Second Post-Workshop Communication 13 January 2008
Global Soil Change and LT Soil-Ecosystem Studies
To: GSC 2007 Workshop Participants
Fr: Dan Richter & Mike Hofmockel
Thanks are still owed to each of you for active participation at our remarkable workshop!
As the second communication in response to our workshop, this is still very much an experiment. Monthly communication seems do-able in this form, at least for the immediate future; let’s approach this like any good experiment. Comments, suggestions, critiques, or new ideas are encouraged. We are strongest working together.
A. Workshop-Related Business
1. Progress on workshop summary submissions. We have “assigned” each of you to submit a workshop summary to a suggested news outlet. “Assignments!!” are found in the table below the draft workshop-summary at the url:
http://ltse.env.duke.edu/gsc07_coordination
The goal is one submission per person, and while time is passing and we should submit workshop summaries soon, this is not a difficult task. Edit the draft workshop summary to satisfy yourself, then send it to a newsletter or journal with your name as first author. Keep Mike and Dan Richter informed, so that we can send congratulations!!
2. Update on Seeds of Discovery “Homework.” The first 500-word draft has been received, this from David Powlson, who addressed the question, “Why I am working on long-term sites” which is posted at:
http://ltse.env.duke.edu/node/920
Remember “homework” essays can address “Why I am working on long-term sites?”, or “How to make long-term soil studies work harder?” or “What are key findings that can only be discovered in long-term soil studies?” If you feel inclined, you might supplement your short essay with a figure or table that demonstrate how short-term studies may be misleading compared with soil and ecosystem trajectories that become apparent only with long-term study. Our target date for drafts is 15 January.
3. How to post your own poster on LTSE website! If you presented a poster at the 2007 Workshop (Meg, Gobina, David, Mike, Jianwei, DanielM, DanR, Jason, Julie, and Arlene), convert the poster to a pdf file and post it on our LTSEs website!! This is easy, and here’s how!! Note that the following easy steps are useful for many website applications.
a. Login, click on Create Content (upper screen), select and click on Publication from list of content types.
b. In the Submit Publication window, enter the Title of your poster; enter the Publisher as “Global Soil Change workshop - Dec2007 - Duke University”;
enter Authors with first authors family name first;
enter Year as “2007”;
select “Poster” from the pull-down of Publication Types;
enter Kewords as “Global Soil Change workshop 07”;
then browse and attach your pdf file, clicking “Upload”;
and finally, click the submit button on the bottom of the form.
4. LTSEs website will highlight new projects list and workshop notes.
A list of new ideas for projects, papers, reviews, and cross-site projects will soon be posted on the website’s “Global Soil Change 07” pull-down list (left hand side of main page). Meeting notes will also be available at the same location.
5. Planning future workshops & themes. I have been re-considering the how to organize future workshops. I was impressed with our workshop dynamics that sprang directly from breadth of our deliberations. I now think that each future workshop should have a theme, for example, LTSEs and the global carbon cycle, but that each future workshop should also be about how to network LTSEs irrespective of the workshop theme. Your reactions will be appreciated.
I will be developing ideas about the second workshop in the upcoming few months. In addition to themes and locations, an important issue concerns future participants. We need to build breadth of community, so we need to invite new persons to our table. As much as I’d like to be able to invite each of you to all five workshops, we won’t be able to do this given constraints of budget.
B. The Larger LT Soil Research Base Project
1. Exciting cross-site fellowship opportunities for PhD students and post-docs. Although not massive, we have about $10,000 set aside in years two to five for travel and research support for students and post-docs who aim conduct research on a question at several LTSEs. In the coming months, I will write a short Request for Short Proposals statement(RFSP), have the RFSP reviewed by some of you, set a submission date, and then convene three or four of us to review cross-site research proposals, and award funds. We can invite awardees to future workshops. Suggestions about any of this are welcome.
2. I’m writing a content paper, that will be co-authored by us all, aimed at Nature, Science, or BioScience, journals with broad readership that allows us to expand the base of persons who value LTSEs. I’ve corresponded with BioScience Editor who has expressed great interest. I plan to finish a first draft then post it on the website for review by us all.
3. Recruitment of popular science writers. I have contacted Mike Tennessen and Monte Basgall and other popular science writers about our project. The workshop PowerPoint presentations, posters, and Seeds of Discovery essays and will be introductory materials we can provide these writers.
6. Ouch!! Still Lost: A Duke Univ library book, Gene Likens’ Long Term Ecological Research is checked out to Richter and traveled to CEFS in Goldsboro. It is a small dark green hardback, so kplease return if the book walked home with you.
NEWS FOR Third Post-Workshop Communiqué
On-going Business
1. Seeds of Discovery essays
2. Cross-site fellowship opportunities for PhD students and post-docs
3. Progress with popular science writer
4. Future workshops & themes
5. Linkage of LTSEs project with IUSS working group
6. Content paper, co-authored by us all
New Business
1. Project Ceres! (something brand new!).