UA SRP Trainee Attend Soil Society of America Meeting
Dec. 22, 2016
The Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) hosted its largest meeting of the year, the SSSA International Annual Meeting, at the Phoenix Convention Center in Phoenix, Arizona November 6-9, 2016. This meeting is held jointly with the American Society of Agronomy and Crop Science Society of America and the Entomological Society of America, and brought more than 7,600 scientists, professionals, educators, and students. The 2016 theme was “Resilience Emerging from Scarcity and Abundance.”
Four research faculty and nine trainees from the University of Arizona Superfund Research Program (UA SRP) attended the meeting. All UA SRP trainees presented posters highlighting their on-going investigations. The Contaminant Transport Group (Mark Brusseau) focused their posters on their uranium biosequestration work in Monument Valley, Arizona. The Integrated Environmental Science and Health Risk Laboratory (Mónica Ramírez-Andreotta) highlighted their research on plant-soil systems and environmental citizen science work with environmental justice communities. According to UA SRP Trainee Shana Sandhaus, “It was my first time at a conference, and my first research presentation, and I really enjoyed it. I was able to gain presentation experience and network with professionals in my field.” The Environmental Microbiology group (Raina Maier) discussed their research on microbial diversity in nutrient-poor soils and strategies employed by microbes to survive in resource-poor environments as well as the functional impacts of such microbes on ecosystem services.
Three panel sessions were also organized by present and past UA SRP researchers that included::
- “Microbial Diversity of Oligotrophic Environmental: Strategies, Processes, and Functions” (Moderator: Aditi Sengupta)
- “Impacts of Soil and Water Pollution on Food Safety” (Moderators: Mónica Ramirez-Andreotta, Hui Li, Qiaoyun Huang)
- “Physical, Chemical and Biological Processes Controlling Transport and Remediation of Emerging Contaminants in Soils” (Moderators: Audrey Matteson, Kenneth Carroll)
On the evening of November 8th, the UA SRP team had a dinner at the famous Pizzeria Bianco that is a favorite of the group. A good time was had by all.