News from the Media

Marco Keiluweit, assistant professor, Stockbridge School of Agriculture, and collaborators are studying how climate change affects the capacity of soils to remove carbon from the atmosphere and retain enough nutrients for food production. (Science & Technology Research News, 1/15/19;  News Office Release). 

Jon M. Clements, UMass Extension, says tariffs on the fruit and nut industries aren’t likely to have much impact on this region because, “It has become primarily a retail/direct market.” He says the top issues he sees are regulations and recordkeeping and lack of labor for smaller jobs and retail. (Growingproduce.com, 12/29/18)

Julie Brigham-Grette, geosciences, says a new report from researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison that says climate change could turn back the geological clock 50 million years in just 200 years, shows there is less time than scientists thought to prevent warming and the changes it will cause. “It’s a real call to action to all countries, including our own, to really quickly ramp up technologies that get us away from fossil fuels.” (La Crosse Tribune, 12/10/18)
 

Joseph S. Elkinton, environmental conservation, comments in a science news story about efforts to restore Puritan tiger beetles to the Connecticut River basin. The tiny insects currently are found only along the banks of the Connecticut River and in the Chesapeake Bay area. Elkinton has been helping Rodger Gwiazdowski, the entomologist who is leading the project. (New York Times, 12/4/18)

Plant ecologist Kristina Stinson at UMass Amherst, leads a research team that has been studying ragweed for over a decade – particularly how it responds to elevated CO2 levels – worked with climate modeler and corresponding author Michael Case at UW on this project. A new predictive model suggests that climate change may allow common ragweed to extend its growing range northward and into major northeast metro areas, worsening conditions for millions of people with hay fever and asthma. (Health Medicine Network, Medicine Newsline, News Medical Life Sciences, 11/9/18; Phys.org, 11/8/18; News Office release)

AMHERST, Mass. – Fall may not seem like a good time for planting, but cool temperatures and ample soil moisture can help plants settle in, says viticulture expert Elsa Petit at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where her students in the Stockbridge School of Agriculture have been busy this fall planting dozens of cold-tolerant grapes at the campus’s first student-run vineyard. (Western Mass News, Miami Herald, Boston Herald, U.S. News & World Report, WCVB-TV 5, 11/8/18; Fresno Bee, [All from AP], Recorder, Republican, 11/7/18; News Office release)

 

Elsa Petit, viticulture specialist and lecturer at Stockbridge School of Agriculture and Sonia Schloemann, UMass Extension specialist for small fruits comment on popularity of new varieties of local grapes.Edible Pioneer Valley, Fall 2018

A study to explore the role of fermeneted foods in boosting the immune system was conducted by UMass Food Science at Real Pickles (food producer) over a year and a half. Reserchers examined microbiome communities in the Greenfield facility which could lead to future studies and a better understanding of how to enhance nutrition in fermented foods. (Gazette 10/11/18; Recorder 10/15/18)

 

 

A news story recaps two departmental milestones celebrated within a week at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. (Republican 10/5/18; News Office release 10/2/18; News Office release 9/25/18)