We are working in Professor Iskander’s Soil Mechanics Lab to examine a new application for transparent soils. Specifically, we are investigating various approaches to get plants to survive in a hydrated aqua-bead environment instead of their native soil. This application will help us understand the dynamics of root growth.

Some of the experimental challenges include identifying plants that survive in saturated soils and grow quickly enough to optimize our transparent soil system within the allotted four weeks. Another challenge is to ensure that the plant’s native soil doesn’t get overly saturated causing plant infection or growth retardation. Lastly we are working on optimizing transparency of the aqua-bead solution with sucrose (~30%) so that we can better visualize root growth patterns during the experiment.

This research experience can be used in a variety of lessons in the living environment curriculum. For instance, we can teach the class how the proper balance of nutrients is needed to ensure root growth, fruiting, and flowering. From an experimental perspective the students can discuss the proper controls and dependent variables available to the researcher in this experimental setup.