Scenes Around NSM

Shasta’s Prairie: Natural Beauty on Campus

Located next to Science & Research 2 and the Houston Science Center building, Shasta’s Prairie is turning one year old. A small version of the vast prairies that used to cover this part of Texas, it serves both for educational purposes and as an advertisement of the pristine prairie habitat located at the UH Coastal Center, the field station run out of NSM. Installation of the prairie was a collaboration between the Department of Biology and Biochemistry, the UH Office of Sustainability and the Katy Prairie Conservancy.

Solar Observations and Star Gazing: Students Renovate Observatory

The observatory on the rooftop of Science and Research 1 is back in use – thanks to a group of NSM students. The students spent several months improving the facility and have opened up the observatory for night-time viewings twice a month, as well as solar observations on Fridays. The group also formed the Astronomy Society of UH.

NSM at Graduate School Fair

Ricardo Azevedo, Associate Chair for Graduate Affairs in the Department of Biology and Biochemistry, discusses graduate degree options with an interested UH student at the on-campus Graduate School Fair. NSM’s three tables were staffed by faculty and staff graduate advisors and current graduate students.

Meteorite Expedition in Antarctica

Minako Righter, a researcher and lab supervisor in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, was part of the six-person team participating in the annual field excursion of the Antarctica Search for Meteorites program. The team recovered a total of 219 meteorites that will be shipped to NASA Johnson Space Center for cataloging and analysis.

President Khator Visits NSM Grad Students

At the start of the spring semester, UH President Renu Khator visited several graduate classes. She took time to answer questions of NSM students enrolled in Dr. Vassiliy Lubchenko’s Statistical Thermodynamics course.