Student Research Reports

Thank you for your interest in our study. As far as the relationship between lichen and Ozone, the more diverse the lichen are the better the air quality. Our ozone strips have measured favorably to good air quality. We have limited spatial patterns because we have not yet mapped out our 138 tree samples yet. Once we do, we hypothesize to see more of spatial pattern. Our next step for our project will be to see the relation between the lichen on trees near roads and trees that are in wooded areas. Also we would put out more ozone strips and survey more trees.

Thank you for your comment. At this time we don't know which species of tree lichen prefer. This would be a great idea as a project for the next 7th grade. The air quality is the worst in the summer. The warm months activate the materials that make up ground level ozone. We put the ozone strips in the same place. It just happens to be very convenient in the place we put them. In front of our school we have moderate traffic with a two lane road.

Thanks again for your interest in our project. It will take 2-4 weeks to finish mapping out our lichen. We have done 20 out of 138 trees. Like we said it is a work in progress. That is a very good question about the effects of lichen and the effects on air pollution. Lichen turn nitrogen from the air into nitrates that can be used by plants.

Our most surprising thing in our research was that the lichen matched favorably with the ozone strips. Our ozone strips indicated good air quality and so did the lichen that we found around our area. This was not as much as a surprise as it was a great feeling of excitement that we did something right in our project. Our next steps are measuring more trees for lichen. We are also going to ask questions like "Does the species of tree effect the kind or amount of lichen that is on that tree." We hope to pass this project on to the next 7th grade class.
Thank you for your intrest in our project.