WKU News

A central mission of student engagement in WKU’s Department of Geography and Geology is to engage students in faculty-supervised research that leads to publication. In recent months, faculty and students in the geography, meteorology and GIS programs have been very successful in bringing collaborative research to publication in some of the disciplines’ leading journals.

• Undergraduate Meteorology majors Lee Campbell of Paducah, Kyle Berry of Mount Washington and Dustin Jordan of Seymour, Tenn., working with Dr. Josh Durkee, Dr. Greg Goodrich, Dr. Stuart Foster and Dr. Rezaul Mahmood, have an article that addresses the record May 2010 regional rain and flood event accepted for publication in one of the country’s leading climate journals, the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. It is scheduled to appear in print in early 2012.
• Ronnie Leeper of Asheville, N.C., who earned his master’s degree in Geoscience in 2009, has a paper titled Influence of Karst Landscapes On Planetary Boundary Layer Atmosphere: A Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) Model-based Investigation, co-authored with Dr. Rezaul Mahmood, accepted for publication in the Journal of Hydrometeorology, which is scheduled to appear in print in early 2012. Leeper is working at the National Climatic Data Center in North Carolina.
• Ashley Littell of Louisville, who earned her master’s in Geoscience in 2007, has a paper titled Observed Data-based Assessment of Relationships among Soil Moisture at Various Depths, Precipitation, and Temperature, co-authored with Dr. Rezaul Mahmood and two other collaborators, accepted for publication in Applied Geography, which will appear in print in early 2012. She works for Connected Nation in Louisville.
• Astrid Gonzalez of State College, Pa., who earned her bachelor’s degree in Meteorology in 2010 and participated in the National Science Foundation’s Research Experience for Undergraduates while at WKU, is the lead author with three collaborators on an article titled Comparison of Ensemble Kalman Filter-based forecasts to traditional ensemble and deterministic forecasts for a case study of banded snow scheduled to appear in the journal Weather and Forecasting in early 2012. She is enrolled in the geography graduate program at Penn State.
• Anthony Bedel of Athens, Ga., who earned his bachelor’s degree in Meteorology in 2010 and is enrolled in the geography graduate program at the University of Georgia, is a co-author on a paper titled Predicting the Seasonal Shift in Mosquito Populations Preceding the Onset of the West Nile Virus in Central Illinois published in the September 2011 issue of the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.
• Ann Epperson of Nashville, Tenn., and Matt Brunt of Bowling Green, who earned their master’s in Geoscience in 2010 and 2009 respectively, along with co-author Dr. Katie Algeo, published Historical GIS as a Platform for Public Memory at Mammoth Cave National Park in the Fall 2011 issue of the International Journal of Applied Geospatial Research. Brunt works as a GIS Analyst for Connected Nation, and Epperson works for the Tennessee Department of Transportation.
• Melissa Hendrikson of Vernal, Utah, who earned her master’s in Geoscience in 2006, published From sink to resurgence: the buffering capacity of a cave system in the Tongass National Forest, USA, with co-author Dr. Chris Groves, in the Fall 2011 issue of Acta Carsologica. She works for the Ashley National Forest in Utah.

The Harbor Bridge in Sydney, Australia, from Dr. David Keeling’s article on "Iconic Landscapes" that appears in FOCUS on Geography.

Other recent peer-reviewed publications in print or in press by faculty include:

• Dr. Katie Algeo, with co-authors (2011). Nationalism in Geography Classrooms: Challenges and Opportunities. Journal of Geography 110(4): 166-175.
• Dr. David Keeling (2011). Iconic Landscapes: The Lyrical Links of Songs and Cities. FOCUS on Geography 54(4): 113-125.
• Dr. Rezaul Mahmood with co-authors (2012). Land use/land cover changes and climate: Modeling analysis and observational evidence. WIREs: Climate Change (in press).
• Dr. Leslie North and Dr. Jason Polk, with co-authors (2011).  Application of a cave inventory system to stimulate development of management strategies: The case of west-central Florida. Journal of Environmental Management 92(10): 2547-2557.

More: A full listing of 2011 published articles and 2012 articles in press by faculty and students.

Contact: David Keeling, (270) 745-4555.