For the love of
Lester River
He grew up fishing "thanks." Ron Weber, former-Duluthian
and generous benefactor of the University of Minnesota Duluth, has donated
$100,000 to NRRI to restore and protect the expansive Lester River/Amity Creek
system.
NRRI's scientists
won't start and stop there, however. They've put together a proposal to use
this funding as seed money to develop an environmental initiative to raise
public awareness of everyone’s impact on local tributaries up and down the North
Shore.
But it will all
start with the Lester, a beloved trout stream that has been designated as
"impaired" by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency due to excessive suspended
sediments.
"Water is proving
to be the most important resource we have. The sooner we start maintaining its
quality, the better," said Weber. "This river is a tremendous resource for young
people to have access to a good, wholesome sport right here in town."
Duluth does a
pretty good job taking care of its 42 streams. Just the fact that 12 are
designated trout streams says a lot. Trout are sensitive fish that need cool,
clean water. Still, vigilance and education are important watershed
responsibilities to keep them clean.
NRRI is
particularly talented at building partnerships between agencies and community
organizations. NRRI will use this talent to the fullest for this project. The
hope is that a successful restoration of the Lester/Amity pilot project will
foster support for a comprehensive management plan that will secure the
integrity of many streams. The Lester/Amity system is a great starting point.
"The streams wind
through urban and rural settings and they get a lot of use. People care about
this," said NRRI aquatic ecologist Dan Breneman, who is coordinating this
project. "More importantly, we have great partnership potential in the Twin
Ports area, which gives us more possibilities for additional funding to continue
this effort on other streams."
One problem the
scientists will address in Lester and Amity is excess sediment. It enters the
stream by natural erosion, or runoff of road salt and sand during spring
snowmelt. The process often speeds up when natural vegetation along the banks
is removed or during road construction or development projects in the
watershed.
Sediment is hard
on the aquatic life in streams, especially trout. It degrades their spawning
habitat and is abrasive to their gills and fins. Excessive sediment also reduces
the habitat quality for aquatic insects, a major food source for stream fish.
"The most important thing we
can do today to keep the Lester River healthy is to spread the word on how
activities, even away from a stream, impact what goes on in the entire
watershed," Breneman said. "There are a lot of people who can make a
difference, even when it occurs along a small tributary. It's really up to
them."
Algae:
tiny research tools
They're just a
fraction of a millimeter long, slimy and sensitive, but what a story algae have
to tell.
Algae are one of
the indicators ecologists use to understand what's going on in the waters we
live near and play in. Algae are the organisms that make rocks and docks
slippery in the water. These microscopic species play an important role in the
global ecosystem, taking in carbon dioxide and producing oxygen. But even more,
their sensitive nature makes them respond quickly to any disturbances in water
quality, making them an excellent warning system for ecological problems.
Which is why Ely,
Minnesota, on the border of the lake-laden Boundary Waters Canoe Area, is NRRI's
center for algal research. Housed in Vermilion Community College, the
laboratory focuses on aquatic studies, including assessments of aquatic
ecosystem health and paleoecology (the study of sedimentary records).
Algae thrive in
all aquatic habitats, with each of the more than 20,000 species having an
affinity for different environmental conditions. And it's that affinity that
gives scientists clues about water conditions.
"Most algae live a
very short life, usually less than a week," explains Euan Reavie, lead scientist
at the Ely station. "If something happens in their environment, the pH balance
changes, or the nutrients increase, a new algal community that is tolerant of the
disturbance will quickly replace them."
"Although their
life is short, algae leave clues behind that scientists can read later, even
thousands of years later. Diatom algae have intricate "glass house" cell walls
made of biogenic silica, and each species' cell wall exhibits a unique
architecture. Long after the diatom algae die, those resilient
cell walls accumulate in the sediments preserving a sedimentary archive of past
ecological conditions.
"Following the
algal trail, Reavie and research fellow Amy Kireta can piece together the
history of a lake to prehistoric times, noting when changes occurred and the
likely causes of any disturbances. Reavie has used this method many times to
reveal human impacts in lakes, and define pre-impact conditions to help
determine appropriate rehabilitation measures. Sometimes, what is assumed to be
a human-related disturbance is simply a lake's natural condition.
