Six innovative graduate students from Texas Tech's College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources took top honors earlier this semester at the Texas Tech University Graduate School's 18th Annual Graduate Student Poster Competition at the university's Student Union Building. The competition, which featured more than 100 high-level projects, is seen as a professional development opportunity for students as they present their work to people who are not in their field of study.

Students get a chance to practice being able to tell someone what they do and why it's important, said CASNR Dean William Brown. "As you look through the research that's being done here in CASNR, you see some really innovative things," he said.

CASNR winners and runners-up for the 2019 competition by category are:

Animal Science
• First Place: Alexsandra Schaubhut, a master's student from Austin, Texas; Poster Title: Specific Gravity Device Can Predict Bovine Embryo Sex; Advisor: Samuel Prien, a professor of reproductive physiology-assisted reproduction with the Department of Animal & Food Sciences
• Second Place: Catherine Hixson, a doctoral student from Atlanta, Georgia; Poster Title: Changes in Social Behavior in Dairy Calves Infected with Manheimia haemolytica; Advisor: John McGlone, a professor of animal behavior, physiology, and welfare with the Department of Animal & Food Sciences

Cotton
• First Place: Atinderpal Singh, a master's student from the Punjab, India; Poster Title: Numerical modeling of root water uptake of cotton under deficit subsurface drip irrigation; Advisor: Sanjit Deb, an assistant professor of soil physics with the Department of Plant and Soil Science
• Second Place: Shaida Rumi, a master's student from Bangladesh; Poster Title: Conversion of Low – Quality Cotton to Bioplastic; Advisor: Noureddine Abidi, Leidigh Professor with the Department of Plant and Soil Science, and Managing Director of Tech's Fiber & Biopolymer Research Institute

Food Science
• Second Place: Caitlin Stanton, a master's student from San Luis Obispo, California; Poster Title: Developing a Taxonomy for Food Labels; Advisor: Courtney Meyers, an Associate Professor and Graduate Studies Coordinator with the with the Department of Agricultural Education & Communications

Plant & Soil Sciences
• Second Place: Grace Flusche Ogden, a master's student from Muskogee, Oklahoma; Poster Title: Sesame Response to Preemergence Herbicide; Advisor: Peter Dotray, Rockwell Chair of Weed Science with the Department of Plant and Soil Science, and joint appointment with Texas A&M Agrilife Research & Extension Service

In other action, CASNR officials indicated that Singh with the Department of Plant and Soil Science also won first place honors last month at the 10th Annual Texas Tech Biological Sciences Symposium. His talk - Modeling of root water uptake of cotton under deficit subsurface drip irrigation – was in the oral presentation category. The symposium, held at Texas Tech's Student Union Building, had some 200 undergraduate, graduate and faculty participants from 10 academic institutions.

CONTACT: William Brown, Dean, College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, Texas Tech University at (806) 742-2808 or william.f.brown@ttu.edu

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