DRI
Research Professor Dale Johnson Receives 1999 Board of Regents Researcher Award
Dr. Dale Johnson, a DRI Research Professor, has received the 1999 Regents Researcher Award, the University and Community College System of Nevada's top faculty honor for research. Dr. Johnson's award acknowledges more than 25 years of outstanding research on soil chemistry, forest ecosystems, and natural resource management.
Johnson, who is also deputy director of DRI's Biological Sciences Center, has gained an international reputation for his work spanning such topics as the impact of acid rain on forests and forest soils, the effects of forest fires on the health of forest ecosystems, how increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide affects forests, and important basic advances in describing the movement of plant nutrients through those ecosystems.
Johnson was nominated by Dr. James Coleman, executive director of the Biological Sciences Center. "Perhaps most striking about Dale's career as a researcher are the continuity of his work and his persistence in questioning commonly held assumptions," says Coleman. He pointed to a landmark paper by Johnson showing that soil changes due to the effects of acid rain were occurring at a much faster rate than previously expected. "This contributed significantly to the understanding of this issue worldwide," Coleman notes.
On DRI's faculty since 1989, Johnson is the second Institute scientist to receive the Regents Researcher Award, following the Board of Regents recognition of Dr. John Hallett, an atmospheric physicist, in 1998. Both are also recipients of DRI's Alessandro Dandini Award for Science, presented annually to DRI's top scientist.
Johnson's research has resulted in nearly $27 million in grants and contracts and in the publication of 31 book chapters and at least 95 peer-reviewed publications and 34 conference proceedings. He also teaches in the Environmental and Resources Sciences program at the University of Nevada, Reno.
Barbara Zielinska 1999 DRI Woman of Achievement
Research Professor Barbara Zielinska has been named the Desert Research Institute's Woman of Achievement for 1999 based on her contributions in the fields of air pollution sampling and analysis, air toxics, and atmospheric chemistry. Dr. Zielinska was honored this spring by the Nevada Women's Fund and the University and Community College System of Nevada Board of Regents for her accomplishments.
Zielinska directs DRI's Organic Analytical Laboratory in the Energy and Environmental Engineering Center. She has received national and international recognition for her work in identifying the complex makeup of polluted atmospheres, particularly in the area of volatile toxic substances produced by the combustion of diesel, coal, and wood. She recently guided the development of advanced sampling techniques for capturing and preserving highly volatile chemical compounds that tend to change rapidly into new substances as they are emitted from smokestacks and chimneys.
A native of Poland, Zielinska received her Ph.D. from the Polish Academy of Sciences and has been on the research staff of DRI since 1989.
Toyota
Foundation Grant Expands Science Box
Program
The Toyota USA Foundation has awarded $60,000 to the Desert Research Institute to expand its "Science Box Traveling Kits Program" to include more Nevada science teachers and classrooms and to begin initiating similar science outreach programs in neighboring states. The Science Box program involves portable instruction modules designed by K-12 science teachers during summer workshops. The boxes-actually airline "roll-on" luggage-are circulated continuously to teachers throughout the state by DRI. Directed by Dr. Susan Moore, DRI's K-12 education coordinator, the program has grown since 1997 to include 75 separate instructional science boxes that are based on Nevada's Science Education Framework, the state's guidelines for required science instruction. The teachers selected to design the boxes meet during summer workshops using distance education technology that connects DRI's campuses in Las Vegas and Reno with remote sites in Elko and Winnemucca. The Toyota grant allows the addition of teachers from Arizona, California, Idaho, Oregon and Utah who will participate in this summer's workshop program and will return to their states to propose similar Science Box programs there.
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Jonathan O. Davis Scholarship and Stipend Awarded Sheryl Fontaine, a Ph.D. candidate in Geology and Neotectonics at the University of Nevada, Reno (UNR), has been awarded the 1999 Jonathan O. Davis Scholarship in Quaternary Sciences from DRI. Fontaine won the scholarship for her dissertation research "Quaternary Neotectonics of the Central Walker Lane Belt, Western Great Basin." In addition, UNR M.A. student Leah Bonstead received a stipend for her field research of an early Holocene site in the Harney Basin of east-central Oregon. The family, colleagues, and friends of Jonathan O. Davis, a prominent geologist and geoarchaeologist who died in 1990, established the endowment which provides a $2,000 annual national scholarship plus a stipend for a University of Nevada, Reno student. The national scholarship, administered by DRI's Quaternary Sciences Center, is open to graduate students enrolled in an M.S. or Ph.D. program at any U.S. university. Applicants must be pursuing research with a geologic component or that demonstrates a strong reliance on geological techniques. Applications must be received by March 1 of each year so that the scholarship can be used during the subsequent summer. For further information, contact Dr. Colleen Beck, Interim Executive Director, Quaternary Sciences Center at (702) 795-8077 or colleen@dri.edu.
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Rosemary Carroll Wins Maxey Award Rosemary Carroll, an M.S. student in the Hydrologic Sciences Graduate Program at the University of Nevada, Reno, has been selected to receive the 1999 George B. and Jane Maxey Award from DRI. Carroll was selected for the competitive award on the basis of her paper, "Simulation of Mercury Transport and Fate in the Carson River, Nevada." Maxey, a renowned hydrogeologist who established the first Ph.D. program in Nevada's higher education system, was an early and prominent director of DRI's Water Resources Center. He and his wife, Jane, also provided considerable extracurricular support and guidance for the hydrology and hydrogeology graduate students enrolled in the program. The Maxey Science Center at DRI in Reno is named in Maxey's memory. Sierra Pacific Renews Fellowship Funding The Desert Research Institute has received a $14,000 grant from Sierra Pacific Power Company to support the Sierra Pacific Fellowship Program for 1999. The fellowship supports a University of Nevada, Reno graduate student working in UNR's atmospheric science, environmental science and health, or hydrologic sciences program. The recipient works under the direction of a DRI scientist. The fellowship, now in its third year, is awarded by DRI in conjunction with UNR's Center for Environmental Sciences and Engineering. |
Graduate Students Receive Nevada Medal Research Fellowships
Four graduate students conducting research at DRI have been awarded Nevada Medal Fellowships for 1999. Nearly $20,000 in support was awarded for student research projects: Nicole Brown, "Modeling the Diffusion of Reactive and Nonreactive Solutes in Cores from the Cannikin Test Site, Amchitka Island, Alaska"; Arne LaVen, "Fuel Cell Powered Motor Scooter"; Jeremy Snyder, "Renewable Hydrogen Energy System"; and Rina Schumer, "Development of a Fractional Advection-Dispersion Equation Describing Reactive Transport."
The purposes of the Nevada Medal Fellowships are to: improve the research capabilities of graduate students working at DRI, enhance cooperative research work among DRI faculty and graduate students, recognize achievements of graduate students at DRI, and enhance the capabilities and prestige of DRI. The fellowships are funded through the proceeds of the Nevada Medal Dinner events.
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