"We can save folks
a lot of money and headache trying to fix something they believe is human impact
when that's not the problem at all," said Reavie.
"Often, however, the algae
tell them that detergents (especially phosphate-based soaps of the 1960s and
70s), acid rain, In such cases, changes need to be made.
Recent Projects
GREAT LAKES ENVIRONMENTAL INDICATORS
"The goal of this project is to develop a set of
tools for understanding the Great Lakes coastal water quality. Algae are one
such tool and were sampled at over 200 sites for the study. Algae allow
researchers to forecast the effects of trends like increased nutrient loads and
other impact on the watersheds.
ZIPPEL BAY
What’s going on in this busy waterway on the
south side of Lake of the Woods? The Ely research team is looking at causes for
sediment build-up and algal blooms. By studying the paleoecology of two streams
that feed into the bay, they are able to evaluate the effect of the resorts and
agriculture that hug its shores. A plan for rehabilitation will follow.
LAKE VERMILION
The Sportsmen Club of Lake Vermilion initiated a
study to see if the taconite tailings basins in Mountain Iron are having an
effect on the lake's water quality. Reavie found elevated levels of iron,
magnesium, lead and sodium, but thinks it's likely these increases are the
result of air pollution and local activities. Increases in sodium, from
non-detectable levels in sediments from before European settlement to 45 parts
per million (ppm) in the top layers of sediment is almost certainly from road
salt runoff.
The research also indicated
that the level of phosphorous, the number one contributor to algae growth in
Minnesota lakes, has nearly tripled since European settlement of the area. Tests
also indicated that mercury levels in the sediments are extremely low (only
about 0.1 ppm) far below some other known contaminated lakes in the region.
Emergency
housing launched
It took a lot of
careful thought, planning, and just plain sweat, but the first demonstration model
of NRRI's rapid response housing was unveiled this spring.
Representatives
from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, American Red Cross, Economic
Development Administration, and Department of Defense came to NRRI to see this
efficient and portable emergency housing concept.
The idea to
transform a shipping container into emergency relief housing isn't new, but
NRRI's system is unique. Other systems rely on a steel super-structure, which
is costly and specialized. NRRI's solution is wood-based, which could stimulate
the development of renewable natural resources industrial clusters in
Minnesota. The end result is more cost effective and immediate.
The NRRI
containerized house is a self-contained 8-by-20 foot unit that partially
disassembles and reassembles into a 20-by-24 foot, two-bedroom home. The house
can be assembled on site in about four hours. All construction materials for
the home (including electrical and plumbing systems) are built to HUD-code
standards and are embedded in the container unit.
NRRI's rapid response
housing system can be deployed for refugee housing, military shelter, homeless
mitigation, and disaster relief.
Archiving
metadata
"Too much
information!" has become a modern catch phrase. We all live with information
overload. But data is especially valuable information: a collection of facts
from which conclusions can be drawn. And scientists can't get enough of it.
The problem with
data is that it's often just numbers. Metadata holds the details about the
numbers: what they mean, why they're important, how they were gathered and the
goal for gathering them. This detailed information is crucial to other
researchers who want to use the data for further study.
Another problem is
that once it's used for its specific purpose, scientific data is often
improperly archived, making it inaccessible for future researchers. Valuable
sets of facts are easily lost if the original creator of the dataset retires or
dies, or new computing platforms move in, or it decays from improper storage.
"A straightforward
discovery and retrieval system for datasets will greatly expand the availability
of research results to the public and other researchers," said NRRI Aquatic
Ecologist Valerie Brady, who is coordinating this project. "That means more
usage of, and benefits from, the work that went into gathering it."
NRRI will build an
archiving system that will be tested on the Environmental Protection Agency's
expansive STAR Estuarine and Great Lakes Coastal Initiative that reaches from
coast to coast. The project is generating impressive amounts of datasets that
need safekeeping.
The EPA's
Environmental Information Management System is being designed to be as simple as
possible for both data submitters and data retrievers. Most importantly, the
data will be stored in a way that will be stable across computing platforms for
at least 20 years.
