?Our program is an on-campus, "hands-on" program with heavy emphasis on real laboratory-based and field-based learning experiences. Lecture rooms, teaching laboratories, a greenhouse, and research facilities of the department are located in Breukelman Hall. Constant-temperature chambers for plant and animal studies, a darkroom, centrifuges of various kinds, and electrophoretic, spectrographic, chromatographic, electrophysiological, and immunochemical instruments, as well as field-operated physioecological monitoring equipment, are extensively used by graduate students. There is also equipment for modern molecular and cellular biology research, animal facilities, a herbarium, and research microscopes. A natural history museum, with specimens mounted by internationally recognized taxidermist Richard H. Schmidt, contains hundreds of species of birds, mammals, fish mounts, and hand-painted molds of Kansas snakes. The museum also has more than a thousand other vertebrate study specimens. A field station, The Ross Natural History Reservation, consisting of laboratory buildings, ponds, and 200 acres of native grassland located ten miles northwest of the main campus, is extensively used in conjunction with class work, research, and science education. In addition, the students in our graduate programs have access to two Ozarkian wooded areas, two wetlands, a 40-acre tallgrass prairie area in the Flint Hills with a spring, stream, and pond, and several federal reservoirs within a short drive. The Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism has a research office on campus and often interacts with the department. We have a thesis option and a non-thesis option.
Comments