Spanish Flu

Lasting from June 1918 to December 1920, the Spanish flu killed between 50 and 100 million.  This made it one of the deadliest natural disasters in human history.  This doesn't include the 500 million that were infected.  While we cannot pinpoint one certain location that it originated in we know that it spread all around the world.  Some sample tissues were saved in order to recreate this infection.  When this was done it was discovered that it kills via a cytokine storm, meaning an overreaction of the body's immune system, which would explain the target age (young adults) and the severity of it.  Modern transportation was the cause of its wide spread reaction. 

ENB in the woods

We had a nice hike through the woods this past Tuesday at Hitchiti Forest!  Hitchiti Experimental Forest, ran by the Southern Research Station and the Georgia Forestry Commission to showcase pine management for nonindustrial land owners.

Ocmulgee National Monument

Just this past week we visited Ocmulgee National Monument for lab on Tuesday.  While I was there I found out that there were two wars fought in Macon dring the civil war. Both battles were fought on the monuments grounds. 

What Type of Rock?

These rocks are a type of rock formed from the solidification magma or lava.  They can be formed above ground and underground. These types of rocks are classified igneous rocks and there are two types: intrusive and extrusive.  Intrusive is formed when the magma cools and solidifies within the earth’s crust and extrusive cools and solidifies outside the earth’s crust and does so at a much faster rate.  Igneous rocks are the oldest classification of rocks.  The earth’s crust is composed of over 95% igneous rock with the rest being split between sedimentary and metamorphic rocks. 

These rocks are transformations of existing rocks, meaning that these rocks must be classified as metamorphic rocks.  They have been subject to some kind of high pressure or temperatures causing chemical or physical changes to the rocks.  Metamorphic rocks are classifies my chemical and mineral assemblage know as metamorphic facies.  These types of rocks are often formed when tectonic processes occur, such as continental collisions. 

Extremophiles

Extremophiles are organisms that thrive in the most extreme environment, conditions which would be detremental to any other life form on earth. A good example of an extremophile is a thermophile ( an organism that can thrive at temperatures between 60-80 degrees celcius; 113-176 degrees fairenhight).  These type of extremophiles are also archea, a type of bacteria. These bacteria are responisble for the bright colors of the Grand Prismatic Spring; as you see in the picture above. 

Testing your soil by hand

To diagnose your soil with your own hand you must follow these simple steps.  First take a handful of moist soil, move it around between your fingers.  If it is sticky and changes your hand colors is is clay based, if it is gritty and falls apart it is sandy and if it is slippery and contains small particles it is silt.  At the end of this testing if you ball it up and try to form something and it sticks it is clay, if it just falls apart it is sand. 

Soil texture diagnosis key

The three main components of testing soil are sand, clay and silt.  The realative proportion of these minerals is what determines the soil texture. 

Soil Map of Ga.

Generalized soil map of Georgia based on the STATSGO database

Munsell Soil Chart

Created by professor Albert H Munsell, the munsell color chart is a color space created to identify types of soil. The difference between his method and all of the others is that is uses three color dimensions; hue, value (lightness), and  chroma (color purity).  The Hue is measured by the degrees around the horizontal circles.  Value is measured vertically from 0 to 10, black to white.  Chroma is measured from the center out starting at gray (neutral) vertical axis.  You can see these three dimensions in the picture above.

Munsell Soil Chart

Georgia Red Clay

The most prominent soil here in Ga is known as red clay or ultisols, if your using the technical term.  Ultisols comes from strongly leached soils with a subsurface zone for clay accumulation and less than 35% base saturation. In simple terms this basically means the soil lacks nutrients and is not well aerated.  People who live in Georgia often have to use supplements to grow any kind of landscaping. 

12 SOIL ORDERS OF THE WORLD

Geocaching sites for lab (group 2) on 2/1/11

GPS mapping and scientific research

When we think of GPS most of us would automatically think, it goes in my car and tells me turn by turn exactly where to go, but they can be use for much more than that.  A good example of how global positioning systems can help the research of science and mapping is to look at Australia's way of tracking and researching the kangaroos.  They go out and capture the kangaroos.  When they have them captured they place a tracking collar on them using the GPS system.  With this they are able to track every move of each one of them and it allows the scientists to get a look at their life and better preserve them. They know if they have gotten hit by a car, where their feeding grounds are, the impact of high numbers of kangaroos in specific places and much more.  While the scientist are tracking the kangaroos they can also map their every movement with exact locations used on the map which allows them to retrace and keep track of the data and compare with newer maps and fresh data.  

Geocaching

Geocaching website

Geocaching is an outdoor activity where global positioning systems are used to hide and find "geocaches" or "chaches" anywhere in the world.  For the most part, the "chaches" are usually small waterproof containers used to store a list or log books to sign or some kind of symbol you can duplicate.  Some even contain trading items.  You use coordinates that are given to you to find the exact location of the hidden items.  There are currently over 100 countries on all seven continents participating in this sport.  After only 10 years there are over 1.2 million active geocachers. 

Field Station

 

These pictures show parts of a biological field station in Belize.  A small developing nation on the Caribbian coast of Central America.  It was established to host researchers and groups from colleges to provide field experiences to augment academic programs in tropical studies. Minimal transportation is allowed here to prevent major impact on the mangrove habitat with boats being the only mode of transportation.  This field station is here to teach the importance of ecosystems and keeping them alive.

Mt. Rainier National Park

Home to 35 glaciers and a stratovolcano it has over 1.1 million visitors a year.  The tallest part of the park is the Cascada Ranges that reaches over 14000 feet.  It was established in 1899 and is more than 236,000 acres.  It is also home to the two largest glaciers in the continental U.S. Carbon glacier and Emmons.  This park is located in Washington, southeast of Pierce county and northeast of lewis county.  The most visited spot at the park is Paradise (62% of the visitors go here).  It is said to get the most snowfall in a year than anywhere else.

Interesting Animal

Koalas are one of the most endangered animals in the world.  The urban growth of Australia is killing the habitat and food of koalas.  Even though their  are more than 600 types of eucalyptus koalas only like about 100 of them and most koalas choose 4 or 5 of them to eat.  They use to be hunted for their fur but now they are trying to be saved by repopulating and artificial growth of eucalyptus. 

Geological Feature

This is the Amazon Rainforest (largest tropical rainforest).  Located on the South American continent it is split between 6 ocuntries.  It is a journey of more than 4,080 miles of flowing water that flows into the Atlantic Ocean.  One of the most popular starting points for tourist when discovering this exciting place is in Brazil at the port of Manaus.

My google map

This is a picture of where I grew up in Carrollton, Ga.  This particular view shows my grandparents house marked by the orange pin.  The blue lines show the trails where we ride the horses and the green area on the map is where I went to church. 

Bathymetric map

This is a picture of a bathymetric map showing the water depth in Big Lake.

Choropleth map

This is a picture of a choropleth map showing the number of fatalities from car crashes in Georgia.