Catching Up with CALS — March 20, 2024

Dean's Message — A Statewide Presence

Isolated in the state’s northern panhandle, University of Idaho’s location is neither strategic nor intuitive. So why is the state’s land-grant university based in Moscow, removed from population centers where prospective students and stakeholders live? As explained in “This Crested Hill: An Illustrated History of the University of Idaho” by Keith Petersen, the choice of campus was essentially a thank-you gift. Territorial Gov. Edward Stevenson signed the bill founding the University of Idaho on Jan. 30, 1889, shortly before Idaho was ratified as the 43rd state on July 3, 1890. Stevenson and the territorial legislature chose Moscow in gratitude to panhandle residents who resisted pressure to merge into adjacent Washington.

The Morrill Act of 1862 — signed by President Lincoln to “educate the next generation of farmers, ranchers and citizens” — was extended in 1890 to every state and territory, solidifying U of I as Idaho’s land-grant institution. States received federal public lands and were directed to appropriate revenue derived from those acres toward the “endowment, support and maintenance” of land-grant colleges, including CALS at U of I. Furthermore, the Hatch Act of 1887 provided federal funds for setting up a network of agricultural experiment stations under each state’s land-grant college, and the Smith-Lever Act of 1914 established a cooperative extension system to deliver results of agricultural research to food producers. Following the original tenets of the Morrill, Hatch and Smith-Lever acts, CALS concentrates its activities in five areas: agriculture, natural resources, 4-H youth development, families and communities.

Many attempts have been made throughout the years to move the state’s agricultural college from Moscow to southern Idaho — closer to big cities and where most of the state’s major commodities, including dairy, potatoes and sugar beets, are produced. Yet throughout the decades U of I and CALS have transcended these geographical limitations in many ways, and we’re becoming increasingly visible, building a strong presence in every corner of the state. University of Idaho Extension professionals are embedded in county offices in 42 of Idaho’s 44 counties and within three tribal communities, working to “empower rural and urban communities of all sizes to meet the challenges they face, adapt to changing technology, improve nutrition and food safety, prepare for and respond to emergencies and protect our environment.” 

We’re reaching the next generation of Idaho leaders through UI Extension 4-H Youth Development, supported in 2023 by more than 2,100 certified adult volunteers who worked with more than 14,200 enrolled youth members. We’re training agricultural and family and consumer sciences educators who work in school districts throughout the state. We have nine research and extension centers, plus the Sandpoint Organic Agriculture Center, providing solutions for Idaho agriculture in every region. We’re building the nation’s largest research dairy in Rupert, known as the Idaho Center for Agriculture, Food and the Environment (Idaho CAFE), which will dramatically boost our Magic Valley presence and will help ensure a sustainable future for the state’s crucial dairy industry. Our veterinary science students will train at Idaho CAFE. The facility will include a 2,000-cow, commercial-scale dairy and a Water and Soil Health Demonstration Farm, where we will explore the interconnections between plant and animal agriculture.

The original intent of establishing land-grant institutions was to better serve and interact with stakeholders and food producers. We’re poised to test a new paradigm for delivering information and serving farmers and ranchers with the forthcoming launch of our Innovative Agriculture and Marketing Partnership (IAMP) for Idaho program. The model thus far has relied upon us conducting research and handing the results down to food producers. IAMP, funded with a $55 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Partnerships for Climate Smart Commodities initiative, will involve food producers of several commodities working as partners in research. They’ll receive payments for implementing designated sustainable production practices, and our scientists will collect data measuring the benefits both to their operations and the environment. Through such partnerships, our research is bound to be more relevant, more specific to each producer’s unique circumstances and more readily adopted. I consider the age-old debate about the wisdom of our location to be settled. Moscow is but one of many homes to CALS and the university we represent. Truly, we’re based wherever Idahoans live.

Michael P. Parrella

Dean
College of Agricultural and Life Sciences

By the Numbers

The National 4-H Council and Hart Research surveyed 1,510 youth ages 9-17 to examine their use of artificial intelligence (AI) technology. According to the survey, 66% of youth have some understanding of what AI is and how it can be used, 72% would like support from adults to better understand how to use the tools correctly and with confidence, 64% agree AI will be important in preparing them for their future careers, 58% believe the technology will help them improve how they learn in school, 61% have concerns that AI could be used for cheating and 53% fear it could be used to expose private information about themselves.

Our Stories

Growing Through Experience

When Saige Grundman received an email about a hands-on veterinary experience in Costa Rica, she knew it was the perfect opportunity to expand her skills. Grundman, a University of Idaho junior studying animal and veterinary science: pre-veterinary option, traveled to La Suerte, Costa Rica in June 2023 as part of the Maderas Rainforest Conservancy Veterinary Field Training Mission. She was one of 14 undergraduate students selected to participate in the 10-day program.

