RESEARCH & PRACTICUM
INTERNSHIP WITH BIOSPHERE
Research Intern Title: Bio Systems Research
Number of Internships: Multiple Positions
Research Faculty: Dr. Joost Van Haren
Hours of Research/Class: 10 hrs/week
Class meeting time; Monday, 4-6 pm.
2
Duration: Spring Semester, 2016
Honors Credits: 3 – Grading: Superior, Pass, Fail
Application Deadline: Number of internships is limited,
so please apply early. Positions open until filled
Salary: Unpaid
SUMMARY: The Biosphere (B2) internships are suited for Honors students interested in exploring and engaging in the
scientific research, and related outreach, being conducted at the B2 facility. B2 offers unique opportunities because of its
ability to combine varying scales, precise manipulation, and fine monitoring in controlled experiments related to
hydrology, geology, geochemistry, ecology, biology, physics, engineering, atmospheric sciences, education and outreach,
and assessment. Continuation of projects beyond the initial semester internship is encouraged. A B2 van typically drives
from UA main campus to B2 each weekday and can be utilized by active interns. Individuals completing this research
internship will gain experience in conducting research from the idea and proposal writing to data analysis and
presentation. To learn more about B2; http://b2science.org/
MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS
REQUIRED APPLICATION MATERIALS
-Education – Preference given to sophomore and above
-Completed Application
-Cum GPA – 3.2
-Resume
-Name of a Faculty Reference
KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS, AND ABILITIES:
-Scientific interest and background
-Desire and motivation to continually learn, reflect, improve, and innovate
-Ability to travel to B2 as needed (a minimum of one day or two half days per week)
INTERN RESPONSIBILITIES:
WHAT YOU WILL LEARN:
-Meet regularly with faculty and cohort members (10 hours)
-How to work through a science/outreach project
-Work independently on a project (135 hours)
-Techniques to measure environmental variables
-Perform analysis of environmental data
-Confidence to interact with the public visiting B2
-Assist in the creation of outreach materials to interpret
-Understanding of the science process
work to the B2 visitors
-Understanding of science communication
-Handle B2 data confidentially and professionally
-Maintain professional relationships with fellow interns & B2 staff
-Present findings at the end of the semester
INTERNSHIP WITH BIOSPHERE 2
APPLICATION INSTRUCTIONS
Spring 2016
Please submit your completed application early in the semester. Positions are open until filled. Email
application and resume directly to Honors Internship Coordinator, Sharon Overstreet at
sharono1@email.arizona.edu .
Your application should include the following:
 A completed application, including additional pages to address the five questions.
 Résumé, including descriptions of relevant laboratory, field, or data analysis experience
We encourage you to contact the researcher(s) you are interested in working with before you start the
application process.
Complete all demographic and reference information below.
Name:
Student ID#:
Email Address:
Phone Number:
Permanent Address:
Summer Address:
Major(s):
College:
Class Standing:
Cumulative GPA:
Projected Date of Graduation:
Current Career Goals:
Faculty Reference Name:
Faculty Reference email:
Faculty Reference phone number:
Please use additional pages to answer the following questions:
Question #1: Why you are interested in the Biosphere 2 Honors internship opportunity? (150-word limit)
Question #2: As an intern at Biosphere 2, you would be part of a team that performs scientific research and
outreach. What important and/or unique traits would you bring to the team that would further the mission of
Biosphere 2? (200-word limit)
Question #3: What role should science play in society? (250-word limit)
Question #4: Review the Biosphere 2 project ideas (attached) that are included in the internship description,
and list your top three choices (researcher name and project topic). Describe why these topics are of interest to
you. Why are these projects important and worth pursuing? (350-word limit).
Question #5: Discuss your current extracurricular activities. (List and describe up to five activities)
In addition to submitting written responses to the five questions above, please attach your one page résumé
to this document.
*Please contact the staff or faculty member in each project area before applying to discuss your
interest area.
