Our 2nd Year student Julia Kachanova, spent her Summer in Arizona and Corvallis. In her own words:

"Summer brought a lot of opportunities to explore new horizons and collaborate with American colleagues!

I was invited to present a poster at The 12^th North American Forest Ecology Workshop (NAFEW) in June that was hosted by Northern Arizona University (NAU) in Flagstaff, AZ. This conference happens once in two years and brings together the diversity of researches, stakeholders and scholars from all over the world. I represented MEDfOR and University of Padova there, attended useful lectures and workshops. It was a great experience!

Later, I came to Corvallis, OR, to carry out an internship in Oregon State University (OSU) in collaboration with the Department of Forest Engineering, Resources and Management (FERM),  with the Vegetation Management Research Cooperative (VMRC) under supervision of Dr. Carlos Gonzalez-Benecke. During the internship, I conducted field measurements of tree seedling growth, water stress, soil moisture, vegetation cover and biomass, and seedling physiology (including stomatal conductance and photosynthesis). Moreover, I was lucky enough to perform in Dr. Gonzalez’s lab my graduation project about hydraulic conductivity and drought resistance of Douglas Firs' different genotypes in Pacific Northwest. This pilot project will contribute to researches in a field of plant ecophysiology. I’m endlessly grateful to OSU and Dr. Gonzalez for support, mentoring and for getting this cultural and scientific experience during these two months.