Researchers
archiving their data will have to submit metadata with it, but the extra effort
will be well worth it. One readily apparent benefit is having a safe, offsite
backup of all their data in case of a computer crash. The system will link the
power of the Internet with the power of really big databases. How big? Approximately one terabyte
(1,000 gigabytes) of data. And all of that
information will be made available through the system Web portal to researchers
and the general public after it has been published in peer-reviewed journals.
Brady is also coordinator
for the EPA's Estuarine and Great Lakes Coastal Initiative, the "guinea pigs"
for this metadata and archiving system. NRRI database manager, Terry Brown, is
redesigning metadata creation software for this project.
Life on the
rocks
The craggy,
crashing North Shore of Lake Superior is beautiful to look at, but difficult to
study. The rocky surface that makes up more than 50 percent of the lake's
near-shore area renders typical sampling methods for bottom-dwelling critters, a
special scoop called a ponar, impossible to use. And divers sent underwater to
collect samples are very expensive.
NRRI received an
$80,000 grant from Minnesota Sea Grant (along with funding for a graduate
student) to develop a more cost-effective method for monitoring the
macroinvertebrate communities living on those rocky surfaces. They'll test the
effectiveness of putting artificial substrates, woven bags full of rocks that
will mimic the rocky habitat, into the water at various sampling points at 15 to
30 foot depths. They're hoping the "cobble bags" will attract enough species to
provide a reasonable sample of what is making its home along the shores.
The cobble bag system will
be refined to assess the aquatic invertebrate community responses to shoreland
development at up to seven sites along the coast.
The future
of Minnesota ore
More people mean more buildings. More buildings
mean more steel. More steel means more markets for iron ore. China's recently
purchased interest in, and start up of, the United Taconite plant is certainly a
boon to the Iron Range economy. But what does the future hold for Minnesota ore
in the world economy?
It depends how we play the global market. The
Mesabi Range is no longer the only source for iron ore in the United States, and
certainly not for countries half-way around the world. Still, steel consumption
continues to grow. The question is, who is best suited to supply the ore to
feed the hungry steel mills?
"The fact is, there’s no shortage of global
resources for iron ore," says NRRI center director Donald Fosnacht. "But not
everyone can mine it effectively. Whether or not a deposit can be developed
into a commercially viable mine depends on a number of economic and
geo-political factors."
The competition is tough. Minnesota's taconite
pellet quality is excellent with high iron values and low phosphorus content,
even though our mill grades are generally much lower than competitive mines on a
world-wide basis. The big players in the merchant iron ore trade are Brazil
and Australia, accounting for over 67 percent of the total world commerce in
ore. Their iron ore resources are enormous and the quality of the ore is
excellent.
Understanding that Minnesota is a small player
in the world ore marketplace brings the challenges into focus, our cost to
produce pellets is higher because of the low-grade ore and extra costs
associated with crushing and separating our ore to make the final products used
by the steel mills. To stay in the game, Minnesota's taconite operations need
to be as efficient as possible, find uses for the by-products that we routinely
generate and add value to the products we do produce.
NRRI's expertise is critical to maximize the
utility of Minnesota ore. NRRI has been instrumental in helping the mines
produce very high quality iron ore for blast furnaces. Now, NRRI is developing
new technology that will allow the mines to serve the electric arc furnace
sector with oxygen- and gangue-free iron metal. NRRI has also been busy finding
markets for the rock by-products of the taconite industry. Our research shows
that various rock by-products can be used for high quality aggregate, road
patching compounds and new building materials (for example, inorganically bonded
wood fiber panels).
Ongoing modernization of Iron Range taconite
plants will enhance the recovery of the value of iron oxide components and help
keep costs down. NRRI research has shown that the typical taconite processing
flowsheet can be improved with new minerals separation and crushing techniques.
