the wyoming center for environmental hydrology …€¦ · the wyoming center for environmental...

The Wyoming Center for Environmental Hydrology and Geophysics

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A center of excellence in environmental hydrology and geophysics that serves water science and watershed management in Wyoming by providing cutting-edge tools to managers, scientists and educators in the public and private sectors.

Directors’ Update As you might guess from the delay in getting this issue of The Keg to press, it’s been a hectic spring and early summer for WyCEHG. We have wrapped up a very eventful first year for the center (the NSF-EPSCoR Track-1 grant officially entered its second year on July 1). Taking stock of Year One, we have had quite a few successes: we’ve made a number of excellent new hires, begun building two instrument facilities for hydrology and near-surface geophysics, conducted our first field course in ecohydrogeophysics, recruited new graduate students and postdocs, held a productive strategic planning meeting, placed our first industry intern, begun field work in our first two target watersheds, kicked off our community college partnerships… the list goes on and on.

A major focus of our efforts this spring was to prepare the Year One annual report for NSF. This was a substantial document tracking progress toward our strategic goals over the past twelve months, and we are very pleased to report that NSF accepted our report without revision. The reporting and documentation requirements for a grant of this magnitude are quite formidable, and the Wyoming EPSCoR office did a great job of pulling all the diverse reporting elements together.

We’ll highlight several recent activities in this issue of The Keg, including a profile of our new hydrogeophysics faculty member, a summary of our joint field course with Jackson State University, a Science Corner on some exciting new interdisciplinary work, and much more. As always, feel free to contact either of us if you have questions, comments, or project ideas. Enjoy!

-Steve Holbrook and Scott Miller, Co-Directors

Science Corner: Tree Geophysics………... p. 2

Community College Training Program……. p. 2

JSU-UW Field Course……………………. p. 3-4

New Arrivals……………………………….p. 4

Dawn Allenbach Visit…………………….... p. 5

Aarhus University Visit……………………. p. 5

CUAHSI Cyberseminar……………..p. 5

From the EPSCoR Office……………p. 6

Upcoming Events and Deadlines…... p. 7

The Keg: WyCEHG NewsletterVol. 1, No. 3, July 2013

In This Issue


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Geophysical Imaging of Trees The image at right shows an electrical resistivity tomography experiment around a tree trunk at Chimney park (WY). The results show high resistivity anomalies in the inner part of the tree, indicating the heartwood, and much lower resistivity values towards the outside, indicating the water-filled sapwood area. In addition, the models show high resistive anomalies on the bottom right edge, indicating a possible fungus infection. Such non-invasive measurements have the potential to accurately image the sapwood area, track the movement of water inside trees, and determine the health state of trees. WyCHEG hydrogeophysics team members are working with faculty team member Brent Ewers and postdoc researcher Scott Peckham (Botany department) to quantify tree water use and to better understand the biogeophysical processes following bark beetle disturbances using geophysics and other direct plant physiology measurements. We are fortunate that our field site has a number of eddy covariance towers to measure total evapotranspiration, and many trees are installed with sap-flow sensors. That will complement the geophysics measurements and help us to validate some of our data processing strategies. Our next steps are to collect time-lapse geophysical measurements (e.g., Ground Penetrating Radar, Frequency-domain EM, and resistivity) around tree trunks as well as on the ground. In addition, we plan to collect tree core samples in order to establish a petrophysical relationship between resistivity and water content. The outcome of such interdisciplinary research will be important components in ecosystem and groundwater models. We hope, in the future, to extend our measurements to watershed and regional scales.

-Mehrez Elwaseif, Dept. of Geology and Geophysics

The Keg July 2013

Resistivity tomography results at Chimney Park. (Right) The experimental configuration, with electrodes installed around the tree

trunk at two different levels. (Left) Tomography results, showing cross-sectional resistivity. Warm colors are electrically resistive (less moisture) and cool colors are conductive (greater moisture content).

Science Corner

Community College Training Session In May, FINSE Manager Brad Carr conducted a two-day training session for professors and students from Casper College (Prof. Kent Sundell) and Central Wyoming College (Prof. Suki Smaglik). Colleagues from CC and CWC, as well as Western Wyoming College, will use FINSE geophysical equipment this summer and next in student-led research projects funded through our EPSCoR grant. The training was intensive but successful: in two days, everyone learned the basics of ground-penetrating radar, seismic refraction, electrical resistivity, and soil conductivity measurements. We are looking foward to a successful collaboration with our sister colleges throughout Wyoming! (Strange but true: not two weeks after the photo at right was taken, Kent’s daughter Emily learned the same equipment in the UW Geology field camp!)

