11 news posts related to Graduate Students

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Shallow soda lakes show promise as cradles of life on Earth

people walk across a lake that has a salty crust

Charles Darwin proposed that life could have emerged in a “warm little pond” with the right cocktail of chemicals and energy. A new study from the University of Washington reports that a shallow “soda lake” in western Canada shows promise for matching those requirements. The findings provide new support that life could have emerged from lakes on the early Earth, roughly 4 billion years ago.

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In the Field: Tracking seismic clues in one of the driest places on Earth

UW doctoral student collects rock samples on dry, brown hills in Chile’s Atacama Desert.

Unlike the Pacific Northwest, the Atacama Desert in Chile experiences very little rain. But the two regions are both seismically active. Faults in the Atacama Desert are slowly sliding past each other in a way similar to the Seattle Fault in Puget Sound and the San Andreas Fault in California. The Atacama Desert’s lack of rain makes it easier to see how those gradual movements shape the landscape over time. 

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DNA shows where Washington culvert replacements helped spawning salmon

people sample water in a stream at the mouth of a culvert

To help struggling salmon populations, the state of Washington is legally required to replace hundreds of culverts that divert streams under roadways. The state transportation department is replacing old, rusting metal pipes with broad, concrete promenades that provide more gradual gradients and gentler flows for salmon swimming upstream to access more spawning grounds. The full scope of the effort will last 17 years and cost $3.8 billion. 

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Spring Celebration honors 2022-23 UW Environment award winners

2023 Spring Celebration

Join us for an afternoon of games, food and merriment as we celebrate our outstanding College community! All College faculty, staff, students, postdocs and their guests are invited to attend. UW College of the Environment Spring Celebration Thursday, May 25, 2023, 2:30 – 4 pm Fishery Sciences Building (FSH), 1122 NE Boat Street We also celebrate the College of the Environment award recipients at the 2023 Spring Celebration. 

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