Undergraduate student, Mykael Pineda, was awarded an Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP) Individual Grant for her “Climate Sensitive Post-Fire Management” project. She will be co-mentored by Holly Barnard and GEOG Alum Teresa Chapman from The Nature Conservancy. Mykael will be using this work as the basis of her honors thesis.

Mykael will be using GIS mapping technology to determine the accessibility of seedling planting sites by foot and reports she is "grateful for the opportunity and optimistic about what the future holds!"

���Ҵ�ý�ƽ������ has a rich culture for cultivating undergraduates as emerging scholars, artists and practicing researchers. UROP provides consultation services, workshops, and grants to promote undergraduate research as a high-impact learning practice for student success. Each year UROP funds hundreds of students who produce new knowledge and creative work with CU's world-class faculty. For more information see the ���Ҵ�ý�ƽ������ Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program page.

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Western U.S. forests killed by the mountain pine beetle epidemic are no more at risk to burn than healthy Western forests, according to new findings by the University of Colorado Boulder that fly in the face of both public perception and policy.

The CU-Boulder study authors looked at the three peak years of Western wildfires since 2002, using maps produced by federal land management agencies. The researchers superimposed maps of areas burned in the West in 2006, 2007 and 2012 on maps of areas identified as infested by mountain pine beetles.

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Results of a new study show that episodes of reduced precipitation in the Southern Rocky Mountains, especially during the 2001-2002 drought, greatly accelerated a rise in numbers of mountain pine beetles. The overabundance is a threat to regional forests.

The research is the first to chart the evolution of the current pine beetle epidemic in the southern Rocky Mountains.

It compared patterns of beetle outbreaks in the two primary host species, the ponderosa pine and lodgepole pine, said University of Colorado at Boulder (CU-Boulder) researcher Teresa Chapman.

A paper on the subject is published in the current issue of the journal Ecology. Chapman is lead author of the paper; co-authors include CU-Boulder scientists Thomas Veblen and Tania Schoennagel.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) funded the research.

See more at 

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The CU-Boulder Outreach has awarded Professor Tom Veblen $5000 for an outreach project focusing on historical perspectives and ecological impacts of the September 2010 Fourmile Canyon wildfire. The Fourmile Canyon fire was the most destructive wildland fire in Colorado's history, destroying more than 160 homes and burning over 6,000 acres of forest. There is an urgent need for historical perspective on wildfires and post-fire regeneration. Graduate students Meredith Gartner, Teresa Chapman, Cameron Naficy and Monica Rother will work on this project which will include an exhibit to be displayed at the CU-Boulder Museum on campus and a website on wildfire history and wildfire hazard in Boulder County to connect the Veblen lab’s fire research to local residents, K-12 educators, land managers, and policymakers.
See for more information.

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Teresa Chapman has been awarded a Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Award for 2010-2011 from the Geography and Spatial Sciences Program of the National Science Foundation. Teresa is conducting research on mountain pine beetle and fire influences on the regeneration of lodgepole pine in northern Colorado.

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