The Fall Technical Meeting 2012 You Should Have Been There

The Fall 2012 Technical Meeting of the Oklahoma Academy of Science was the place to be on November 9. There were more registrants and more presentations than in many recent meetings. The meeting was at the Nigh Center on the campus of the University of Central Oklahoma at Edmond. It is always inspiring to see such a concentration of talent and passion for science in science students and faculty in our state. Some people think that Oklahoma has little science in it. But they would be wrong, and there is no better place to see it than at the Oklahoma Academy of Science. OAS is grateful to UCO for hosting this meeting.

There were many student and faculty presentations, in over a dozen different fields of science, from botany to zoology to engineering to microscopy to engineering.

Below are some photos of people that you may recognize: Craig Clifford, president, and Valerie O'Brien, secretary; Executive Director David Bass explaining the budget; Sheila Strawn, Ken Hobson, and Adam Ryburn.

Vic Hutchison, Professor Emeritus at OU, gave the keynote presentation. Vic is the grand old man of defending science education in Oklahoma. He told us about the work of Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education, which for many years has worked against creationist legislation in Oklahoma. Vic and OESE have gained national recognition for these efforts. Creationist legislation has so far been cut down whenever it appears, but it sort of seems like hydra-heads, always reappearing. It looks as if the people who oppose evolution the most do not know what it is, because they have allowed "natural selection" and "change through time" to be included in Oklahoma secondary school teaching standards. OESE has sponsored many workshops for teachers, and has recently expanded into north Texas and will soon focus on global climate change as well as evolution. Oklahoma has been privileged to have Vic Hutchison working for us. The final photo is of his presentation.

Posted by Stanley Rice, president-elect, OAS

Fall Field meeting

The Oklahoma Academy of Sciences had its fall field meeting on the weekend of September 21-23 at Boiling Springs State Park and the Selman Living Lab of the University of Central Oklahoma. Nice weather made the 1.7 billion sandburs tolerable. There were numerous field trips, in addition to the renewal of old, and the making of new, friendships (which is always one of the best parts of a scientific meeting).

I went on the two botany trips led by Gloria Caddell of UCO. Anyone who went on a different trip and would like to write about it, please let David Bass know (dbass@uco.edu) and we can include it in this blog. Photographs are welcome.

The first trip was in the park itself, where Dr. Caddell showed us how to distinguish among superficially-similar composite plants and different grasses. We got to know the forest trees, including soapberry, Kentucky coffee tree, honey locust, black locust, netleaf hackberry, and green ash. I for one was surprised that the small-leaved elms were the same species (American elm) that grows in the eastern part of the state and throughout the eastern deciduous forest. We also saw the Oklahoma champion bur oak tree.

The Selman living laboratory, about twenty miles away, is on shortgrass prairie land with numerous gypsum outcrops. We could clearly distinguish zones (usually between outcrops) that had been grazed in recent decades and the gypsum outcrops. The outcrops had less dense vegetation, which is why the cows had avoided them; these outcrops had different species from the grazed zones, including Phacelia integrifolia, a wildflower mostly restricted to gypsum outcrops. One of the field trip participants cracked open some alabaster (crystalline gypsum) and found some cyanobacteria growing inside the translucent alabaster.

The Selman Lab, and to a lesser extent Boiling Springs, are exactly the kinds of places about which many of my students would say, “There’s nothing out here.” But I find it always inspiring to see how many different species of plants (and animals, which the herpetology group pursued) can survive in a hostile environment, and in so many different ways. Grasses, with thin leaves and deep roots, thrive in the same place as small cacti, with succulent stems and shallow roots.

Don’t forget to register (http://oas.uco.edu) for the Technical Meeting, which will be November 9 at UCO.

Field trip participants learn botany from Gloria Caddell.

Cyanobacteria grow underneath alabaster--inside of a rock.

The largest bur oak tree in Oklahoma.

Gleditsia triacanthos, the honey locust, has formidable thorns.



Global warming information session in Tulsa on May 17

The Oklahoma Academy of Science is one of the sponsors of a global warming information session that will take place in the Aaronson Auditorium of the Central Library in downtown Tulsa on Thursday, May 17, from 6:30 to 8:30 pm. The other sponsor is Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education.

Dr. Stanley Rice will give a presentation and then lead a discussion about global warming. I am the author of several science books. Two of them (Green Planet: How Plants Keep the Earth Alive and Encyclopedia of Biodiversity) have extensive coverage of global warming. A PDF file of the text of the presentation will be available on my website under “presentations” shortly before the session.

Global warming is beginning to surpass evolution as the hot topic of science education today, and that is why OAS and OESE are interested in it. As with creationism, global warming denialism is based on inaccurate science and often on religious assertions that have no clear connection with religious tradition. In addition, there is a strong motivation by some industry groups to deny global warming. At the same time, many other industries are ready to pursue clean energy, and many religious groups want to protect what they see as God’s creation from damage caused by humans.

My professional connection to the science of global warming is that I have a multi-year study of the effects of climate change on budburst times in deciduous trees, and I studied the effects of carbon dioxide on plant growth when I was in graduate school.

The event is free and open to the public. Expect a diverse crowd: the Tulsa geologists (many of whom are petroleum geologists) have been invited to participate in the audience and discussion.

Posted by: Stanley Rice, president-elect

Welcome to the Oklahoma Academy of Science blog!

Welcome to the blog of the Oklahoma Academy of Science! On this site, the leadership of OAS will post entries about recent and upcoming activities of the Oklahoma Academy of Science. We will let you know of the interesting things that our very active Academy has done or is doing. Since the posts will be permanently archived, this site is the place to go to find photos and stories about Academy activities starting in 2012. Posted by: Stanley Rice, president-elect