Penn State Postcard: Forestry Building

There are so many impressive facilities at University Park.  The new Forestry Building is just one of them.  While waiting for a writer to finish interviewing a faculty member I made this picture looking down into the lobby where students have a comfortable place to talk and study.  It is right outside the big auditorium and one of the many useful spaces.  The building houses faculty and staff in three programs: Forest Science, Wildlife and Fisheries Science, and Wood Products.  Students in these programs will find exceptional labs, classrooms, and other fine facilities. 

And the view looks out over the new Arboretum at Penn State.  It's a fine part of campus. 

Signs of Spring at University Park

I made this picture at the Berkey Creamery on my way back to my office on Friday. It’s still chilly in the morning, not the balmy sort of weather that will fill the outdoor seating to capacity, but it was a bit more evidence that warm weather isn’t too far off.

Earlier in the day I was looking at the trees and shrubs that will be planted, maybe this week, at the Arboretum at Penn State. There are thousands of perennial plants, trees and shrubs waiting to turn what looks like a huge construction site into the H.O. Smith Botanic Gardens. Surely a sign of spring at Penn State.

If that isn’t enough then mud surely is evidence of spring thawing. This mud was at the Arboretum. Unfortunately some of that mud followed me back to my office and across the carpet of the College Relations office. Another sign of spring is an extra pair of boots in my truck. 

The footprints on the carpet reminded me of a cartoon from The Family Circus.

I’m in trouble.

The Millenium Science Complex

On the way to work this morning I stopped to look at the Millenium Science Complex construction at the corner of Bigler and Pollock Roads.  It's a big project and when completed will bring together the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences and the Materials Research Institute, both enterprises that researchers in the College of Ag Sciences participate.

I made this picture this morning from the top of the Eisenhower Parking Deck.  As a freshman in the summer of 1972 this area was intramural fields and tennis courts.  Thirty-seven years later a lot has changed as Penn State and Ag Sciences adapts to meet the needs and challenges of a changing world. It's hard to reconcile the science and math classes I had then  (Chem 12, Biol 11, and Math 62) with the work and challenges students face today.

Mount Nittany stills looks the same!

Multidisciplinary Research in Food Science

Beth Tirio is a graduate student in Chemical Engineering working in the Department of Food Science at Penn State.  Graduate research and study embraces a multidisciplinary approach across the campus and allows all graduate students easy access to the people and technology they need to pursue their academic and scientific interests. Students in Ag Sciences as well as other programs learn to reach across institutional boundaries early here. 

Tirio is working with Greg Ziegler, professor of food science, on a spray drying project in the dry Pilot Plant located in the new Food Science Building.

Tirio is working to develop a pilot plant level spray drying process that will allow food ingredient manufacturers to consider spray drying  as a feasible alternative to ingredient manufacturing.  Before going on I should explain what spray drying is.  Think of some ingredient mixed in water inside a spray bottle.  Spray into a stream of hot air which drives off the moisture and all that's left is the solid ingredient.  Sounds simple but until Tirio started work on her project successful spray drying was creating ingredients at the microgram level.

The Pilot Plants in the new building are outstanding facilities for the application and utilization of research for real world problems.  And this is only one of two pilot plants in Food Science.

The Challenge for Students, and Faculty, and Staff, and Everyone...

My boss sent this video to a group of us late yesterday. It is a sobering account of what faces us all in a world changing faster and faster. And it also outlines the challenge set before the College of Ag Sciences. New ideas, new tools, new skills and a growing flow of information is being met head on by a lot of the people I meet on a day to day basis.

It is an amazing place to work!