Lectures and labs were followed by hands-on experiences at a three-day spay and neuter clinic offered in the rural area near the La Suerte Biological Field Station. Participants assisted a veterinarian during surgeries, performed intake and post-op procedures and placed catheters in animals.

The ability to assist during surgery wasn’t something that Grundman would have been able to experience in the United States where strict regulations limit what students are allowed to do at a veterinary clinic. 

Read the full story

Deep Into Soil

The University of Idaho has received a large grant toward equipping a planned deep-soil research facility with advanced technology capable of capturing the “molecular fingerprint” of soil.

The M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust awarded a research team led by U of I’s College of Agricultural and Life Sciences (CALS) $550,000 — the largest grant the trust has ever awarded the university — to help fund a proton-transfer-reaction mass spectrometer. The machine will monitor a broad range of volatile organic compounds emitted by soil microorganisms, informing researchers about the living components of soils.

The highly sensitive instrument separates volatile compounds by their charge and mass, then analyzes their component molecules.

It will be part of the laboratory supporting the university’s forthcoming Deep Soil Ecotron.

“The plants and soil microbes produce their own chemicals to communicate and react to the environment. We’re adding this whole other dimension by looking at the fingerprint of the chemicals that these organisms give off,” said Zachary Kayler, an associate professor with the Department of Soil and Water Systems within CALS. “We might be able to determine different microbial communities by looking at the different chemicals they exude below ground.”

The National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded U of I about $19 million toward construction of the Ecotron in September 2021. Renovations of rooms in the JW Martin Laboratory at the Moscow campus are underway to house the Ecotron, where scientists will have the ability to manipulate several environmental variables and study various soil types down to 3 meters — the greatest depth of any research facility in the world. The first of 24 planned eco-units — soil columns inside of heavily instrumented stainless-steel cylinders — should arrive on campus this summer.

Probes at various depths in the Ecotron soil columns will transfer gases emitted to the mass spectrometer, which will evaluate them and visually depict them in a graph, called a chromatogram.

The Ecotron should be fully operational by 2026, accommodating researchers from throughout the world who will manipulate variables in replicated trials studying how climate change, soil heating, drought, changes in gas concentrations affect soil function.

Kayler and Michael Strickland, a colleague within the Department of Soil and Water Systems, are co-directors of the Ecotron. Investigators overseeing the mass spectrometer project include Kayler, Strickland, Leda Kobziar and Armando McDonald, with the College of Natural Resources, and Klas Udekwu, with the College of Science.

“There isn’t a facility that exists to do these types of experiments,” Kayler said regarding the combination of the Ecotron and the mass spectrometer.

The M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust, created by the will of the late Melvin J. Murdock, provides grants to nonprofit organizations in Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington that seek to strengthen the region’s educational, social, spiritual and cultural base in creative and sustainable ways.

The grant will also support research projects involving the mass spectrometer to understand plant and soil interactions, analyze ties between wildfires and microbial communities, evaluate emissions from the degradation of bioplastics and to better understand certain gastrointestinal ailments.

The Ecotron project was funded to U of I by the NSF under award No. 2131837. The total funding authorization is $18,950,955, of which 100% is the federal share.

Fighting Hunger with Beef

Volunteering to package beef chubs at the Idaho Foodbank warehouse in Lewiston on a recent Monday afternoon was a family affair for University of Idaho Extension educators.

Audra Cochran, a UI Extension educator based in Clearwater County led the effort to bring the Beef Counts program to northern Idaho, along with Jessie Van Buren, who specializes in 4-H youth development and is based in Latah County and Meranda Small, a UI Extension educator who’s programming focuses on beef cattle production, based in Idaho County. Beef Counts is a partnership involving the Idaho Cattle Association, Idaho CattleWomen Council, Idaho Beef Council and Agri Beef Co. that fills Idaho Foodbank freezers with donated beef.

To recruit more helping hands, Van Buren sent out a group text message to several family members involved in ranching. Van Buren’s mother, aunt and cousins showed up, and the team of educators, students and producers relabeled more than 2,000 pounds of ground beef 1-pound chubs in just a couple of hours.

All three Extension educators operate their own beef herds and are well connected within the cattle industry. They hope the recent experience will spark a lasting partnership between U of I’s College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, the Idaho Foodbank and Idaho beef producers.

“I am fortunate that I have a lot of family connections in the area who are beef producers,” Van Buren said. “In the future, more of my family would also be willing to participate.”