Prof. Kent Sundell of Casper College learns the intricacies of deploying electrodes and resistivity cables.


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JSU-UW Field Course For two weeks in June, WyCEHG faculty (Carr, Ewers, Holbrook, Miller, and Williams) taught a field course in “ecohydrogeophysics” to 15 students -- 7 from Jackson State University and 8 from UW. The course was a terrific start to a growing partnership between UW and JSU. This ambitious course blended elements of ecology, hydrology, and geophysics into a interdisciplinary course in field and laboratory methods in watershed hydrology.

During the geophysics portion of the course, students collected and interpreted seismic refraction, electrical resistivity, and ground penetrating radar data in two watersheds, one near Blair-Wallis in the Laramie Range,

and one near Little Brooklyn Lake in the Snowies. Students learned to run the equipment, download data, and conduct data analysis. An example of a resistivity inversion result, conducted by JSU students, is shown above.

The hydrology section of the course introduced students to field sciences including the use of observation and technology (flow velocity, water quality, isotopes, installation of stilling wells) to better understand the fate and transport of water. Students worked in both the Laramie and Snowy Ranges and were often

co-located with the geophysics sites in order to link the sciences, and investigated the roles of beavers in altering flow quality, quantity and timing and quantified velocity and discharge changes in mountain rivers.

The final section of the course introduced students to the role of vegetation in hydrology. The students explored two components of ecohydrology, the control of vegetation over water loss to the atmosphere and the source of water for vegetation use. Students collected soil, stem, leaf and snow samples along a short transect from forest to wet meadow around the GLEES Ameriflux tower near Brooklyn Lake in the Snowy Range, performed

water extraction at the UW Stable Isotope Facility, and analyzed isotope ratios of oxygen and hydrogen. The students also spun stem samples in a centrifuge at the UW Plant Physiological Ecology Laboratory to determine how easily the water columns break. Students discovered that the small spruce saplings

and willow plants growing at the edge of the wet meadow appeared to be using different water sources: the spruce were taking up water from unsaturated soil layers, whereas the willow seemed perfectly happy using water from the heavy wet muck in the drainage of the meadow. The students discovered from the gas exchange data that > 70% of the water vapor going into the atmosphere came from the trees but that contribution has declined 30% since the trees have been dying from bark beetles. Overall, quite a set of accomplishments for two and a half days of ecohydrology exploration.

The Keg July 2013

Resistivity structure of the subsurface beneath the Blair-Wallis drainage, near Vedauwoo, WY. This result was produced by JSU students on the same day they acquired the data. The image extends 60 m into the subsurface; the blue layer at top represents sediments in the drainage; yellows and reds represent the underlying granitic bedrock. Note the pale blue (conductive) zone in the center, which likely represents a fractured aquifer within the granite bedrock.

JSU students Laura Matthews and Lizzie Starks measure a

stream cross-section.

UW student Callie Berman in the Stable Isotope Facility.


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New ArrivalsAndy Parsekian, Asst. Professor We are pleased to announce that Dr. Andy Parsekian, currently of Stanford University, will be joining WyCEHG in a few months, as a new faculty member. Andy is a hydrogeophysicist (which, truly, is an important expertise for a new center that combines hydrology and geophysics), who did his PhD in 2011 at Rutgers University, where he used ground-penetrating radar and remote sensing data to study the structure and

decomposition of peatlands. For the past two years, he’s been a postdoc at Stanford, working with field-scale NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) and electrical resistivity -- both key technologies for WyCEHG. Andy says, “I'm excited to be joining the WyCEHG team at UW in just a few short months! I

look forward to developing new collaborations and friendships with the many talented scientists and students who are involved with WyCEHG. There's a lot of great creative energy in the field of hydrogeophysics right now and I see a bright future to bring enthusiasm for this field

to a new location and a new set of innovative science questions.”

