Day 3

As usual we started the day off with a meeting at 8:45. Joe asked each of us how our research was going so far and what our topics were. After, we went to our labs. I finished reading two of the articles that I printed yesterday. The first article was titled "particle size distribution analysis of coarse aggregate using digital image processing"and described in detail both the DIP technique and the mechanical sieving method as well as why the DIP method is better than mechanical sieving. The second article mainly talked about the the effects of different sieving methods (wet and dry) on carbon and nitrogen pools in soils. The study described in the article concluded that while dry sieving resulted in a greater proportion of C associated with fine (less than 150 microns) aggregate (grain) size classes, wet sieving showed greater ability in differentiating soil C associated with coarse aggregate (grain) size classes. Around noon, Hannah, Amy, and I attended a seminar of one of the professors in the building, Robert Kremens. We discussed the history of food production and agriculture and branched off from there. It was really interesting to listen to everyone's inputs. After lunch, Chris, our advisor, came by to talk to Hannah and I about the objectives of our research project, which includes evaluating methods for ground truth such as density and grain size to figure out if known standards are good for real-world applications as well as how different methods affect the distribution of grains. More specifically, I will be comparing the dry sieving method and image analysis techniques used on different soil types with varying compositions. The plan for tomorrow is to start writing my abstract/problem statement that is due on Monday.

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