Van Buren, Cochran and Small serve on a U of I team leading a three-year, $479,000 grant funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture to provide training for beginning ranchers throughout the Northwest. They anticipate involving some of the beginning ranchers they’re serving in future volunteer efforts with the Idaho Foodbank. They’ll also seek to recruit more 4-H participants to help the Idaho Foodbank accomplish its mission of feeding Idaho’s hungry residents.

“The Idaho Foodbank staff shared with us that most of their volunteer base is senior citizens who are retired,” Small said. “Occasionally, however, a good number of 4-H clubs come in on an annual basis for their community service time and help repackage products and get them ready for dispersal. That was really encouraging for us to hear that we’ve got youth taking an interest in this, so the Idaho Foodbank knows they have a next volunteer base as the current one ages out.”

The Extension educators also got to tour the Lewiston facility, which is a central warehouse that distributes food to surrounding Idaho Foodbank locations. After seeing a kiosk with recipe cards, which gives recipients ideas about how to prepare the commodities they receive, the Extension educators asked the Idaho Beef Council to provide additional recipe cards featuring beef.

The Extension educators may also collaborate with the Idaho Foodbank on an event in July celebrating Idaho Beef Month and National Grilling Month, where grilled beef would be served. Protein sources are in high demand by the Idaho Foodbank and comprise just 16% of food donations. Foodbank staff estimated that the large Beef Counts donation would last just one week.

“We want our 4-Hers to be involved and really want to build community within our stakeholder constituency to further the work the Idaho Foodbank is doing,” Cochran said.

Faces and Places

Foundation Seed Program Coordinator David Hoadley will retire April 1 after nearly 33 years of service to the University of Idaho.

FCS graduate student Megan Follett received the Promising Young Investigator award at the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition annual conference. This award recognizes and honors an Early Career Investigator who has submitted a top-scoring original abstract and demonstrates excellence via a manuscript and oral presentation at the annual conference. Megan's research is part of a larger study investigating early feeding exposures on intestinal, systemic and neuroinflammation/neurodevelopment. She is advised by Assistant Professor Yimin Chen.

Eight CALS students recently participated in the 2024 Western Regional Dairy Challenge held in Richfield, Utah. A total of 49 students from seven universities competed, working in mixed teams to identify areas for further exploration and opportunity on a host farm and presenting their findings to a panel of judges. Four U of I students placed with their teams in first and second place in two judging groups. Jordan Cassidy and Christian Ramirez were on first place teams and Gabriella Ponce and Alyssa Murillo were on second place teams. Also competing at the event were Alicia Easterday, Katlyn Scarrow, Galilea Quezada and Cassandra Moulaison. The students are advised by Professor Amin Ahmadzadeh and graduate student Danny Salas. CALS alumni Jordan Stebbins and Paul Smith also participated, serving as a judge and mentor, respectively.

The Institute for Health in the Human Ecosystem will host its Annual Research Symposium on April 8. The keynote presentation, “Local-to-global Win-Win Solutions for Disease, Food, Energy, Water Sustainability and Poverty Challenges in Disadvantaged Communities,” will be delivered by Jason Rohr with the University of Notre Dame Department of Ecology and Public Health from 10:30-11:30 a.m. in the ISUB. It will also be available via Zoom. A student, staff and postdoc lunch with Rohr will be hosted from 12:30-1:30 p.m., and oral and poster presentations from IHHE scholarship award winners and current research of U of I and Washington State University IHHE faculty and trainees will be featured from 4-7 p.m. The deadline to submit poster titles is March 25. To submit a poster title or sign up for any of the events, contact chhe@uidaho.edu.

UI Extension economist Hernan Tejeda is working with leaders from Washington State University and Western Extension Risk Management Education to organize workshops entitled “Opportunities and Risks of Carbon Markets for Dairies.” Workshops are scheduled from 10 a.m. to 2:45 p.m. on March 27 at the Hilton Garden Inn, 145 E. Riverside Drive, Eagle, and March 28 at Morey’s Event Center, 219 E. Third St., Burley. Lunch will be provided. Please confirm attendance.

Recognize outstanding colleagues by nominating them for awards at the Extension Awards Banquet during the 2024 University of Idaho Extension Annual Conference, scheduled for April 8-11 in Moscow. The deadline for submitting nominations is 5 p.m. PT on March 29. Categories include team player, mentoring champion, marvelously positive, best presenter, early bird and scholarly product extraordinaire.

CALS faculty and staff — Register for the 2024 UI Extension Annual Conference, scheduled for April 8-11 in Moscow including All CALS Day on Tuesday, April 9.