Latest news with #NAU
Time of India
7 days ago
- General
- Time of India
NAU PhD scholar selected as scientist at Isro
Surat: A forestry doctoral candidate at Navsari Agricultural University (NAU), Preeti Vats, has secured a position as a scientist at the Indian Space Research Organisation ( ISRO ) . She is set to commence her role at the Space Application Centre (SAC) in Ahmedabad in the coming week, where she will focus on India's forest management initiatives. Originally from a farming background in Tumbaheri village in Haryana's Jhajjar district, Vats earned her bachelor's degree from NAU's forestry college and completed her master's at Kerala Agricultural University (KAU). Currently, she is working towards her PhD in forest products and utilisation at NAU, supervised by Prof. SK Sinha. "After completing my post-graduate studies, I thought of going into state or national forest services by appearing in competitive jobs. I never thought of serving India's prestigious organisation ISRO. However, with the guidance of my mentors at NAU, I came to know that ISRO is looking for specialists in the forestry and ecology," she said. Preeti appeared for a written exam in December last year. "I will be joining SAC, Ahmedabad, where I am supposed to work on forest stand structure and forest stand dynamics using remote sensing and GIS technology," she added. Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Over 40 and Struggling With Belly Fat? Try 1 Teaspoon Daily (See Results Fast!) getfittoday Undo NAU vice-chancellor Dr ZP Patel praised her selection, saying it demonstrates the growing importance of forestry across disciplines and expanded career opportunities for forestry graduates, particularly in space research, remote sensing, GIS, climate modelling, and natural resource monitoring. Preeti received the VC's Gold Medal in 2021 from NAU, Navsari, during her undergraduate studies. Preeti stated: "I would like to thank NAU, its faculty members, and colleagues for providing an excellent environment for academic excellence and encouragement." Additionally, Preeti receives a monthly Rs. 37,000 scholarship through the CSIR (JRF) for her PhD studies. Her father works as a farmer, her mother manages the household, and her brother serves in the Haryana police. Surat: A forestry doctoral candidate at Navsari Agricultural University (NAU), Preeti Vats, has secured a position as a scientist at the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). She is set to commence her role at the Space Application Centre (SAC) in Ahmedabad in the coming week, where she will focus on India's forest management initiatives. Originally from a farming background in Tumbaheri village in Haryana's Jhajjar district, Vats earned her bachelor's degree from NAU's forestry college and completed her master's at Kerala Agricultural University (KAU). Currently, she is working towards her PhD in forest products and utilisation at NAU, supervised by Prof. SK Sinha. "After completing my post-graduate studies, I thought of going into state or national forest services by appearing in competitive jobs. I never thought of serving India's prestigious organisation ISRO. However, with the guidance of my mentors at NAU, I came to know that ISRO is looking for specialists in the forestry and ecology," she said. Preeti appeared for a written exam in December last year. "I will be joining SAC, Ahmedabad, where I am supposed to work on forest stand structure and forest stand dynamics using remote sensing and GIS technology," she added. NAU vice-chancellor Dr ZP Patel praised her selection, saying it demonstrates the growing importance of forestry across disciplines and expanded career opportunities for forestry graduates, particularly in space research, remote sensing, GIS, climate modelling, and natural resource monitoring. Preeti received the VC's Gold Medal in 2021 from NAU, Navsari, during her undergraduate studies. Preeti stated: "I would like to thank NAU, its faculty members, and colleagues for providing an excellent environment for academic excellence and encouragement." Additionally, Preeti receives a monthly Rs. 37,000 scholarship through the CSIR (JRF) for her PhD studies. Her father works as a farmer, her mother manages the household, and her brother serves in the Haryana police.
