discoveries Gift secures agricultural and environmental research A gift of land just outside St. Albert by the Bocock family has secured agricultural and environmental research at the U of A for years to come. The family sold 777 acres to the University of Alberta at a fraction of the appraised value. The land, to be known as the St. Albert Research Station, will host a variety of crop research projects and provide the university with the added ability to grow and expand. Two research crops have been planted this year and more will be planted as activities wind down and are completed by 2011 at the Ellerslie Research Station. In recognition of this historic gift, the university is establishing the Bocock Chair in Agriculture and Environment. The chair will study the interactions between agriculture and the environment using interdisciplinary approaches to seek a balance between sustainable food and bio-products production, economic viability and environmental health. The chair is expected to be filled in July 2009.
The Bocock family
Milk producers establish research fund Researchers in the Dairy Research and Technology Centre received a huge boost with a donation from Alberta Milk worth more than $1.6 million. An additional $500,000 was also donated from the Canada-Alberta Livestock Research Trust. Dr. John Kennelly, Dean of the Faculty said the sizable donation will enhance and intensify the faculty’s research on optimizing production and reproduction efficiency, enhancing the nutritional quality of milk and milk products, and improving animal health. The interest from the endowment will support dairy research that will help to ensure the profitability and sustainability of dairying, he said. “Our goal is very simple - to transfer information and technology to stakeholders in the dairy industry,” added Dr. Erasmus Okine, Chair of the Department of Agricultural, Food and Nutritional Science, and one of Canada’s foremost ruminant nutrition and metabolism researchers. Some of the ongoing dairy research at the U of A includes: • development of a biological intervention strategy to reduce carriage of the foodborne pathogen Escherichia coli 0157:H7 in cattle; • the use of probiotic bacteria and novel immuno-enhancing techniques to prevent or treat uterine infections in dairy cows; • investigating strategies to improve ovulation and embryo development in timed insemination programs for dairy cattle; and • researching the possibility of using fenngreek as a forage alternative for dairy cows.
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from the dean
elcome to the first issue of discoveries. Our faculty is unique in that it is a science-based faculty that combines the natural sciences with the social sciences providing us with the ability to offer comprehensive solutions to some of the key challenges facing society today. Our uniqueness will be reflected in these pages as we offer some of the research findings our faculty members and their students discover. Published three times a year, this newsletter will also feature, from time to time, funding news, new staff, award winners and graduate scholarships. We hope you enjoy discoveries and invite you to provide us with feedback. Let us know what you think and if there’s anything else you would like to see in this newsletter. Dr. John Kennelly Dean
Many variables about ageing in rural communities Policy makers can’t apply a one-size-fits-all solution when it comes to ageing in rural communities. “It’s impossible to make generalizations about growing old in rural communities,” says Dr. Norah Keating of the Department of Human Ecology. “There are huge differences across the country in the supportiveness of rural communities to older adults.” Keating edited Rural Ageing: A Good Place to Grow Old? a ground-breaking book released last spring that examined ageing in rural communities in Canada and Europe. The authors looked at two stereotypical yet contradictory beliefs with respect to ageing in rural communities. The first is that rural communities are good places to grow old because they offer a close-knit, supportive setting in which people know each other well and look out for each other. The other belief is that rural communities are poor places to grow old because services are diminishing, hospitals are closing and it’s difficult to get health and social care. Keating said there are elements of truth in each of these stereotypes. The authors also found that rural communities vary greatly in the everyday services and other resources available while older adults’ needs and wants from their community also varies tremendously based largely on their individual resources and health. Dr Norah Keating
(For more information, please visit http://www.ales. ualberta.ca/hecol/hcic/index.cfm)
More infrastructure needed to combat climate change Alberta needs to invest even more in its infrastructure if it’s going to adapt to climate change, concludes Dr. Debra Davidson. Jointly appointed to the departments of Rural Economy and Renewable Resources, Davidson conducted a three-year study with an economist and a natural scientist that examined Alberta’s vulnerability to climate change and what can be done about it. The group noted Alberta has started and will continue to experience a range of climate change issues such as more extreme storms, warmer summers and winters, more precipitation (yet, less moisture in soils as warmer temperatures will cause greater
evaporation), and more droughts. Davidson argues Alberta’s wealth provides it with the means to adapt to climate change, more so than other jurisdictions. “What climate change imposes on us is even greater demand on our infrastructure,” she says. “We do have the potential to adapt in ways that won’t necessarily imply a decline in our economy or way of life. But our ability to embrace those opportunities has a lot to do with our adaptability to change gears quickly and with our ability to avoid the heavy costs of
unexpected crises.” (For more information, please visit http://www.ales. ualberta.ca/re/d_j_davidson.cfm)
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Reducing roads could boost grizzly bear population The key to sustaining the grizzly bear population in Alberta is to reduce human-bear interactions and the best way to do that is to reduce the number of roads in the animals’ habitat. “Road development, access management and human attitudes are far more important factors to Alberta grizzly populations than the size and shape of clearcuts,” says biologist Scott Nielsen of Renewable Resources. Nielsen and Mark Boyce conducted a study that showed that, regardless of any ecologically friendly harvesting practices adopted by the forest industry, if road density is not reduced in the Alberta foothills, the grizzly population may continue to decline. Nielsen added road construction by other natural resource industries, such as oil and gas, has the same negative effect on the grizzly population. It is estimated that there are currently less than 500 grizzly bears in Alberta. The study, conducted in a 9,800 square-kilometre area of west-central Alberta, compared current harvesting practices that use small clearcuts in a checkerboard pattern, with ones that mimic a naturally-occurring disturbance like a wildfire, resulting in large clear-cut areas. The second method is thought to be more environmentally friendly to the animals, but was found by the researchers to have little benefit to grizzly bears because of associated roads. (For more information, please visit http://www. ualberta.ca/~scottn/)
