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Geology major Melissa Larsen ’09 (Swarthmore, Pa.) is performing research on the preservation of wet meadow environments in the Great Basin region of Central Nevada. She is working with Dru Germanoski, VanArtsdalen Professor and head of geology and environmental geosciences.
The main objective of my EXCEL research is to assist a group of scientists, including Dr. Dru Germanoski, who are attempting to better understand the wet meadow environments in the Great Basin region of the United States. This is an ongoing interdisciplinary project, which is trying to preserve the meadows that are left in the system. We are attempting to find out what characteristics of the meadows cause their degradation.
The project combines ecologists, geomorphologists, and hydrologists in an attempt to stabilize the meadow complexes that are being incised by their streams. The wet meadows form in the middle of Nevada’s semi-arid environment because of the gentle slope of certain valley’s streams. Unfortunately, the streams are incising through the meadows, thus increasing the slope of the stream and destroying the meadow ecosystem. The goal of the research is to find out why the streams incise and what measures we can take to stabilize and maintain these rare systems.
In June of this past summer, I traveled with Dr. Germanoski to Austin, Nevada. While there, I helped the scientists on the team gather data about the stream, meadow, and surrounding topography. The data included stream cross-sections, sediment analysis, as well as the temperature, pH, and DO content of the water in the numerous meadows’ well fields.
I also mapped the characteristics of the meadows on a geographic information systems computer program to help characterize them. With better characterization of their size, slope, and stream morphology, we can gain an understanding of the causes of stream incision. Then, we can determine what stage of incision the meadows are experiencing. This knowledge allows us to predict whether other meadows are heading toward the same fate.
I stayed in a National Forest Service house in Austin along Highway 50, the “loneliest road” in the U.S.A. Austin, once a booming silver mining town with a population of 10,000, is now a semi ghost town with a population of around 300 people. Spending two weeks in this ghost town was a culture shock for me as well as a unique learning experience. The more time I spent in Austin, the more I began to appreciate the different shades of brown vegetation, small town dynamic, and the town’s history. I learned more than just how to study riparian systems, I also learned a lot about myself.
Larsen is a geology and math tutor and is a member of the Lafayette Arts Society. After graduation, she plans on attending graduate school for geology or geographic information systems.
Lafayette’s focus on close student-faculty interaction has made it a national leader in undergraduate research. Some of the College’s research programs include honors theses, independent study, and the distinctive EXCEL Scholars program. Many of the hundreds of students who participate in these programs each year publish their work in academic journals and present at regional and national conferences.