Yahoo
08-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
NAU leads effort to preserve untold Holocaust histories. Here's how
When Karl Krotke-Crandall, a specialist in Russian-Holocaust genocide studies, joined Northern Arizona University as an assistant teaching professor in 2023, he was surprised to discover a box of untouched audio recordings from Holocaust survivors, preserved in the library. "What was a collection of historical audio tapes doing hidden in Flagstaff?" he remembered wondering when he first discovered the untapped archive. "There was a degree of mystery to it." Krotke-Crandall, alongside several student interns from NAU's Honors College, has spent the past two years beginning to unravel that mystery. What he uncovered was a collection of 80 cassette tapes containing 52 personal oral histories, primarily from Holocaust survivors. The collection was accompanied by a piece of paper that read 'Delaware Valley Holocaust Committee,' a group he and his students are still working to learn more about. None of the recordings had been previously archived. "Audio-cassettes have a shelf-life, and these recordings would not have survived much longer," said Krotke-Crandal, who said most of the survivors on the tapes shared their stories in the 1980s. "These individuals shared their stories with the intention that they would be heard. That is why it is so critical that collections like these are preserved." The collection featured several remarkable accounts, including an interview with Leon Poullada, a former U.S. ambassador and investigator for the Nuremberg trials, who recounted his experience prosecuting Nazis for war crimes. In one recording, Poullada details his interview with Hermann Göring, one of the most powerful figures in the Nazi Party. The majority of the interviews, however, were with Holocaust survivors, many of whom were living in Arizona when their stories were recorded. Krotke-Crandall noted that very few of the survivors in the collection are still alive today. Becca Sandhu, a sophomore at NAU's Honors College double majoring in political science and media, joined Krotke-Crandall in transcribing the extensive oral histories. "Coming into this internship I had a little knowledge of the Holocaust and genocide, but nowhere near the extent of my understanding now," said Sandhu. While she used to think of political science and Holocaust studies as separate areas of focus, the project has shown her how deeply interconnected the topics are. "At the end of the day, genocide was a political action, propagated through a political campaign and legislation," she said. "That understanding has really broadened my perspective." She was also deeply moved by the diverse experiences shared in the Holocaust survivor accounts. One individual was just an infant when Hitler came to power and was taken to a convent by their parents to ensure survival. Another was 12 years old when the Nazis rose to power and was sent to live with relatives in the United States to escape the war. "Every person's story is different, even though they all come from the same event," said Sandhu, who finds herself on the edge of her seat while transcribing these decades-old cassettes. "With every new story, you never know what is going to happen next," she said. "That's the most interesting part." The project has left her feeling deeply connected to the historical storytelling process. "I'm hearing their stories, but they'll never know I'm the one who listened," she said. Today, all of the recordings have been digitized, and NAU students are actively transcribing, labeling, and organizing the content. Once the project is complete, the collection will be transferred to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., where it will be accessible to the public. Krotke-Crandall ensured that NAU students remain involved throughout the process, allowing it to serve as an ongoing educational experience. "The individuals who sat for these interviews did so with the intention that history not repeat itself, that this never happen again," said Krotke-Crandal. "It is our responsibility to preserve these voices so they are not lost to history." This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: NAU digitizes forgotten Holocaust survivor recordings for DC museum
Yahoo
08-03-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Rain cancels spring training game while Tempe Festival of the Arts continues, Flagstaff sees heavy snowfall