BIOSPHERE 2 RESEARCH PROJECT IDEAS:
Topics for Honors interns include the areas described below. Detailed research questions, methodologies, and
scheduling will be determined via collaborative dialogue between the Honors intern and the Biosphere 2
mentor(s). The number of students that can be paired with any given mentor is limited, so please consider
having a back-up mentor or two in mind when applying. We encourage you to contact the researcher(s) you are
interested in working with before you start the application process. You are welcome to propose additional
topics, but these are the ones for which we are best prepared to support.
Education and Outreach, Translating Research Findings for the Public
Kevin Bonine, kebonine@email.arizona.edu, Biosphere 2, College of Science, Ecology & Evolutionary Biology
Dr. Bonine is a herpetologist, ecologist, evolutionary biologist, and conservation biologist. He is also the
Director of Education and Outreach at Biosphere 2. Myriad opportunities are available with him to study how
best to engage visitors and school groups at Biosphere 2, how best to teach complex ecosystem principles, and
how to ensure that researchers present their findings in a way that the public can understand. Talking with
visitors, generating surveys, planning nature trails or educational playgrounds, refining age-appropriate
lessons, teaching school kids, and deploying wildlife cameras can all be part of your internship experience.
Program evaluation
Kevin Bonine kebonine@email.arizona.edu or Joost van Haren, jvanhare@email.arizona.edu
In science and outreach not enough time is taken to evaluate in how far the programs, strategies, or exhibits are
actually accomplishing what they were designed for. Evaluation requires a clear communication of the leader
to state the objectives and goals of a program, then an evaluator can design a methodology to test which
objectives and goals are reached. Students can work with Kevin Bonine or Joost van Haren to develop and
implement program evaluation of projects potentially related, but not limited, to the visitor programs, exhibits,
tours, research projects, and needs assessment. The students would work with Allison Titcomb (a University
evaluation expert) to determine the relevant methodologies and assessment strategy.
Soil Chemistry and Soil Formation
Katerina Dontsova, dontsova@email.arizona.edu, Biosphere 2
With Dr. Dontsova, students will have the opportunity to participate in one of several ongoing projects at B2
that focus on soil formation processes. The projects range in scale from Landscape Evolution Observatory (
LEO) (340 m2 area, 1 m soil depth) to large mesocosms with mesquite and grasses ( 0.26 m2 area, 1 m depth) to
smaller and more controlled systems (20 cm2 area, 30 cm depth). Students can observe the changes that are
happening in the rock during initial stages of soil formation as a result of water flow and biological activity. In
the small mesocosms students will be working on establishing the role of root-mycorrhizae-bacterial
associations on the extent of total weathering and chemical denudation. Specifically, to what extent does the
biota (plants and microbes) contribute to weathering rock to form high surface area secondary solids while also
diminishing the loss of weathering products in solution. Interns may use direct measurements and geochemical
modeling. Dr. Dontsova and her colleagues have hypothesized that plant and microbial/fungal effects are
synergistic and not simply additive. In larger mesocosms research can link measured weathering, denudation,
and carbon sequestration in the soil to water transpiration, plant photosynthesis, and plant and soil
respiration; while LEO research can focus on development of subsurface heterogeneity through hydrologicgeochemical coupling.
