LEAP Projects

Conium maculatum Project

As part of the LEAP capstone course, three LEAP students (our first cohort) developed an interdisciplinary project to study the invasion of poison hemlock, Conium maculatum , into the Chicago region. One of the students, Paul Gulezian, had documented the first reported presence of the species in Cook County , where he found it was restricted to major expressways and on land owned by the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District. Working together, the students are bringing three disciplines to bear on the problem of biological invasions in general and C. maculatum in particular: environmental engineering (K. Granberg), landscape ecology (P. Gulezian), and plant population genetics (J. Ison). They recently received a significant grant from Chicago Wilderness to study the possible adaptation of invasive conium to contaminated soils as a mechanism underlying its invasion in the Chicago region.

Fort Sheridan Project

During the fall semester, 2007, LEAP students participated in the course “Interdisciplinary Approaches to the Study if Integrated Human/Natural Landscapes.” This course embodied the core principles of LEAP: graduate training that focuses on developing the research and communication skills needed to solve interdisciplinary problems of integrated ecosystems. During the semester students and faculty learned together by conducting research on options for developing the newly-created Openlands Lakeshore Preserve at Fort Sheridan . The Lakeshore Preserve is a mile of Lake Michigan shoreline that was part of the former Fort Sheridan and contains unique ravine habitats and other natural elements, but has been highly degraded by past human activities and poor management. The semester culminated in the preparation of a final report for Openlands and presentation given to the staff of Openlands on December 14, 2007.