2nd National Extension Nat Res Conference-Abstract 46

Cindy Hagley, Minnesota Sea Grant, 2305 E. 5th Street, Duluth, MN 55812; 218-726-8713; chagley@d.umn.edu, R.P. Axler, G. Host, Natural Resources Research Institute, 5013 Miller Trunk Highway, Duluth, MN 55811, B.H. Munson, Department of Education, 10 University Drive, University of Minnesota-Duluth, Duluth, MN 55812, G. Merrick, Lake Superior College, 2101 Trinity Road, Duluth, MN 55811, C.J. Owen, Apprise Technologies, Inc., 5013 Miller Trunk Highway, Duluth, MN 55811, B. Liukkonen, Minnesota Sea Grant, and J. Barten, Hennepin Parks, 12615 County Road 9, Plymouth, MN 55441

Water on the Web (WOW) and Lake Access allow high school students, college students, and community members to monitor Minnesota lakes and rivers over the Internet. WOW and Lake Access integrate state-of-the-art environmental monitoring with geographic information systems, data visualization, and in-depth educational materials. The goal of these 2 related projects is to train students and community members to work with real-world data to identify and resolve problems in water resource management.

Environmental monitoring is based on a Remote Underwater Sampling Station (RUSS) developed by Apprise Technologies, Inc. RUSS consists of a mobile underwater sensor package tethered to a floating platform containing a computer, solar panels, and telemetry equipment. RUSS units provide remotely-programmable data from multiple depths every 4-6 hours for temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH, conductivity, and turbidity. Instructions for lake profiling are transmitted to RUSS via cellular phone; resulting data are returned to the web server and become accessible almost immediately via the Internet.

RUSS units are currently in place in 4 diverse Minnesota lakes, including 2 units in Lake Minnetonka, a large, heavily-used lake in suburban Minneapolis. A RUSS unit will soon be placed in the St. Louis River, which discharges into Lake Superior.

WOW, funded by the National Science Foundation, seeks to develop a more technologically-competent work force. A team of educators and scientists has developed curriculum materials that make use of the RUSS-generated ?real-time? data to teach basic science and environmental management concepts. WOW can be found at http://wow.nrri.umn.edu.

Lake Access, funded by the Environmental Protection Agency, seeks to bring to people up-to-date environmental information they can understand and use in their day-to-day decision-making about their health and the environment. Lake Access can be found at http://www.nrri.umn.edu/empact.