Substance abuse exacerbated in boom towns Conventional wisdom dictates substance abuse in boom towns is due to workers having too much money and too little to do. Not so, says John Parkins Dr. John Parkins, a professor in the Department of Rural Economy, and his master’s student Angela C. Angell. Underlying pressures including loneliness, a lack of healthy social connections and a need to “keep up with the Joneses” are more likely to blame. Parkins and Angell conducted research in Hinton and found that the social problems in resource-based communities have existed for many years and are exacerbated by boom town conditions. “Communities such as Hinton have been battling these issues long before the oil and gas boom, and the inter-generational transfer of these behaviours and attitudes have led to widespread family and community dysfunction,” noted Angell. The study recommends that industry and major employers need to promote healthy lifestyles and, though desperate for workers, not turn a blind eye to substance-abuse issues among their current or would-be employees. Because many resource-based communities in Alberta and North America have similar social and economic structures, the study’s findings may provide insights into the social challenges of boom towns everywhere. (For more information, please visit http://www.ales.ualberta.ca/re/j_parkins.cfm)
Early planting inhibits flea beetle damage to canola Farmers can be both mean and green when protecting their canola fields from a pesky insect that poses a chronic threat, says Dr. Lloyd Dosdall of the Department of Agricultural, Food and Nutritional Science. Insecticide is no longer the only option available to protect crops from the flea beetle, a striped insect that devours the canola plant in its tender seedling stage. Dosdall and researchers from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada conducted a three-year study of canola in the Lethbridge (southern), Lacombe (central) and Beaverlodge (northern) growing areas and showed that early seeding plays a role in controlling crop damage without disturbing the environment. The researchers found that crops seeded in October for early germination the following year survived beetle damage better than crops seeded the next spring from early to mid-May. Crops seeded in April also fared better. To maximize their yields, farmers in all parts of Alberta need to seed their crops as early as possible in the planting season, so that by the time the insects invade in June, the plants are strong enough to withstand the attack, Dosdall says. “By then, the plants have more leaf tissue and there’s more surface area to compensate for flea beetles feeding.” (For more information, please visit, http://www.ales.ualberta.ca/afns/ldosdall.cfm)
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If a seed falls in the forest, will a tree grow? New knowledge about how white spruce regenerates naturally from seed after forest harvesting could lead to improvements and cost savings in future forest management. White spruce has been notoriously hard to establish after harvesting of mixed (spruceaspen) forest. Forest companies invest tremendous effort and money in preparing sites and planting spruce in some areas while other areas are left to regenerate naturally just to deciduous (mainly aspen) forest. “We’re finding that areas that have been designated deciduous sometimes have a substantial amount of white spruce that established naturally from seed after forest harvesting – and that it is still alive and growing well 10 to 15 years later,” said Dr. Ellen Macdonald who, along with Dr. Vic Lieffers and graduate students Jonathan Martin-DeMoor and Ian Curran, from the Department of Renewable Resources, are conducting the research. The team is carefully defining the conditions for successful natural white spruce regeneration after harvesting of deciduous forests. “These mixed forests account for 50 per cent of the forested area in the province. We hope forest managers can use our research results to determine when and where natural regeneration of white spruce can be used. This can save money and develop more natural mixtures of spruce and aspen,” said Lieffers. For more information, please visit, http://www.ales2. ualberta.ca/rr/people/vlieffers/ and http://www. ualberta.ca/~emacdona/index.html)
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More help needed for wounded veterans As Canada engages in overseas military action and severely wounded soldiers are sent home, more needs to be done to help their struggling families, states a report written by two Human Ecology professors. The families of young wounded veterans released from active duty with severe disabilities are suffering poorer financial, social and health outcomes than any other group of caregivers studied by their team, said Norah Keating and Janet Fast, authors of the study and professors of
Human Ecology. “These young veterans present a whole new phenomenon. There haven’t been many since the Second World War or the Korean War, and we need to address their needs,” Keating said. While government agencies have traditionally focused on helping caregivers of frail, aging veterans, “now we’ve got disabilities happening much earlier in life. Families have to cope for 20 or more years,” said Keating. (For more information, please visit http://www. ales.ualberta.ca/hecol/hcic/index.cfm)
Prion research looks into BSE Dr. Nat Kav of the Department of Agricultural, Food and Nutritional Science, and Dr. Michael James are trying to better understand the structure of prions, proteins that are misshapen into disease-causing forms. Prion diseases are untreatable, infectious and fatal neurodegenerative diseases. The researchers will use x-ray crystallography-a process to determine the 3D makeup of a molecule-to develop a better understanding of the structure of the prion protein. They expect their work to provide much-needed information on the structural features of the shape-shifting protein and thereby hopefully lead to the development of novel therapeutic strategies for prion diseases, including BSE and
chronic wasting disease. Meanwhile, Dr. Tomas Nilsson of the Department of Rural Economy and his team will be examining consumer responses related to voluntary or mandatory BSE testing. Their research aims at targeting policies for BSE testing while enhancing the risk assessment of future similar disease outbreaks in Canada by using a “farm-to-fork” strategy to trace the human food chain of animal products in conjunction with assessments of the political economy. They’ll be looking at similar policies around the world and see if there’s anything we might learn from them and adjust our policies. (For more information, please visit, http://www.ales. ualberta.ca/afns/nkav.cfm)
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