The Brief Rain in the Valley led to the cancelation of the Diamondbacks-Angels spring training game, while other events like the Festival of the Arts in downtown Tempe carried on. NAU students enjoyed a snow day as more than one foot of snow fell at Arizona Snowbowl. Parts of Interstate 17 were closed due to the heavy snowfall in the high country. PHOENIX - It's event season in the Valley and the rain is not welcome for some outdoor festivities. The other side Luckily, vendors at the Festival of the Arts are able to set up under tents to keep their precious items dry. The news was not so good for baseball fans in Tempe. The Diamondbacks-Angels spring training matchup was canceled on March 7, shortly before first pitch. There were some disappointed fans who showed up wearing their ponchos, willing to brave the rainy weather, but the tarp stayed on the field at Diablo Stadium. Local perspective In downtown Tempe, the Festival of the Arts continued through the rain. This morning we spoke to some visitors from the Midwest who said they neglected to pack rain gear, but they are used to this kind of precipitation. Artists, on the other hand, were crossing their fingers that things stayed calm and their artwork stayed protected. What they're saying "I was just hoping that it would turn out good. I mean, we set up in the wind yesterday, which is also scary. So I just thought 'oh, I hope that when I get there that it's gonna be okay and that my booth is gonna be standing,' so, yay?!" said Aileen Frick. "I kinda gotta watch the rain because if anything gets wet, wood, you know, that's not preferred," said Jonah Ballard. "I'm keeping a close eye and making sure that everything's nice and dry for us." The Festival of the Arts is happening March 8 & 9 as well and both days will be sunny and warmer. Why you should care Officials with the Federal Aviation Administration put in a ground delay at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport as a result of the storm. The rain could end up being the most the Valley has seen in a year. As of 3:30 p.m. the Phoenix-metro area had accumulated .35 inches of rain on the day. Last year, the Phoenix-metro area saw 1.34 inches of rain in March, ranking in the 20th percentile of wettest months of March since record-keepers at the National Weather Service began tracking the data. Dig deeper In addition, snow graced many other parts of the high country and the eastern part of the state. Snow is expected to continue falling through the night, but as of 3 p.m., snowfall totals were approaching the one-foot mark in several areas. Parts of Interstate 17 were closed due to the snow and students at Northern Arizona University were given the day off, waking up to a snow day.
Yahoo
02-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Like your apples and peaches? An NAU researcher says you might have a dinosaur to thank
A butterfly beating its wings can alter the trajectory of the universe, or so they say. So it's only natural that an event as pivotal as the extinction of the dinosaurs could have some pretty far-reaching effects too. One of those effects, according to new research out of Northern Arizona University, had to do with fruit. But how, exactly, the demise of the dinosaurs gave rise to the juicy apples and peaches of today is complicated. Chris Doughty, an associate professor at NAU in the informatics department, investigates how animal extinctions will change our world. Today, elephants are the largest land mammals. But it's natural for our ecosystem to host huge animals like mammoths, mastodons and giant ground sloths, Doughty said. They evolved in concert with the species, landscapes and systems of our current world — but then they went extinct. They're thought of as 'relics of the past,' Doughty said, 'but they should be here'. He uses mechanistic models — essentially computer simulations — to explore how large animals impact ecosystems, and how things like forest structure and nutrient distribution would change if they went extinct. His research has centered on the extinctions of Pleistocene megafauna, like the aforementioned mammoths and sloths. But in a recent paper, he and other researchers went back even further — 65 million years, to be exact. Who we are: On a November day 50 years ago, a scientist found 'Lucy' and rewrote our origin story It's long been hypothesized that sauropods — long-necked herbivore dinosaurs such as Brachiosaurus — thinned out forests as they lumbered their way through the trees, eating their fill. After the sauropods went extinct, the forests grew thicker and darker, which gave trees with larger seed sizes and that bore tasty fruit an advantage. As the theory went, larger seeds gave trees a better chance of reaching light and thriving, while the presence of fruit made it more likely large animals would consume and spread its seeds. There were patterns in the fossil data to support this, Doughty said, but it felt speculative to him. 'You can obviously speculate that a sauropod is going to knock down a bunch of trees,' he said. 'People have thought about that for a long time. But it's also, just last year we didn't have any hard data on that.' Coming from an informatics and earth systems background, Doughty had never thought of himself as a paleontologist. Still, he was invited to speak at a paleontology conference about his Pleistocene work. As part of the conference deal, he had to write an additional paper. Then it hit him. Why not apply a mechanistic model to the theory about sauropods, forests and fruit? 