Controlling Piute Ground Squirrels in Southwest Utah

The Piute ground squirrel, (Spermophilus mollis), populations on agricultural lands in Beaver County, Utah are increasing. It is a small gray squirrel found in Nevada and western Utah. It eats grasses, alfalfa and other agronomic crops. High populations of ground squirrels can compete with livestock for forage; destroy food crops, golf courses, and lawns; and can be reservoirs for diseases such as plague. Their burrowing activities alter irrigation systems. Burrow mounds not only cover and kill vegetation, but can damage haying machinery. These squirrels are currently costing farmers in western Utah hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost crops and in control costs. For the past 10 years USU Extension has conducted a number of trials to determine best management practices to reduce squirrel numbers in Southern Utah. These control methods include using different types of bait, timing, and baiting strategies and using different methods of fumigation. Because of our research we were able to get a Section 24(c) Special Local Need Label from the State of Utah for the Rozol Vole Bait for the control of the Piute Ground Squirrel

Magnetic Wreaths and Cycles in Convective Dynamos

Solar-type stars exhibit a rich variety of magnetic activity. Seeking to explore the convective origins of this activity, we have carried out a series of global 3D magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations with the anelastic spherical harmonic (ASH) code. Here we report on the dynamo mechanisms achieved as the effects of artificial diffusion are systematically decreased. The simulations are carried out at a nominal rotation rate of three times the solar value (3$\Omega_\odot$), but similar dynamics may also apply to the Sun. Our previous simulations demonstrated that convective dynamos can build persistent toroidal flux structures (magnetic wreaths) in the midst of a turbulent convection zone and that high rotation rates promote the cyclic reversal of these wreaths. Here we demonstrate that magnetic cycles can also be achieved by reducing the diffusion, thus increasing the Reynolds and magnetic Reynolds numbers. In these more turbulent models, diffusive processes no longer play a significant role in the key dynamical balances that establish and maintain the differential rotation and magnetic wreaths. Magnetic reversals are attributed to an imbalance in the poloidal magnetic induction by convective motions that is stabilized at higher diffusion levels. Additionally, the enhanced levels of turbulence lead to greater intermittency in the toroidal magnetic wreaths, promoting the generation of buoyant magnetic loops that rise from the deep interior to the upper regions of our simulated domain. The implications of such turbulence-induced magnetic buoyancy for solar and stellar flux emergence are also discussed.Comment: 21 pages, 16 figures, accepted for publication in Ap

Global magnetic cycles in rapidly rotating younger suns

Observations of sun-like stars rotating faster than our current sun tend to exhibit increased magnetic activity as well as magnetic cycles spanning multiple years. Using global simulations in spherical shells to study the coupling of large-scale convection, rotation, and magnetism in a younger sun, we have probed effects of rotation on stellar dynamos and the nature of magnetic cycles. Major 3-D MHD simulations carried out at three times the current solar rotation rate reveal hydromagnetic dynamo action that yields wreaths of strong toroidal magnetic field at low latitudes, often with opposite polarity in the two hemispheres. Our recent simulations have explored behavior in systems with considerably lower diffusivities, achieved with sub-grid scale models including a dynamic Smagorinsky treatment of unresolved turbulence. The lower diffusion promotes the generation of magnetic wreaths that undergo prominent temporal variations in field strength, exhibiting global magnetic cycles that involve polarity reversals. In our least diffusive simulation, we find that magnetic buoyancy coupled with advection by convective giant cells can lead to the rise of coherent loops of magnetic field toward the top of the simulated domain.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, from IAU 273: The Physics of Sun and Star Spot

Methanotrophic Bacteria for Nutrient Removal from Wastewater: Attached Film System

It was hypothesized that nutrient removal from wastewater could be achieved by using methane oxidizing bacteria (methanotrophs). Because methane is inexpensive. it can be used as an energy source to encourage bacterial growth to assimilate nitrogen and phosphorus and other trace elements. This initial feasibility study used synthetic nutrient mixtures and secondary sewage effluent as feed to a laboratory-scale methanotrophic attached-film expanded bed (MAFEB) reactor operated at 35°C and 20°C. The MAFEB system operated successfully at low nutrient concentrations under a variety of nutrient-limited conditions. Using a synthetic nutrient mixture with a nitrogen:phosphorus feed ratio (w/w) of 9:1, phosphate concentrations were reduced from 1.3 mg P/ L to below 0.1 mg P/ L, and ammonia was reduced from 12 mg N/L to approximately 1 mg N/L on a continuous flow basis, with a bed hydraulic retention time of 4.8 hours. The average nutrient uptake rates from synthetic nutrient mixtures were 100 mg nitrogen and 10 mg phosphorus/L of expanded bed/d. Nutrient assimilation rates increased with increasing growth rate and with increasing temperature. Nitrogen/phosphorus uptake ratios varied from 8 to 13, and the observed yield varied from 0.11 to 0.16 g volatile solids (VS)/g chemical oxygen demand (COD). Nutrient removal from secondary sewage effluent was successfully demonstrated using sewage effluent from two local treatment plants. Nutrient concentrations of 10-15 mg N/L and 1.0-1.8 mg P/L were reduced consistently below 1 mg N/L and 0.1 mg P/L. No supplemental nutrients were added to the sewage to attain these removal efficiencies since the nutrient mass ratios were similar to that required by the methanotrophs. Removal rates were lower at 20°C than at 35°C, but high removal efficiencies were maintained at both temperatures. Effluent suspended solids concentrations ranged from 8 to 30 mg volatile suspended solids (VSS)/L, and the effluent soluble COD concentration averaged 30 mg/L

Evidence to impact: A community knowledge mobilisation evaluation framework

Many strategies guide knowledge-sharing to enhance uptake of evidence-based programs in practice, though few have been designed specifically for community settings. We highlight the importance of understanding and evaluating knowledge mobilisation in community settings and present a framework for evaluating knowledge mobilisation that captures short-term knowledge use as it relates to community stakeholders’ goals. To examine the utility of this framework, we applied it to the Pan-Canadian knowledge mobilisation activities of Better Beginnings, Better Futures, a community, university and government collaboration to support child development to its full capabilities. Participants included 31 community stakeholders who had attended a Better Beginnings workshop in one of six Canadian provinces and territories. Qualitative phone interviews were conducted to examine the extent to which knowledge mobilisation activities met participants’ learning needs, and how participants had applied the knowledge gained. Findings demonstrate that most participants had used the information, although the ways information was used varied greatly based on the community context. This application of the knowledge mobilisation framework shows it is useful for capturing diverse forms of short-term knowledge use in community settings. Lessons learned through the evaluation were used to refine the framework. The implications of this framework for academic researchers engaged in undertaking and evaluating community knowledge mobilisation are discussed

Laboratory kinetic studies of OH and CO2 relevant to upper atmospheric radiation balance

During the first year of this program, we have made considerable progress toward the measurement of the dipole moments of vibrationally excited OH radicals. Our primary accomplishments have been 1) the modification of the original slit jet spectrometer for the study of radical species and 2) the observation of infrared chemiluminescence from the vibrationally excited OH radicals formed in the H + ozone reaction in the supersonic jet. We are optimistic that we will soon observe OH* laser induced fluorescence in the jet. Modulation of this fluorescence with microwave radiation in an applied electric field will be the final step required for the precise determination of the vibrational dependence of the OH dipole moment