Some of these concepts are being used now in Minnesota plants. The other
players in world iron ore trade continue to install new plants for ore
processing and also have greatly enhanced the logistical capabilities of moving
their products to market. In the near future, both Australia and Brazil will be
routinely shipping over 250 million tonnes each (one tonne equals 1,000
kilograms) of ore to world markets. China is importing significant quantities
of Australian and Brazilian ore for their burgeoning steel market. Expanded
highways, airport construction, manufacturing plans and city modernization are
driving China's demand, which is good for all. If the Chinese consumption were
to ease, the world market could be flooded with iron ore from these sources to
the detriment of Minnesota's iron ore industry.
"If Minnesota is going to
continue to be an active iron mining area, we must continue to enhance our
current capabilities and get the most out of the rock we mine," says Fosnacht.
"Alternative uses must be part of our future economic equation, as well as
value-added iron. These things will continue the economic success that has come
back to Northeast Minnesota during the current steel industry boom."
NRRI hits the court
They may be too
short to make a dunk shot and too slow to take on Kevin Garnett, but NRRI's
forest products researchers were still able to play a highly visible (but, let's
say "supporting") role in this year's men’s NCAA basketball tournament, and the
women’s tournament, even the NBA All-Star game. In fact, working with the
researchers at the USDA Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, Wisc., they've
had a major "impact" at just about all the big basketball venues.
Though it doesn’t
get as much attention as the breathtaking athleticism on court, the wooden floor
underneath the action is an important part of the game. To say it must be
durable is an understatement.
The floor must
withstand endless pounding (imagine having Shaquille O'Neal jump up and down in
your living room 50 times a day for a few years), and it must be versatile with
a surface that's quick to set up and take apart; it's not unusual to have a
hockey game, a rock concert, and a basketball game at the same venue in the same
week.
One of the oldest
and most successful wood floor manufacturing companies is the Horner Flooring
Company of Dollar Bay, Michigan. Horner has been around since 1891, the same
year James Naismith invented basketball. The company specializes in making
high-end portable hardwood flooring surfaces for many NBA and NCAA venues. Since
1983, every NBA All-Star Game and NCAA Final Four has been played on a Horner
floor.
As with the rest
of the wood products industry, Horner Flooring feels the economic pressure of
the global market. The company employs more than 100 people at its headquarters
in Northern Michigan and is an important outlet for the hardwoods from
Michigan's Upper Peninsula. However, many small companies often lack the
resources to implement the technological and manufacturing advances of their
larger competitors. So, like life on the competitive basketball court, it's the
teamwork that counts. In this arena, NRRI Forest Products Program Director
Brian Brashaw is the head coach. Facing especially tough overseas competition,
NRRI is boosting the wood industry's regional defense by creating a team of
experts, like the talent at the USDA Forest Service, who can help companies like
Horner improve their bottom line to stay in the game.
NRRI's game plan
is to work from the inside. Brashaw says his team is unlike typical consultants
who inspect a business from the outside and offer recommendations without really
engaging the company.
"We truly work
hand-in-hand with them," he says. "We start with folks in the company doing
ground level work, who have ideas about how to improve the process, but don't
necessarily have ways to get them to upper-level management where the change can
occur. We also support their ideas with needed technical and engineering
expertise.”
So while NRRI
focuses on improving the manufacturing process, the USDA Forest Products Lab
works to improve the product. Together, the dream team helps Horner at the
tip-off.
"We were able to
come up with an improved flooring system that was easier to manufacture,"
explains Bob Ross, a researcher at the USDA Forest Products Lab. "We improved
the connectors that hold the floor together. We looked at the base and
structure, which is usually plywood or oriented-strand board, products that got
their genesis at our Forest Products Lab. We also looked at finishing and drying
schedules as well as moisture absorption and vibration characteristics."
Ross also says
that getting to work on a project like this was a thrill he won't soon forget.
"You watch some of these
games being played, and you think, wow, I had a hand in that," he quips. "It's a
good feeling. And I also realize this was probably the only way a middle-aged
guy like me was ever going to get on the same basketball floor as Shaq."
NATIONAL
NEWS
NRRI's connection with Horner Flooring made the front page of The Wall Street
Journal on April 1, just in time for the NCAA Final Four basketball games. The
story was picked up across the country, from Florida to Alaska. Reporter Kris
Maher started the story with this lead:
DULUTH, Minn. In a tan,
cube-shaped building here, where Strategic Air Command personnel once guarded
against missles from Russia, a team of researchers labored on a new secret
project. Their mission: build a better basketball floor
The wood products
industry is one of the primary economic drivers for the Western Great Lakes
region of Minnesota, Michigan, and Wisconsin, employing more than 300,000
people.