'I realized I could add something,' Doughty said. There was also plenty of data available to set the parameters of the model. So he created a model, which he described as a grid depicting a tropical forest, with animals moving around and eating and seeds growing. ('It's not visual,' Doughty clarified, using representations rather than artistic renderings of a 'beautiful mammoth.') The model was informed by significant data, including chemical analysis of fossilized leaves from Colombia, which allowed researchers to quantify how much less light was in the forest post-dinosaur extinction, and information on how tall a tropical seed will grow based on size. When researchers ran the model, it closely resembled available data on seed and animal size over time, offering evidence in support of the sauropod forest thinning theory. As the researchers continued to run the model, it pointed to another trend about 35 million years ago. Megafauna, though not dinosaur sized, had by then grown large enough to have the same thinning effect on the forest. This diminished the evolutionary advantage for big seeds, and gradually, seeds started to shrink. The state's past: Arizona schoolkids study the 5 C's, but the true origin may be lost to history The extinction of the dinosaurs likely paved the way for fruit to take center stage in modern diets. In our current age, the Cenozoic, 'almost everything eats fruit,' Doughty said. It's now tasty and ubiquitous, but 65 million years ago, it was rare. 'It just was a really niche, small thing,' Doughty said. 'And so it just took this complete reset of the ecology of the planet to really take off. And I think what triggered it was just the darker understory forest canopy.' Fruit offered an incentive for large animals to swallow seeds and move them far away. That's important because seeds are more likely to die if they grow close to their mother tree, Doughty said. 'Big animals have long legs and big gut lengths so when they swallow a seed they're going to move it much farther.' While this might seem in the weeds — literally — these changes likely fuelled the evolution of our ancestors. 'It's unlikely things would have happened exactly the same way, that evolution would have come out the exact same way, if this hadn't happened and fruit hadn't developed,' Doughty said. 'Because that's a whole niche that early primates were successful in.' Some 50,000 years ago, mammoths and other huge mammals were wiped out in another extinction event. The model again predicted an increase in seed size in response to a darker forest. While most — though not all — believe the dinosaur's fate was sealed by an asteroid, the source of this more recent extinction is much closer to home. 'The data show that everywhere people went, the megafauna went extinct shortly after,' Doughty said. Like all attempts to understand the distant past, it's not definitive. But it's clear to Doughty that there was a correlation between humans arriving and hunting the animals and the extinctions. 'We're not going out on a huge limb here,' he said. Today, elephants can affect light levels in the depths of the forest. But the animal that has the greatest effect is us. 'In some ways we're kind of the new sauropods,' Doughty said. 'When we selectively log forests, the light levels are actually quite similar to what we saw was when we had sauropods walking around.' If humans went extinct — or, in a somewhat less dramatic turn of events, ceased selective logging — the forest understories would likely darken again, potentially triggering another increase in seed size. 'However, if, for whatever reason, humans survive and we're long-term logging these forests, who knows?' Doughty said. 'Obviously it's hugely speculative to say anything about the future of humanity. But it matters for what we're trying to do.' He acknowledges, with a laugh, that there are other, perhaps more pressing, concerns for the future of humanity right now than seed size. Then again, look at what happens when a butterfly beats its wings. This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: How the extinction of the dinosaurs changed the trajectory of fruit
Yahoo
12-02-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
NAU researcher outlines new risks of warming, warns of faltering US science leadership
Accelerated warming in the Arctic will lead to a breakdown of ecosystems and infrastructure that will have damaging consequences cascading all the way to Arizona, according to new research published last week in the prestigious peer-reviewed journal Science. At the same time, a political retreat from domestic efforts to slow climate change and support international research collaborations will lead to a breakdown of many privileges Americans take for granted, said an author of that paper who is based at Northern Arizona University. "I personally am a carbon cycle scientist because I want to help make a difference," said Ted Schuur, a professor of ecosystem ecology at NAU who collaborated with researchers from Canada, Germany and Denmark on the newly published review of climate impacts at 2.7 degrees Celsius of warming above preindustrial levels. "If we care about our kids and grandkids and future generations, this doubling down on fossil fuel use that we know is the wrong direction is not a good path," he told The Arizona Republic. "Mixing science and politics together, which I guess is always the case with climate policy, feels even more heightened in the past few weeks." Schuur was referring to a flurry of anti-science, anti-climate actions President Donald Trump has taken during his first weeks back in office that include withdrawing the United States from the international