bringing waste to the forefront to expose the fashion industries façade. Even though the fashion industry is highly valuable and earns high revenues, it comes at a devastating cost to the environment as this industry is one of the top 7 polluters globally.

Feasibility of Pressure Retarded Osmosis

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

Pressure Retarded Osmosis (PRO) is a renewable energy technology which captures energy from the osmotic pressure of salinity gradients across membranes. This poster presents a feasibility study of PRO at the Samoa Pulp Mill site by employing a pseudo-2-dimensional model to approximate the pressure drops and the salt and water fluxes across a spiral-wound membrane module. The net energy of the system accounts for parasitic loads including pretreatment, conveyance turbine and generator efficiency, and friction losses in the pipe networks. Technical and economic feasibility are evaluated in the project. The conclusions are that PRO is barely technically feasible and not economically feasible.

Features of the Coastal Atmospheric Marine Boundary Layer

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

The marine boundary layer is a semi-annual atmospheric feature occuring along the Humboldt coastline. Fourteen years worth of weather balloon data provided by the NOAA atmospheric observatory in Trinidad, CA have been used to characterize seasonal and spatial patterns of the boundary layer. Preliminary results show that the boundary layer is highly dynamic and occurs in high frequency. It is most common in summertime as a result of warm inland temperatures and strong coastal upwelling. Seasonally, the boundary layer changes height, rising to 1500m in winter and lowering to 900m in summer. A five year time series provides evidence that the California drought may reduce the layer's frequency.

Feeding the Machine: Effects of Propaganda During World War II

College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences

Propaganda has affected politics for centuries. This research identified underlying themes/differences between U.S. and Nazi propaganda from World War II. Methods included a literature review as well as collecting and analyzing propaganda from that time. A trend that emerged during research was that both forms of propaganda espoused the ideal of defeating an enemy that was a threat to national security. U.S. propaganda focused more on maximizing resources and instilling fear among its citizens, while Nazi propaganda rallied citizens to perform their “natural duty”. This research brings to light key trends in the nature of propaganda and reflects how it influenced our modern culture.

Female Athletes using therapy to manage PMS

Vanessa Saltos, School of Applied Health Undergraduate Student

College of Professional Studies

I am doing a literature review on the Effects PMS has on mental health within female collegiate athletes and how to help manage these symptoms. I'm researching the best resources in order to help combat these symptoms.

Female Religious Leaders of Humboldt

College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences

The aim of this research is to gain insight into the experience of female religious leaders in Humboldt County, centering around the challenges, obstacles, and opportunities faced by women in these roles. How do such figures view their gender has affected them in terms of authority, personal spirituality, and relationship to religious tradition? By conducting a series of ethnographic interviews with local religious leaders, these questions have been explored across faith traditions. The examination of gender and power is not only limited to a religious setting, but extends broadly to society as a whole.

Financial Capacity of Local Nonprofits

College of Professional Studies

There are currently a variety of nonprofit organizations operating in and serving the needs of Humboldt County. The purpose of this project is to assess the financial needs of these organizations and develop a report to help them expand their capacity. We conducted an extensive literature review of best financial practices at nonprofit organizations, reviewed three years of IRS 990 forms for local nonprofits, and analyzed survey results from a previous local study. Using the best practices we identified during our literature review and the data from our two analyses we developed an action plan for local nonprofit organizations.

Finding Nemo: Where Are The Fish Going?

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

Rising ocean temperatures will have a huge impact on life in the ocean, and on the communities that have an economic dependence on the fishing industry. It is important to understand the ocean’s changing environment and the serious repercussions these changes will bring to humanity, in order to prepare for the future. To help plan for this future, we have created a mathematical model that predicts where herring and mackerel, two types of fish located around Scotland, will relocate to over the next 50 years, and the impact these relocations will have on small Scottish fishing companies.

Finding Stable Isotope Signatures of Fauna of Northwest California: A Tool for Anthropological Investigations

College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences

Anthropologists use Stable isotope analyses to understand environments where past and present human cultures lived. This project starts a database of isotopic signatures for the region of Humboldt County, in northwestern California, as a baseline for further research. I prepared samples at HSU Archaeology and Biological Anthropology Research labs for Carbon (C) and Oxygen (O) stable isotopes using H2O2 Hydroxyapatite-Carbonate protocol. The samples will be sent to Stable Isotope Laboratory at the University of California, Santa Cruz and analyzed for δ13C & δ18O. As database entries increase, evidence of stable isotopic signatures of specific areas in northwest California may be identified.