If you have a forestry-based
business and are looking for advice, visit NRRI's Web site at: www.nrri.umn.edu or
call 218-720-4294.
International relations have never been better.
NRRI was at the heart of
this year's Indo-U.S. Workshop on Mathematical Chemistry held at the University
of Pune in Maharastra, India, in January.
All corners of
India and the United States were represented, as well as Canada, Slovenia,
Turkey, Colombia, Japan, Taiwan, Russia, France, Germany, Australia and Poland.
Their goal was to share knowledge, not a small undertaking for this gathering of
the brightest minds in mathematical chemistry.
NRRI's Subhash
Basak and Calcutta University's Dilip Sinha, co-chaired this fourth workshop
which brought the world together to understand the intricacies and possibilities
that lie in computer-based chemistry and biology. Back in 1988, Basak and his
colleagues at NRRI developed one of the key computer programs to predict
chemical properties(see NRRI Then).
Here's how it
works: computational chemistry takes the search for information out of the
laboratory where chemicals are tested on animals (in vivo) or in test tubes (in
vitro) to computer models where structures and their derivatives are more
quickly deciphered in silico (literally, in silicon, in the computer). This
powerful computer tool is being used to understand the toxicity of chemical
mixtures at Superfund sites or in fuels, for drug discovery, to understand gene
sequences or to find more effective chemical compounds.
"In silico is
really a decision-support system," explained Basak. "Using the computer, we
decrease the cost by decreasing the size of the problem, sifting through
millions of possible chemical structures to find the best ones for what we
need."
>What's
particularly exciting for the workshop participants are the seemingly limitless
applications for this software, which leads to sharing between disciplines.
Mathematical chemistry and theory is a general framework that can be applied to
many sciences that deal with an overload of data. The unraveling of the human
genome revolutionized genetics research, even beyond the study of DNA sequences.
Proteomics (the study of proteins encoded by a genome) and metabolomics (the
analysis of small molecules generated inside the body during metabolism) are
producing scads of new data every day.
These branches of
research broaden our understanding of human biology, environmental protection
and the search new drugs, but the large numbers of chemicals are becoming
unmanageable. So while the computer sorts and manages information about
hundreds of thousands of chemical and gene structures, it's the mathematicians
who make sense of it all.
"NRRI has become the hub for
the international connection of scientists in this field," said Basak, president
of the International Society of Mathematical Chemistry, which sponsored the workshop.
"We bring all the best people in the world together to collaborate.
That gives us knowledge leverage, and everyone benefits."
Mathematical chemistry at work
For many people, the white
lab coat world of mathematical chemistry seems far removed from everyday life.
It is, however, a helpful tool for solving many everyday concerns: environmental
protection, affordable health care, even a new mosquito repellent. Want lower
priced prescription drugs? Developing new drugs, from the chemist's first
discovery to a pill on the pharmacist's shelf, takes about 10 years and
approximately $1 billion. Using mathematical chemistry software, however,
computers can simplify the search for new and more effective drugs,
significantly lowering the cost.
In 1988, Subhash
Basak was a young research associate who led the development of a computer
program that predicts chemical properties. The program was named POLLY and
written in Pascal to calculate 90-plus factors that compare and order molecules
in a database. Upjohn pharmaceutical company was one of the first to use the
new program.
>The Spring, 1988
edition of NRRI Now, reported that each year pharmaceutical and chemical
companies develop many new chemicals for use in medicine, industry and society,
in general. However, the cost of developing these new agents is increasing
because of an increase in toxicity testing requirements. According to a recent
American Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association report, the average cost of
developing a new drug is $125 million in 1986, compared to $54 million in 1976.
Since then, the
cost to develop new drugs has grown exponentially. Basak's research in
computational chemistry has expanded since then as well.
