See below for project titles from our most recent graduates (2017-2023). This list illustrates the vast array of research opportunities afforded by the NRSM program, and we hope it will spark your drive to discover what problem you will solve. Where possible, we have linked to the student's work as published in the Digital Conservancy.
Assessment, Monitoring, and Geospatial Analysis
2022-2023
- Investigating the Use of Fallout Radionuclides Beryllium-7 and Excess Lead-210 as Short-Term Stream Sediment Chronometers in the Agricultural Upper Midwest, USA
- Modeling aspen yield, aspen site index, and the effects of sustainable timber harvest on wildlife habitat in Minnesota and the Lake States
- Semi-Automated Detection of Invasive Phragmites australis Using Uncrewed Aircraft Systems
2021-2022
- Characterizing the temporal dynamics of Minnesota wetlands using LandTrendr in Google Earth Engine
- Incorporating remote sensing into forest carbon accounting using model-based and model-assisted estimators
- The need to reconfigure aspen stand management guidelines in the western Great Lakes under climate change
- Predicting forest carbon content and tree canopy cover on Forest Inventory and Analysis plots along a forest-prairie gradient
2020-2021
- Comprehensive review and evaluation of whole stand volume yield models for the aspen forest type in Minnesota, USA
2019-2020
- Advancing estimation of timber products output in the Lake States Region of the northern United States
- Remote sensing-based approaches for large-scale comprehensive assessments of tree cover and windbreaks in the Great Plains region of the United States
- Using single-photon Lidar and multispectral imagery for enhancing forest inventories
2018-2019
- Deriving accurate diameter and height measurements of trees from terrestrial Lidar and unmanned aerial systems
2017-2018
- Making national forest inventory data relevant for local forest management
- Urban tree canopy mapping and measuring using high-resolution remotely sensed data
- The vulnerability of northern high-latitude ecosystems to climate and disturbance-induced change
Economics, Policy, Management, and Society
2023-2024
- Identifying the Factors that Constrain and Facilitate the Adoption of Agroforestry Practices by Minnesota and Wisconsin Agricultural Producers
- Using Self Determination Theory to Understand the Motivations of Minnesota Anglers
- Landowner Attitudes Toward Elk in Minnesota: Tolerance, Management Acceptability, and Support for Restoring an Elk Population
2022-2023
- A Model of Risk, Communication, and Environmental Behavior
- Beyond the message: Examining how engaging message mediums impact visitor displacement in emerald ash borer-treated woodlands
- Comparing the impacts of community-based tourism development on local livelihoods and empowerment
- “Visit, Meet, and Walk the Land Together”: A History of US Forest Service and Tribal Nation Relationships in Sacred Sites Management & A Case Study on the Medicine Wheel/Medicine Mountain National Historic Landmark
2021-2022
- Building place-based stories about climate change locally: Ecocultural calendars
- Environmental Impact Assessment: Closing the Gap Between Scientists and Practitioners
- A qualitative study of Minnesota forestry based on logger experiences and the development of county land departments
- (Re)Imagining the City: Urban agriculture, policy, and social justice
2020-2021
- Addressing climate change uncertainty in forest planning: A multi-stage optimization model with multiple futures and price sensitive demands
- Comparing urban community gardens in the Twin Cities Metropolitan Area
- Ecosystem services and coastal adaptations to climate change: An interdisciplinary science-based application in The Gambia
- From Risk to Resilience: Exploring the potential of ecosystem-based adaptation to deliver social and ecological co-benefits
- Indicators of volunteer retention in environmental stewardship programs
- Land manager decision-making practices when establishing public fruit-bearing plants in Hennepin County municipalities, Minnesota
- Pak Mun Dam and its impact on local residents of Ubon Ratchathani Province, Thailand: A quantitative analysis
- Strategic sustainability: Leading corporate change for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions through reputation, dynamic capabilities and interorganizational relationships
- Workforce diversity in federal natural resource organizations
2019-2020
- Blooming alleys for better health: Exploring impacts of small-scale greenspaces on neighborhood wellbeing
- Changes in community capitals and understanding factors influencing medicinal plant traditions in rural Tlaxcala, Mexico
- Community forest enterprise governance in the Maya Biosphere Reserve
- Identifying the information and assistance needs of a unique segment of Minnesota's private forest landowners: A focus on landowners who sought professional information from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources
- Indigenous phenology: An interdisciplinary case study on Indigenous phenological knowledge on the Menominee Nation Forest
- Predicting local and state-level water risk perceptions in Minnesota
- Barriers to barriers: An exploration of snow fence adoption and ramón seed market potential
- What good are volunteers? Understanding the impact of volunteers on community capacity to manage urban forest resources
- Yards as critical urban green spaces: Understanding resident yardscape uses and preferences through an interdisciplinary lens
2018-2019
- Communicating risk and increasing civic engagement in water protection in Minnesota
- Private landownership and Walk-in Access program enrollment: Motivating factors of landowner attitudes and participatory decision-making
- What is the value of knowing the value of water?
