Benthic Macroinvertebrates as Bioindicators of water quality on the Mad River

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

This project sampled benthic macroinvertebrate communities present at three locations in Humboldt County, California totaling 1642 individuals across 19 families. The composition of taxa differed significantly between upstream and downstream sites (p < 0.0000). Pollution taxa sensitive (Caenidae, Perlodidae, Pteronarcyidae, and Lepidostomatidae were present in the upstream sites and absent from the downstream site.

Benthic Microplastic Distribution in Humboldt Bay, Northern California: A Comparative Study of Surface Sediments Based on Proximity from the Shore

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

This study focused on microplastic concentrations in and around Humboldt Bay, CA. Microplastics do not have a universal size class, but for the purpose of this study, microplastics were categorized as any plastic piece from 0.335 mm to 4.75 mm. Samples were taken on Humboldt State's research vessel "Coral Sea", and by foot on land. Both water and sediment samples were collected and analyzed to find the amount of microplastic particles per mass sampled. Visual microscopy was utilized to create counts for each station.

Bio-Renewable Hydrogel Polymers from Modified Chitosan: Progress Toward Three Dimensional Cell Growth Scaffolds

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

Hydrogels are water-containing gels that have a hydrophilic polymer network and can absorb a large quantity of water without the dissolution of the polymer network. The current research focuses on producing hydrogels from chitosan, a bio-renewable polymer, and trans-cinnamic acid. The resulting solutions are photo-crosslinked in a catalyst-free environment under broad band ultra-violet (UV) radiation to produce hydrogels. The hydrogels show an average 75% swelling capacity in H2O. Initial cell growth studies have been carried out on sterilized hydrogels. Current efforts are being directed towards optimization of gels towards cell growth.

Bio-Renewable Hydrogel Polymers from Modified Chitosan: Progress Towards Three Dimensional Cell Growth Scaffolds

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

The current research focuses on producing hydrogels from chitosan, a bio-renewable bio-compatible and bio-degradable polymer. Hydrogels are used as contact lenses, drug delivery systems, and biomedical applications such as tissue engineering. Chitosan is the deacetylated form of chitin, an abundant biopolymer found in the exoskeletons of crustaceans and insects. Amino acid coupling, using 1-Ethyl-3-(3- dimethylaminopropyl) carbodiimide (EDC), is employed to covalently attach trans-cinnamic acid to the free amine of chitosan. Modified chitosan is then cross-linked under UV irradiation to produce hydrogels. The swelling capacity and sterilizability are currently under investigation.

Bird Diversity in Arcata, California: A Study on Urban Influence

Brittany Ocheltree, Wildlife Undergraduate Student

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

In this study, the primary goal was to observe the effects of urbanization on bird species diversity and composition of native and non-native species in Arcata, California. Methods include fixed radius 75-meter point counts for ten minutes, within thirty predetermined study sites, where I counted bird species and the abundance of birds, landscape features (e.g., building density), along with noting any human activity that may occur. I hypothesized that non-native species would increase with increasing building density. In conjunction with that species diversity would decrease with building density.

Black bears in suburban areas consume more anthropogenic foods

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

Consumption of human food by black bears (Ursus americanus) is a common and challenging problem for wildlife managers dealing with the species, because bears will readily use human-associated foods as an easily attainable energy source, especially when natural food sources are scarce .The result of human expansion is increased rates of encounters between humans and bears, particularly if bears are being forced to search farther and wider outside their home ranges for food. In this study I assessed variation in anthropocentric foods in bear diets. To accomplish this, I compared scat samples collected in Humboldt, CA from suburban and rural areas.

Black Phoebe Forage Rates

blake hefner, Wildlife Undergraduate Student

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

An analysis of how foraging rates in Black phoebe differs in wetland environments vs urban environments

Black Phoebes Sing More Often in Noisier Anthropogenic Environments

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

My senior thesis research is about how anthropogenic noise, such as traffic noise influences bird communication is an important question to understand how increasing urbanization influences animal populations. A bird that might be affected by traffic noise is the Black Phoebe, a suboscine songbird that occurs in both rural and urban areas. In contrast to oscines, song in suboscines is innate and not learned, so it is thought to be less plastic. My objective was to investigate if Black Phoebes adjust their singing behavior in response to car traffic in urban and rural sites in Arcata, California.

Botanical Sciences and Native Studies

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

I will be describing research done by the Native Medicinal Plant Research Program relating to ethnobotany. The research includes: their botany database, plants collected, Physalis research, osha, at risk plants, asclepius, and echinacea. The core values of this research are Conservation and sustainable harvest of medicinal plants , Respect for Indigenous knowledge of medicinal plants , and Education toward ecological responsibility,

Boy Scouts and Native American Cultural Appropriation

College of Natural Resources & Sciences

I will be doing a poster that outlines the history of how boy scouts had appropriated native american culture and the effect that that had on both tribes and the scouts that participated in events such as order of the arrow.