Quantifying the Decomposition of Pennycress
Channel: IPREFER Pennycress
Date: 15/10/2021

Alex Hafner (Illinois State University / Molecular & Cellular Biology) was part of the IPREFER the 2021 Integrated Plant Systems – Undergraduate Research Experience. He worked with IPREFER Collaborator Dr. Bill Perry (Illinois State University). Alex's project focused on:
• Assessing pennycress impacts on reducing nutrient flux, nitrogen, and phosphorus, from subsurface drainage throughout the year.
• Determining abundance and diversity of pollinating insects of pennycress, which flowers earlier than most other plants.
• Measuring pennycress forage resources (pollen & nectar) for pollinators and characterize the health of both individual honey bees and colonies near pennycress fields.

This is a presentation Alex made at the August 2021 IPREFER annual meeting. You can also see an abstract of his work at https://www.iprefercap.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Yr-2-ABSTRACT-Alex-Hafner.pdf

For information on IPREFER (Integrated Pennycress Research Enabling Farm & Energy Resilience) please visit:  https://www.iprefercap.org