Paris Agreement to reduce climate-warming fossil fuel emissions; issuing orders to accelerate oil drilling and reverse progress on domestic clean energy development instead; and broadly interrupting funding for domestic and international research efforts. More: Trump's orders on climate and environment could hurt Arizona's economy, experts fear The paper the team including Schuur published last week was submitted for peer review before Trump took office, but has since taken on new significance. It evaluates expected changes to ice sheets and permafrost in Greenland and other Arctic ecosystems at 1.5 and at 2.7 degrees Celsius of average global warming above preindustrial levels and contrasts how those changes would influence climatic shifts and landscape habitability across the planet. In 2015, the historic Paris Agreement established international pledges to keep warming below 1.5 degrees, which scientists had determined would be necessary to avert major undesirable impacts of a destabilized climate. That increase is compared to a baseline average temperature on Earth between 1850 and 1900 before humans were burning fossil fuels for energy at large scales, releasing greenhouse gas byproducts into the atmosphere that trap heat from the sun and result in higher temperatures and more chaotic storms. The first 12-month breach of 1.5 degrees occurred during the warmth-boosting El Niño of February 2023 to January 2024, a period that also saw an uptick in extreme weather events. Just last week, James Hanson, the climate scientist who first warned Congress about an overheated atmosphere in 1988, said he expects humans will also fail to meet the next target benchmark of 2 degrees, given actual warming that has exceeded past projections once deemed "alarmist." The most recent scientific consensus, with rates of ongoing global fossil fuel use, is that Earth will reach 2.7 degrees C of average warming by 2100, leading to dangerous climate impacts like supercharged heat waves and storms. In response, Schuur and his international team of co-authors worked together this summer to evaluate the published literature on expected impacts at the 1.5- and 2.7-degree goalposts on Arctic ecosystems and beyond. By the time the report was published, in the midst of Trump pulling the U.S. out of the international Paris Agreement to reduce emissions and rolling back clean energy funding to do the same, the urgency of its findings had only increased. "Part of the story is we weren't aiming at 2.7, but the world pledged to reduce a certain amount and now (scientists found) that already takes us to 2.7," Schuur said. "But everything I'm talking about was (based on) what we had been doing up until January 20. So, obviously, we've taken a hard turn." A planet with average temperatures 2.7 degrees Celsius higher than during preindustrial times would render Arctic landscapes "transformed beyond contemporary recognition," the researchers including NAU's Schuur concluded in last week's published paper. The Arctic Ocean would be ice-free for most of the summer, disrupting marine ecosystem functioning, fisheries, human ground transportation via snowmobiles and the ability of animals like polar bears to hunt for food, the scientists found. That extra meltwater would result in around 10 feet of sea level rise, leading to larger waves, more coastal erosion and damage to built infrastructure on land and at sea. The last time the Arctic Ocean was ice-free was 130,000 years ago, due to natural, background climate fluctuations that have remained relatively stable over human history until now. When the Arctic's normally frozen, white surface melts, it also exposes the darker permafrost below, which then reflects less heat from the sun and kicks off a two-fold acceleration of climatic warming, Schuur told The Republic. "As we lose ice and snow, we change the reflectivity of the planet, and so the planet warms up faster from the disappearing cryosphere," he said. The exposed permafrost then accelerates further melting, runoff and sea level rise while releasing more warming carbon gasses into the atmosphere that had previously been stored beneath the ice. At 1.5 degrees of average warming, some of that ice loss would build back during colder years. But at 2.7 degrees, several studies the scientists reviewed concluded it would be irreversible. The expected loss of this freeze and thaw cycle by 2100 would, the scientists found, permanently disrupt the normal functioning of Arctic ecosystems and wildlife food chains, the reliability of the marine fisheries industry and the stability of coastal infrastructure, including the seaside homes of Indigenous communities who have contributed little to the causes of climate change. And those changes would not be confined to the northern polar region. More: 'The objective is the Girl Scout motto': ASU's Michael Crow on being a Time climate leader Arizona is changing in parallel with the Arctic, Schuur told The Republic, as evidenced by recent record high temperatures and shifting weather patterns that affect the water cycle and drought. An explosion of greenhouse gases coming out of the Arctic will warm and desiccate the climate in Arizona, too, pushing the limits of its habitability. "The