2017-2018
- Climate Adaptation and Local Narratives: Using qualitative inquiry to inform adaptive management on the North Shore of Lake Superior Minnesota, USA
- Environmental education for forest resources management in Loliondo Area, Northern Tanzania
- Examining collective-efficacy as a framework for watershed scale resource management
- How diets affect human health and environmental sustainability
- Improving performance assessment for technologies of energy transition: Emissions, economics, and policy implications
- Life-cycle assessment of thermally-modified southern pine decking
- Storytelling with data: Designing a map-based website on the global food system
- Volunteer performance in urban forest survey initiatives
Forest Hydrology and Watershed Management
2021-2022
- Analysis of stormwater runoff from impervious surfaces in downtown Minneapolis, MN
- In search of the phosphorus legacy: merging hydrological and biogeochemical approaches to understand phosphorus dynamics in streams.
2020-2021
- Interpretive machine learning to improve predictions of fluvial sediment transport
- Mapping invasive Phragmites australis using unmanned aircraft system imagery, canopy height models, and synthetic aperture radar
2019-2020
- Effect of forest cover change on streamflow in low relief glaciated catchments
- Effect of stream channel incision on the depth to groundwater in riparian corridors across southwestern Minnesota
- Treatment wetland vegetation harvesting for phosphorus removal in Upper Midwest agricultural watersheds
2018-2019
- Assessment of lead and beryllium sorption to exposed stream channel sediment under varying freshwater channel conditions
- Effects of snow cover manipulation and climate factors on the development of soil frost in forested boreal peatlands in Minnesota, USA
- Place-based learning: An integration of stormwater management concepts and monitoring data at Edison High School
- Restored vegetation outcomes in wetland mitigation banks across Minnesota
2017-2018
- Assessment of the impacts of various grazing management strategies on southern Minnesota stream channels
- Effects of simulated emerald ash borer disturbance on carbon and nitrogen cycling in black ash wetland soils in the Great Lakes region, USA
- From skid trail to landscapes: Vegetation is the dominant factor influencing erosion after forest harvest in a low relief, heavily glaciated landscape
- Understanding potential agricultural owner-operator and tenant adoption of saturated buffers in Elm Creek Watershed, Minnesota
- Water quality benefits of a Minnesota floodwater storage impoundment
Forests: Biology, Ecology, Conservation, and Management
2023-2024
- Stewarding Floodplain Forests in a Changing Climate: Assisted Migration and Spring Tree Phenology in an Urban Climate Change Experiment and Monitoring for Floodplain Tree Regeneration
- Implications for management of eastern larch beetle and emerald ash borer and their impact on lowland forest types across the Great Lakes region
- The resin defenses of eastern larch in response to eastern larch beetle: exploring insect-host dynamics under changing climatic conditions
- Tree canopy cover and phenology affect watershed-level event scale dynamics of stormwater nutrients in Saint Paul, Minnesota
- Tradeoffs for Birdsfoot Trefoil Management in a Tallgrass Prairie: University of Minnesota Landscape Arboretum Case Study
- Mapping Oak (Quercus spp.) Stewardship Potential Within the Nantahala National Forest
- Forest carbon estimation associated with fire disturbances in the western United States
- Influence of temperature on development of eastern larch beetle Dendroctonus simplex LeConte
and reproductive success in two novel Larix hosts - Stand Dynamics and Stand Development of Conventional and Mixedwood Aspen Systems in Northern Minnesota
- Management and Impacts of Oak Wilt in Lake States Forests
2022-23
- Adaptation to Climate Change: Impacts of Forest Management, Rainfall Reduction, and Warming on Minnesota Tree Species
- Dynamics and Comparisons of Plant Diversity and Aboveground Carbon Storage Between Old-Growth and Second-Growth Maple-Basswood Forests in Southern Minnesota
- Entomological investigations in a novel agroforestry crop to the Midwestern US: Arthropod pests, their damage, distributions, and resistance factors associated with hybrid hazelnuts (Corylus americana x Corylus avellana)
- Multiple Disturbances and the Turbulent Forest
- Restoring Oak Savannas with Multiple Disturbances: Thinning, Burning, and Targeted Cattle Grazing
- The role of temperature in the phenology of temperate and boreal tree species
2021-2022
- Ecological behavior of velvet longhorned beetle Trichoferus campestris (Coleoptera: Cerambycidae), including hosts and phenology
- Effects of eastern spruce dwarf mistletoe (Arceuthobium pusillum Peck) infestation in lowland black spruce (Picea mariana (Mill.) B.S.P.) at multiple scales
