RESEARCH

Research Facilities

The Department of Biology is housed in the Rankin Science Building. Facilities for research include a fully-equipped electron microscopy laboratory, darkrooms, controlled environmental rooms, and a greenhouse. A number of laboratories contain modern instrumentation for research in plant ecophysiology, plant-animal interactions, animal physiology, molecular biology, microbiology, behavioral ecology, cytogenetics, mycology, immunology, cell biology, developmental biology, parasitology, freshwater and marine ecology, traditional and molecular systematics and phylogeography.

There are several biological collections housed in the Department, including a vertebrate collection, a shell collection, an insect collection, and a variety of other animals used in teaching and research. The ASU Herbarium (BOON) houses approximately 20,000 specimens, many of which are imperiled species from the Southern Appalachians and high elevation wetlands in Blue Ridge Mountains of northwest North Carolina.  A Geographic Information System(GIS) database on the high elevation wetlands is maintained in the herbarium.

Students in the Department can utilize the Department's computer laboratory, as well as the numerous computer labs spread across campus. All the computers are linked to a central server, and all students have access to personal email accounts and the world wide web. The library has electronic searching capabilities, and students can perform literature searches from their own PCs. The University has access to Cray computers at the super-computing center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The Department oversees several natural areas, including a 67-acre Appalachian State University Nature Preserve in the heart of campus, a 217-acre research area (the Gilley Field Station) on the New River about 20 minutes from campus, plus 100 acres of forested land just east of Boone. The Blue Ridge Parkway is just minutes from campus, and the Department has cooperative agreements with the Parkway for doing research within this unit of the National Park System. The Department participates in the running and maintenance of the Highlands Biological Station located in Highlands, North Carolina; this field station is available for research purposes, meetings and field trips.

The University Belk Library contains more than 750,000 books and bound periodicals, 6,000 current periodical and newspaper subscriptions, and over a million microforms. The Library is an official depository for United States and North Carolina governmental agency publications. In addition to the Belk Library, there is a Music Library, a Map Library, and the William Leonard Eury Appalachian Collection.

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Special Facilities

Electron Microscopy Laboratory
Housed in the laboratory are a Philips 201 transmission electron microscope, a Hitachi
S-570 scanning electron microscope, a Polaron sputter coater and critical point dryer, a Denton vacuum evaporator, ultramicrotomes, a knifemaker, and a Jena light microscope with differential interference contrast and epifluorescence capabilities. An adjoining darkroom is available for doing standard photography. A full-time director of the laboratory provides both academic and technical support services.

Greenhouse
A 6,000-square-foot state-of-the-art greenhouse is located 2.5 miles from the main campus. The facility has two separate research houses, a teaching collection, and a large display house, all connected to a headhouse which contains the manager's office, storage room, and a clean laboratory/teaching classroom. An additional 2250-square-feet of space is available outside the greenhouse for research and teaching. A full-time manager oversees the greenhouse and is available to assist faculty and students. The manager also provides information and consultations to businesses and the general public and conducts tours of the facility. Courses in Plant Propagation, Greenhouse Management, and Crop Production are offered.

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Environmental Preserves

The Appalachian State University Nature Preserve
The Appalachian State University Nature Preserve consists of 67 acres of recently protected woodlands in the heart of the campus. The Preserve is interlaced with a network of hiking trails and includes sites with low-ropes courses and a climbing tower utilized by the University's Outdoor Programs. There is a high diversity of plant communities in various successional stages that are utilized by the faculty and students in the Department. The Preserve affords Appalachian students the unique opportunity of being able to walk to outdoor labs in introductory and upper division biology classes, such as Concepts of Biology, Botany and Ecology. The site is used in several graduate level courses as well. Preliminary surveys of vegetational and fungal communities of the Preserve are being conducted. A fund-raising campaign for the Preserve is currently underway to establish interpretation trails and a canopy walk, allowing students and visitors to view the habitat at tree level, and enhance the academic and recreational uses of the site.

Robert Gilley Field Station
The Robert Gilley Field Station encompasses over 200 acres, extending along a mile of the South Fork of the New River in Watauga County, North Carolina. Two ridge systems running parallel to the river include a mature oak forest, a selectively cut hardwood forest, an old field-pasture undergoing secondary succession, and mixed hardwood forests including the Appalachian endemic, Carolina Hemlock. There is a high diversity of spring wildflowers on the slopes above the New River. The Gilley Field Station is currently being used by the Anthropology and Biology Departments for faculty and student research projects. These projects include archeological surveys of the sites, a reconstruction of an early Native American hunting camp, experimental plots investigating the feasibility of uplands hops production, and an established Cornetum. The Cornetum houses a diversity of dogwood species from temperate regions throughout the world that have been characterized at a molecular level toward discerning their taxonomic status.

Elicia Caroon Johnston Biological Reserve
The Elicia Caroon Johnston Biological Reserve is located just off the Blue Ridge Parkway near Aho Gap, North Carolina. The Reserve consists of approximately 100 acres including a deep gorge with mountain streams and cliff faces. The slopes of the reserve house a rich diversity of wildflowers, shrubs, and trees typical of the higher elevations of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Most of the forest growing on the talus slopes of the reserve is represented by cove hardwood species such as a variety of magnolias, buckeyes and maples interspersed with hemlocks and rhododendrons. Several small clear-cut plots and an area subjected to a severe burn several decades ago allow for observation of vegetational regeneration processes following these disturbances.

Tater Hill Lake Basin
This recently acquired North Carolina state-protected high elevation lake basin houses numerous wetland species within its 126 acres. It is managed by the Department of Biology which, after initial plant and animal surveys, is slated for use in faculty and graduate research. Such high elevation wetland habitats are among the rarest of biological communities in the southern Appalachians and long-term monitoring of the site will provide valuable information for ecologists.