Heather Speckman, PhD Student Heather Speckman is a new PhD student in WyCEHG who started on June 3rd. Heather grew up in Denver, CO, and obtained both her BS in Natural Resource Management and MS in Ecology from Colorado State University. Heather is particularly interested in how forests process mass and energy. Her MS work used a combination of gas exchange instruments and statistical techniques to investigate how carbon budgets change in forests experiencing bark beetle disturbance. Heather will build on that expertise by investigating how plant hydraulics control water processing in forests with

different substrates and experiencing disturbance. Heather is being advised by WyCEHG member Brent Ewers but is also excited to learn from the other faculty, post-docs and students on the project. Welcome to Laramie and WyCEHG, Heather!

The Keg July 2013

Andy Parsekian during field work near Fairbanks, Alaska. (Photo:

Heather Speckman doing field work near Laramie.

Sample Student Comments: JSU-UW“The pace of the course was excellent. The content was just right for my background. A lot of the things we were taught were new to me, but were taught and explained in a way that made them understandable.”

“The instructors that I interacted with here were by far the coolest teachers I’ve ever had. By the end of the course they became more of a friend than the teacher, and that really helped out.”

“The field instruction was excellent. Everything was very clearly explained and demonstrated. Learning to use the equipment on campus before going out in the field worked really well. It was also very helpful that some of the other

students in the class already had experience with some of the methods we used to offer additional guidance.”

“Personally, I benefited enormously from being exposed to research techniques and procedures. For me, it allowed me to see why we needed to tackle these complex research questions through these three fields (geophysics, hydrology, eco-hydrology).”

“This sharing of the responsibilities among students working in teams and the expectations of the instructors and students take initiative in collecting worked very well.”

“There was a great collaborative environment.”

“It was a really good experience and I would for sure come back to do another partnership like this one.”


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HappeningsDawn Allenbach Visit This spring, WyCEHG hosted a visit from Dawn Allenbach, a PhD candidate from the University of New Orleans (UNO). Dawn was the first speaker in a series on scientists with disabilities that WyCEHG will host to help increase awareness about disabilities in STEM fields. Dawn presented a talk entitled, “Diary of a Gimpy Kid,” which chronicled her pursuit of a PhD in biology despite daunting physical challenges.

Dawn was born with Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA). SMA is a genetic disorder that causes skeletal muscle strength to diminish over time, necessitating the use of a wheelchair. Over the course of her visit, Dawn talked about her research, her experience as a wheelchair-bound woman in science, and how to make science more accessible to people with disabilities.

Most striking about Dawn in her academic pursuits was her ability to brush aside the doubts of others. As she explained to her UW audience, during the entrance interview at UNO, her future advisor asked, “How can you do research when you can’t do the most basic of physical actions?”

Dawn replied with characteristic well-grounded logic and slight sarcasm. “Have

you ever heard of something called a lab assistant?”

This summer, Dawn will defend her thesis, Effects of Climate Change and Land Use-Related Stressors on Medaka, and earn her doctorate in conservation biology after many long years of research. After finishing her degree, Dawn hopes to eventually work at a university closer to her Kansas home.

For more about Dawn and her experience, please visit: http://wyomingepscor.blogspot.com/2013/05/diary-of-gimpy-kid-story-of-dawn.html

-Kali McCrackin, Wyo-EPSCoR Communications Coordinator

Aarhus University Visit In April Steve Holbrook and Brad Carr visited Aarhus University, Denmark, to kick off our collaboration. Scientists from Aarhus will come to Wyoming in September with “SkyTEM”, their helicopter-borne geophysical instrument, to characterize the subsurface structure of the Laramie and Snowy Ranges. The airborne data will identify targets that will enable us to better focus our ground-based geophysical measurements. We look forward to further visits as we continue to develop our partnership with Aarhus.

