Lead Principal Investigator: Kartzinel, Tyler

Project Description: The PI for the recipient will recruit and select up to two undergraduate students for a summer work-study program. For 4-6 weeks, each student will travel to Yellowstone National Park and work alongside project biologists. Students will work with the park botanist or bison biologist. Students may collect and prepare herbaria specimens, secure plant tissue samples for DNA analysis, collect fecal samples from migrating large herbivores, complete plant inventory surveys, and set up or maintain grazing exclosures. Herbaria specimens will be retained within Yellowstone National Park. The PI will provide analyzed data to YELL and make plant DNA barcoding data publicly available. The PI will mentor the students during the remainder of the work study program in his laboratory at Brown University evaluating plant and fecal samples.

Lead Principal Investigator: Tyler Kartzinel, Brown University

Partner Institution: Brown University

Federal Agency: National Park Service

Federal Agency Technical Contact: Chris Geremia

Project Type: Research

Project Discipline: Natural Resources

Project Sub-Discipline: Biological (Ecology, Fish, Wildlife, Vegetation, T&E)

Start Year: 2023

End Year: 2024

Initial Funding Amount: $11,750.00

Federal Grant Number: P23AC00378

Location: Yellowstone NP

National Park or Protected Area: Yellowstone (NPS)

State(s): Idaho, Montana, Wyoming

Project Description: This project will provide “real world” experience to young scientists by working side-by-side with National Park Service (NPS) staff, with the indirect benefit to the NPS of collecting information assessing dietary overlap of large grazing animals in Yellowstone National Park. The recipient will recruit and hire up to two undergraduate students in a summer research program at Brown University. Principal Investigator (PI) Tyler Kartzinel will mentor the students over the course of the program. Program participants will complete 4-6 weeks of field study in Yellowstone National Park where they will work alongside NPS biologists and field staff. One student will work with the park botanist to collect and prepare herbaria specimens and secure plant tissue samples for DNA analysis. The other student will work with the park bison biologist to collect fecal samples from migrating large herbivores and complete plant inventory surveys in existing long-term monitoring sites. Students will evaluate collected samples during the remainder of the work-study program in the PI’s laboratory at Brown University. Their work directly supports building a plant DNA reference library to evaluate large herbivore diets.

Lead Principal Investigator: Tyler Kartzinel, Brown University

Partner Institution: Brown University

Federal Agency: National Park Service

Federal Agency Technical Contact: Chris Geremia

Project Type: Research

Project Discipline: Natural Resources

Project Sub-Discipline: Biological (Ecology, Fish, Wildlife, Vegetation, T&E)

Start Year: 2022

End Year: 2023

Initial Funding Amount: $11,280.00

Federal Grant Number: P22AC00332

Location: Yellowstone NP

National Park or Protected Area: Yellowstone (NPS)

State(s): Idaho, Montana, Wyoming

Student and Other Involvement:

• Undergraduate Students: 2