Back in '88, Basak called
POLLY "the Model T" version. "This is a continuous program and we will be
developing new software with more models and increased accuracy," he said then.
Still on
the lynx trail
Just three years
ago, it wasn't clear if Minnesota had a breeding population of Canada lynx, or
if lynx were simply visiting from Ontario. NRRI's study, using the newest technologies, is starting
to turn up interesting
answers.
"This spring and
last, we found lynx dens with kittens in Minnesota," says NRRI biologist Ron
Moen, who is leading the Canada lynx research project. "And at least one kitten
from all three of last year's litters is still alive. Whether or not they'll
continue to live and breed here will take more time to answer."
This spring 13
lynx kittens were found in four separate dens in northeast Minnesota. Like the
kittens found last spring, they were ear-tagged so they can be kept track of
from year to year. Last year's kittens will be of breeding age next year. If
they do, this is the next step to documenting the continued existence of the
lynx population in Minnesota.
Meanwhile, the
scientists are learning more than ever about these fascinating felines, thanks
in part to public sightings reported to NRRI or the Department of Natural
Resources. Rich Baker, DNR non-game research coordinator, says these sightings
help the scientists know how far the cats are wandering.
"Five years ago we
would have said there are very few lynx in Minnesota," Baker said. "But today
our Web site map shows 291 sightings. We appreciate all the information about
lynx we can get."
Much of what
biologists have learned since then has been gathered through the efforts of
scientists at NRRI and the U.S. Forest Service in a radiotelemetry project which
began soon after the Canada lynx was listed as a threatened species under the
Endangered Species Act. Resource managers needed to know how many lynx there
were, where they lived and hunted, and what they ate.
Since the project
began in 2003, 32 adult lynx and 21 kittens have been handled, providing
interesting data about their life, and death, in Minnesota's woods. Last winter 25
lynx with radio collars were monitored. Most of the males visit Ontario for a
few days or for several months each year. Adult females, with or without
kittens, tend to stay within a 20 square mile area. Seven monitored lynx died
over the past two years, six deaths were probably related to humans and one by a
hungry fisher.
"We have almost
10,000 locations from the GPS collars that some of the lynx in this project are
wearing," says Chris Burdett, a graduate student working on the project. "I
will be using the GPS locations from collared animals to develop a habitat use
model for lynx in Minnesota."
In Minnesota, as
elsewhere, lynx prefer living in young forests with a conifer understory that
attracts their favorite food, the snowshoe hare. Lynx have also been seen
feeding on road-killed deer. Lynx can be active any time, but they are most
active in the early morning and late afternoon according to data from the GPS
collars worn by lynx in this project.
Pictures and more
information on the Canada lynx research project can be found at www.nrri.umn.edu/lynx.
If you see a lynx, this web site also tells you how to report the sighting.
"Minnesota once had the
largest lynx population in the Midwest," said Moen. "Ultimately, people will
decide whether lynx continue to survive here. How we manage our forests, our
daily activities, even climate change, will all affect Minnesota's lynx
population."
NRRI
partners appreciate 20 years of results
"NRRI’s scientists
can take complicated science, and make it user friendly. The data is local,
cutting-edge information. NRRI has helped us by taking bird monitoring data and
constructing a journal on bird populations. They helped us build maps from their
data in a way that children can understand. Congratulations NRRI, and thanks
for working with us."
Peter Harris, Science Coordinator
Wolf Ridge Environmental
Learning Center
"NRRI has been a tremendous resource to
Northern Contours and played a significant role in our success. From product
testing and evaluation to Research and Development and lean manufacturing assistance, the
professionals at NRRI have kept in step with our needs and a step ahead of
the industry. We're very pleased with the results we have achieved through our
association with the NRRI."
Lary Skow,
National Sales Manager
Northern Contours
"The NRRI and their Coleraine Laboratory
have been especially beneficial in helping our taconite mines remain competitive
during some very difficult years. Their achievements include research, testing
and implementation of better process flow sheets, help in handling lower grade
ores in the plants, material handling solutions, environmental improvements and
help in day-to-day operating problems, to mention a few.
Jim Swearingen, Retired General Manager
U.S. SteelMinntac Operations
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