question is, why in Arizona do we care about the changing Arctic?" Schuur asked. "One answer is that what's changing in the Arctic is directly linked to global changes, and so the same kind of changes are happening here with these heat temperature records in Phoenix. What's that going to look like in 10 or 20 years? It could be pushing the limits of even wanting to live here." Just as changes to the climate and landscapes in the Arctic send ripple effects all over the globe, the state of scientific collaboration's consequences are borderless. Schuur told The Republic he has already been directly affected by Trump's orders to pause scientific work funded by federal grants and to restrict scientists working for federal agencies from communicating with collaborators at institutions outside the government. He said this dismantling of American leadership in science immediately influenced what he's able to do, and will surely cause the United States to lose ground in the global research dominance it has enjoyed for generations. "This nation has led the way for 50 or 70 years, and the things that are happening right now at the federal level really look to crimp that down," Schuur said. "That has the potential of handing over advantages of science to other nations. I think we're just gonna hurt our own competitiveness and our own knowledge." Read our climate series: The latest from Joan Meiners at azcentral: climate coverage from Arizona and the Southwest Even if Trump's actions to stall the flow of research money don't withstand the legal challenges already filed against them, the chaos caused at the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health by disrupting grant funding to projects that have been designed, planned and, in some cases, are already underway will leave a mark. Long-term research like Schuur's ongoing work in the Arctic is timed to specific seasonal windows and often requires months of planning to arrange travel and permits after funding is secured. "This nation, I think, became wealthy, powerful and important because we had a science-based, open, transparent way to learn and that is really what seems to be under attack right now," he said. "If we cut those ties, even within our own nation, which is happening now, or internationally, we just suffer as a result, as humans, in terms of understanding what's going on and trying to forecast where we're going to end up in the future." There is a precedent mentioned in last week's Science paper for what gets lost when international flows of data and research connections are interrupted. After the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the established ecosystem monitoring network made up of a small group of scientists across the world who study the Arctic was diminished, cutting off access to 50% of the available information on carbon flux monitoring that was being collected at sites controlled by the Russian Federation. The related militarization of the Arctic region and science in general is also resulting in more damage to those ecosystems and disruption to their long-term management and study, the paper concluded. "As Arctic researchers, we're working in a remote area where we always wish we had more data," Schuur said. "But the best we can do is collaborate with scientists around the world that are making similar observations." One more obvious but perhaps seldom-noticed aspect of the new research paper Schuur wrote with colleagues from Denmark, Germany and Canada may be at stake: It's in English. That is a direct result of the United States dominating the international science research scene for generations, Schuur said, by funding and sending American scientists to collaborative projects around the world. You will find more infographics at Statista But with China and India far outpacing the United States in numbers of STEM graduates in recent years, according to data compiled by Georgetown University's Center for Security and Emerging Technology in 2023 and by Statista in 2017, all that could change. "I think we enjoy a lot of things being Americans that we take for granted, that have happened because we're a large nation that has led the way," Schuur said. "If you think about the English language, transparent science, the open internet, or the use of the dollar for different nations to run their economies, it doesn't have to be like that," Schuur said. "It's that way because we led the way," he said. "We provided a model that was open and let people into it. But that can be broken. I think we have a real risk of falling behind and not really realizing it until five or 10 years has passed." Joan Meiners is the climate news and storytelling reporter at The Arizona Republic and Her award-winning work has also appeared in Discover Magazine, National Geographic, ProPublica and the Washington Post Magazine. Before becoming a journalist, she completed a doctorate in ecology. Follow Joan on Twitter at @beecycles, on Bluesky @ or email her at Sign up for AZ Climate, The Republic's weekly climate and environment newsletter. Read more of the team's coverage at by subscribing to This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Researchers find new warming threats, warn about attacks on science