Ecology and Carbon & Water Cycling
Dr. Greg Barron-Gafford, gregbg@email.arizona.edu, Biosphere 2 and School of Geography
Dr. Barron-Gafford studies ecohydrology in mountain and valley ecosystems in the desert southwest. His
interdisciplinary research involves measuring leaf and soil carbon and water fluxes with the goal of better
understanding how semiarid environments will respond to climatic stresses of temperature, summer drought,
and reduced mountain snow input. He and his colleagues can estimate the component fluxes within subcanopy and canopy species in the Santa Catalina Mountains and in the Santa Rita Experimental Range that
border Tucson to the north and south, respectively. Potential projects include measuring carbon and water
exchange with the atmosphere in individual trees or whole sub-canopy plots to capture variation due to canopy
cover (a biological influence), slope and/or aspect (a physical driver), and changing climate (atmospheric
influences). Methods may include measures of plant water status, hemispherical photography (to quantify
incoming solar radiation), and leaf/plot/soil gas exchange with the atmosphere. His group is interested in how
these ecosystems will perform under projected climate change scenarios, which species might begin
dominating the ecosystem, and how tightly coupled carbon uptake is to water availability in this semiarid, sky
island setting. The internship experience can include fieldwork or center on lab activities depending on student
interest and availability. More information on Barron-Gafford’s research and lab members can be found at
http://www.u.arizona.edu/~gregbg/Home.html
Water Movement Across the Landscape
Peter Troch and Luke Pangle, lpangle@email.arizona.edu, Biosphere 2 and Hydrology & Water Resources
Drs. Troch and Pangle want to better understand catchment scale hydrological processes, including water
transit time, through advanced measurement, modeling and synthesis methods. The objectives of their
research include: (1) Developing, testing and applying advanced observation methods for hydrological fluxes
and states at a range of spatial and temporal scales; (2) Developing hillslope to catchment scale hydrological
models for water and solute transport; and (3) Hydrological synthesis at the catchment scale with special
attention to hydrological extremes. The motivation of their work is to contribute to improved water resources
management in the light of climate change and other human influences on the hydrological cycle. Students
working in their lab may work on water transit time estimation using stable isotope data from rain and
streamflow samples. The internship experience can include field work, lab work that includes running the laser
spectrophotometer, and mathematical modeling of flow and transport processes at catchment scales.
Plant Growth, Physiology, and Phenology
David Moore, davidjpmoore@email.arizona.edu, School of Natural Resources and the Environment
Plants take up about half of all the carbon produced by humanity through the process of photosynthesis but
there are many unanswered questions about how long this will continue especially as spring arrives earlier and
autumn later, for some plant populations. Dr. Moore’s lab group aims to discover the environmental triggers
for major phenological events in cottonwood trees by studying patterns of leaf development, plant
photosynthesis, and growth. Interns will work at B2 using an experimental stand of trees. Depending on their
interests students can learn how to carry out physiological measurements, image analysis, spectral
measurements of leaves, and other laboratory techniques.
Computer modeling of terrestrial hydrology, ecology, and climate change
Guo-Yue Niu, niug@email.arizona.edu, Biosphere 2 and Hydrology & Water Resources
To enhance our understanding of the interactions between the soil, plants, and air and their integrated
behavior at hillslope and catchment scales, Dr. Niu’s group is developing a Terrestrial Integrated Modeling
System (TIMS) for modeling hydrological, microbial, geochemical, geomorphological, and ecological processes
at the Earth’s land surface. The coupled model will be used for interpreting LEO measurements and three other
projects funded by federal agencies: 1) an NSF-funded biology project for exploring the impacts of climate
change and rainfall redistribution over complex terrain on the spread of invasive species, 2) a DOE-funded
Earth System Model (ESM) project to develop a global high spatial resolution land surface modeling system for
studying the interactions between climate and the global water cycle, and 3) an NSF-funded project to study
the integrated processes of energy, water and carbon in the Jemez-Catalina Critical Zone.
Rainforest Response to Climate Change and trace gas exchange across the soil-atmosphere
boundary
Joost van Haren, jvanhare@email.arizona.edu, Biosphere 2 and Honors College Dr. van Haren studies the
effect of climate change on tropical ecosystem activity and in particular the exchange of greenhouse gases
across the soil-atmosphere boundary. Tropical forests are the most dynamic ecosystems in the world, however
they are threatened by deforestation and climate change. The potential response of tropical forests to climate
change is uncertain, because little experimentation under predicted future environmental conditions
(increased temperature and decreased precipitation) has been done in tropical ecosystems. Biosphere 2
provides an opportunity to study tropical ecosystem processes under future conditions. The student(s) involved
in this project will have the opportunity to work within the B2 tropical forest to investigate both plant and
microbial responses to changing temperature and precipitation. The exchange of greenhouse gases across the
soil-atmosphere boundary greatly influences the global budgets of these gases, but is still poorly understood,
especially in regard to the influence of biology on the rates. In Biosphere 2, students will have the opportunity
to measure the gas exchange in a range of ecosystems from pure bare soil (LEO) to tropical vegetation.