CUAHSI Cyberseminar Scott Miller and Steve Holbrook, WyCEHG Co-Directors, gave an invited presentation in April in the CUAHSI Cyberseminar series, entitled “WyCEHG: Linking surface hydrology and groundwater through near-surface geophysics.” (CUAHSI is the Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc., an NSF-supported, non-profit organization of universities that foster research in water science. Scott and Steve presented an overview of WyCEHG’s mission, as well as preliminary hydrologic and geophysical data acquired under the center’s auspices. The presentation drew over 40 participants from around the world (which, we’re told, is a good turnout). The cyberseminar was recorded and can be viewed here:

http://www.cuahsi.org/SeminarDetails.aspx?id=58

The Keg July 2013

Dawn Allenbach

Aarhus University colleagues demonstrate the “WalkTEM” instrument on their campus

http://wyomingepscor.blogspot.com/2013/05/diary-of-gimpy-kid-story-of-dawn.html







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From the EPSCoR Office The EPSCoR office has been busy transitioning from our first to second year of the Track-1 award. The annual report, submitted to NSF on April 19, brought to our attention the remarkable progress establishing WyCEHG. I thank everyone, including office staff, WyCEHG researchers and all our diverse partners, for your contributions and commitment to excellence during our first successful year. I particularly acknowledge the folks in the Wyoming EPSCoR office who contributed so significantly to keeping the gears well oiled this year. Here is just a sampling of our new programs and the great work of EPSCoR staff:

Our diversity programs are flourishing: A visit from Jackson State University faculty in the spring reinforced our growing partnership. A disability awareness program was successfully designed and directed by Sarah Konrad, Associate Project Director. Please see the associated KEG article about Dawn Allenbach’s visit to UW. Sarah is also launching the Wyoming Women in Science program this fall, so stay tuned to hear more about this opportunity for travel and seminar speaker support for female scientists.

Our social media presence is alive and well under Kali McCrackin’s oversight. Kali is also training Robin Rasmussen, our new EPSCoR intern from the Dept. of Communications and Journalism. When Kali departs for a teaching assignment in Korea this fall, Robin will continue Kali’s expert blogging and will help with our Communicating about Water (CAW) program.

Our educational programs are growing: Beth Cable and Track-2 collaborators from Utah developed effective water-oriented toolkits that are now being used by our subawardee, the Teton Science School, for teacher training in WyCEHG-related science. The SRAP high school research program, directed by Lisa Abeyta, grew in size and was again outstanding this summer. Rick Matlock once again juggled his many duties as Project

Administrator to direct Undergraduate Research Day in April and our summer Undergraduate Research Symposium, both keystone events for our research fellowship program.

We are also pleased to have a fully staffed office now with two final outstanding hires: Ted Haskell was promoted to EPSCoR accountant and Liz Nysson was hired as our Track-1 EOD Coordinator. Liz received her BA from UW, majoring in Humanities/Fine Arts with a minor in ENR, and then received an MS from the University of Michigan. Liz brings great ideas, energy, and organizational skill to EPSCoR. She will work directly with ENR to develop partnerships with the Wind River Reservation, will direct the communications program (CAW), will help advance the Jackson State University partnership, and will activate Community College Fellowship and Transition Programs. Please keep an eye on our website for new information as Liz makes her mark on WyEPSCoR.

As always, please visit us in the EPSCoR offices anytime (4th floor of Wyo Hall) or come to see me in the Molecular Biology Department, room 224.

-Anne Sylvester, Wyoming EPSCoR Program Director

The Keg July 2013

Wyoming Center for Environmental Hydrology and GeophysicsWyoming EPSCoR Office422 Wyoming HallUniversity of Wyoming1000 E. University Ave., Dept. 3622Laramie, WY 82071-2000

The Keg July 2013

[email protected]@uwyo.edu

July22-26: Wyoming Water in the Classroom,

Teton Science School August

5: WyCEHG External Advisory Committee meeting (webinar)

9: Deadline for pre-proposals for the Track-2 competition

13-15: Front Range High Performance Computing Symposium

29: Wyoming EPSCoR Office RetreatSeptember

3-6: AAAS Review Panel in Wyoming9-13: Airborne geophysical surveys, Laramie

& Snowy Ranges

12-13: “Becoming the Messenger”- an NSF sponsored workshop hosted by WyEPSCoR and held in the Wildcatter Suites, UW campus

26: Track-1 Reverse Site Visit, NSF, Arlington, VA

October14: Kamini Singha (Colo. School of Mines)

speaks24-26: CZO Sampling, Drilling, and Imaging

Workshop, Denver November

3-7: National EPSCoR Conference, NashvilleDecember

9-13: AGU Conference, San Francisco (WyCEHG Booth)

Upcoming Events and Deadlines

Geology undergraduates acquire electrical resistivity

data using WyCEHG equipment during Geology Summer Field Camp, June

2013, Laramie Range.

mailto:[email protected]




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