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students to research water
without getting wet
by Marie Zhuikov
High school and community college students in Minnesota are getting
the opportunity to conduct water research from the comfort of
their computer chairs. The National Science Foundation awarded
the University of Minnesota's Sea Grant Program, Natural
Resources Research Institute, and College of Education and
Human Service Professions, $656,600 for a high-tech, three-year
project where students can create their own water monitoring projects
using Geographic Information System technology, the Internet and
robotic Remote
Underwater Sampling Station Site (RUSS) units developed by
University and industry partners. Although the project is beginning
in Minnesota, the information is accessible to anyone with an
Internet link.
"We expect that students benefiting from this project will become
the highly-skilled environmental scientists and technicians of
tomorrow," said Bruce Munson, Sea Grant Marine Educator. "In order
to succeed as scientists and environmental technicians in the
future, students need to become familiar with this technology
now."
Teams of academic, science, and technology specialists have developed
a curriculum that teaches basic science concepts. The studies
are done with the help of RUSS, a patent-pending water sampling
robot that students program to gather, measure, analyze, chart
and report water quality data. RUSS units have been placed in
four diverse Minnesota lakes so students can compare and contrast
"real-time" data from differing sites.
The RUSS units are powered by solar energy and use cellular phone
transmissions to relay data via specially-designed software. "RUSS
has the capability to operate continuously 24 hours a day," said
Rich Axler, an aquatic ecologist at the Natural Resources Research
Institute. "This provides students the opportunity to design their
own experiments and answer their own questions, such as how a
major storm affects water quality."
Four of these robotic Remote Underwater Sampling Stations
have been placed in Minnesota lakes to help students gather water
quality data.
"Each RUSS unit can be accessed by several students and still
maintain each individual's data, which makes RUSS perfectly suited
for this project," said Cindy Hagley, Sea Grant Water Quality
Educator.
Final curricula has been disseminated through printed materials,
an interactive compact disk, a Web site, in-service training workshops,
and presentations at professional conferences.
For more information about this project, contact Bruce Munson
at 218.726.6324.
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