- Effects of flooding and light on the performance of potential replacement species in black ash wetland forests
- Effects of throughfall reduction and snow removal on soil physical and biogeochemical properties in aspen forests of northern Minnesota, USA
- Evaluating regeneration and stand dynamics in tamarack stands impacted by eastern larch beetle in northern Minnesota, USA
- Influence of Eastern dwarf mistletoe and fungi on regeneration health and composition in lowland black spruce post-harvest
- Influence of land-use history & jumping worm invasion on species richness & composition of maple-basswood understory plant communities
- A national assessment of states' forest management guidelines and the policy tools used to achieve their implementation
- Using the US National Forest Inventory to model and simulate forest dynamics, composition, and land conversion
2020-2021
- Compaction and case studies: Applied silviculture
- Impacts of prescribed burns and severe weather events on oak wilt transmission in central Minnesota
- The photosynthetic process will shape how tree species from the boreal-temperate ecotone will fare in the future climate
2019-2020
- Analysis of factors influencing mortality of young trees in the Midwest
- Black spruce alternative silvicultural methods and dwarf mistletoe in northern Minnesota, USA
- Lost in the Forest: Seeking the narrative networks, echo-chambers, and boundaries of science in the institution of public resource management in Oregon and Texas
- Vegetation response to adaptive silviculture treatment aimed at climate change in northern Minnesota, USA
2018-2019
- Analysis of future climate-biome envelopes and bur oak succession potential of the Western Great Lake States
- Climate change and future forests of the Boundary Canoe Waters Area Wilderness: An assessment of temperate tree abundance, earthworm invasion and understory regeneration trends
- Controlling reed canarygrass (Phalaris arundinacea) and restoring floodplain forest in the Upper Mississippi River Valley
- The effects of biochar, weed control, and irrigation on the growth and survival of jack pine seedlings and native plant communities in northern Minnesota, USA
- The effect of season of prescribed fire on richness and abundance of breeding bird species and vegetation structure in Minnesota lowland brush ecosystems
- Invasion of the gypsy moth (Lymantria dispar) in Minnesota: The dispersal capacity of late instar larvae and stakeholder perspectives of the gypsy moth issue
- Managing for future oak forests in the hardwood hills of Minnesota – a 20 year journey
- Seasonal prescribed burning impacts to northern Minnesota lowland brush ecosystem plant communities
2017-2018
- Identifying physiological and growth-allocation strategies among varying resource availabilities enabling Scotch broom (Cytisus scoparius (L.) Link) dominance in recently clearcut Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii (Mirb.) Franco var. menziesii) forests of the western Pacific Northwest
- Impacts of multiple fires and wind disturbance on forest community composition, succession and diversity in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness
- Forest restoration in Eastern Madagascar: Post-fire survival of select Malagasy tree species
- Short- and long-term effects of alternative silvicultural systems on stand development of lowland black spruce forests in northern Minnesota, USA
Recreation Resources, Tourism, and Environmental Education
2020-2021
2019-2020
- Being and becoming in nature: Connection to nature in early childhood
- Social media and safety messaging: Needs and opportunities for the St. Croix National Scenic Riverway
2018-2019
- Does awareness-making elicit meaning-making in Bell Museum visitors? A mixed-methods study of a natural history moose exhibit
- Professional interpretive planners provide recommendations for writing engaging text
- Substitution interests among active-sport tourists: The case of a cross-country ski event
2017-2018
Tribal Natural Resources (new track beginning in 2022)
2023-2024
- Handicraft Production Influences on Gender, Livelihoods, and Natural Resources Management in Maya Communities
General program track (new option beginning in 2020)
2023-2024
- Biochar And Ecosystem Recovery: Evaluating Artificial Regeneration Outcomes And Understory Plant Community Dynamics In Response To Top-Dress Amendments In Northern Minnesota
- Hunting for Hemlock: Locating, restoring, and expanding eastern hemlock (Tsuga canadensis (L.) Carr.) presence in Minnesota
2022-2023
- Influence of urban canopies on throughfall nutrient composition and DOM optical properties, and the decomposition of urban leaf litter
- Professional Guidelines: Assessing Iowa’s Environmental Educators and Naturalists
- Program Manual for Team Tree: Youth Engagement in Arboriculture
2021-2022