Frank Owens, an associate professor in the Mississippi State Department of Sustainable Bioproducts, is the new president of the Forest Products Society, a premier international wood products organization.
Established in 1947, the FPS is a global network for professionals and researchers in the forest products industry. A nonprofit association, it is dedicated to enhancing the development of forest resources in an environmentally resp...
A prestigious international organization is honoring a Mississippi State faculty member and two students for their achievements in forest products.
Assistant Professor Mostafa Mohammadabadi of MSU's Department of Sustainable Bioproducts is the recipient of the Wood Engineering Achievement Award from the Forest Products Society, an organization representing all segments of the worldwide forest products industry. The scientist in the F...
Wood rot can be a homeowner's worst nightmare. Spotting signs of decay often means significant structural damage has already occurred. But what if you could detect wood rot before it is visible?
Researchers in the Mississippi State University Forest and Wildlife Research Center are teaming with the United States Department of Agriculture Forest Products Laboratory to identify the earliest presence of brown rot fungus in southern yellow...
A Mississippi State sustainable bioproducts student is one of only four graduate students in the country to receive a summer fellowship from the Electrochemical Society.
Ridwan Ayinla, a doctoral student in the College of Forest Resources, will use the $5,000 ES award to expand his research into green batteries and supercapacitors powered by biomass—the harnessing and storing of energy from agricultural waste products.
"L...
Mississippi State Associate Professor Frank Owens sees wood as a window to the world. His forest products career has taken him to 26 countries where he has connected different cultures through the beauty of wood.
A native of St. Paul, Minnesota, he earned his bachelor's in international relations from the University of Minnesota and his master's in East Asian Languages and Cultures from the University of California, Los Angeles. He the...
Frank Owens, associate professor in the Department of Sustainable Bioproducts in MSU's College of Forest Resources, was recently reelected to the Council of the International Association of Wood Anatomists (IAWA). Owens, who is also the current vice president of the Forest Products Society, is the only council member from North America. Having been a council member for the past three years, he will serve another three-year ter...
The future of fuel is practical, sustainable and green, and Mississippi State's Department of Sustainable Bioproducts is committed to discovering solutions that will power tomorrow's fuels.
El Barbary Hassan, department professor and scientist in the university's Forest and Wildlife Research Center, has received a National Institute of Food and Agriculture grant totaling over $610,000 to take foundational steps toward producing viable ...
Students in all levels of higher education—at Mississippi State and other universities across the country—are advancing as researchers in various disciplines after benefitting from two separate MSU research experience programs, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
MSU/USDA Graduate Summer Research Experience
The MSU/USDA Graduate Summer Research Experience program, hosted in the G...
Mississippi State University's Department of Sustainable Bioproducts hosted the Wood Magic Science Fair last Monday [Sept. 18] through Friday [Sept. 22].
Approximately 4,000 third- and fourth- graders from across the state came to campus for WMSF to learn about forestry and the importance of forest products.
Students were taught that wood is renewable, recyclable, biodegradable and durable in an exciting and engaging format. S...
Many wood items we import from abroad are incorrectly declared on customs forms. Sometimes it's an honest mistake, but other times, items made from illegally cut timber—commonly from tropical regions like the Congo and the Amazon—are deliberately mislabeled and enter the U.S. and other countries in violation of law. Accurate wood identification plays a critical role in maintaining sustainable wood product value chains and adhering ...
The Forest Products Laboratory (FPL), in cooperation with Mississippi State University (MSU), has developed a strong graduate education and research program over the past several years that has attracted outstanding scholars from South America. Many have completed graduate degrees and are now providing leadership in academic, research and industry programs, both here in the United States and abroad.
"I'm very proud of the strong partner...
The U.S. exported nearly 7.26 million metric tons of wood pellets in 2020, up five percent from 2019, according to the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service. Due to the rising interest in this energy source across the globe, researchers in the Forest and Wildlife Research Center seek to develop a cost-effective reliable material that is sturdier in transport and burns cleaner when consumed.
U.K.-based renewable energy company Drax has partne...
STARKVILLE, Miss. - Mississippi State will host the Disaster Resilient Food Energy Water Systems workshop this Wednesday [June 29] at The Mill at MSU.
A first-of-its-kind event, DIRE-FEWS is hosted by a team of researchers from the university's Department of Sustainable Bioproducts in the College of Forest Resources and funded by a National Science Foundation Sustainable Regional Systems planning grant. It will include a panel of speak...
Safe drinking water is something often taken for granted. Few are aware of the chemical processes that make water safe to use and consume at the turn of the tap.
Historically, water treatment plants have relied on petrochemicals to filter out contaminants, such as toxic metals and dyes, that are present in local water sources. But an unwanted result of this capability is that these treatments create their own waste, since they are made f...
A $500,000 federal grant will help Mississippi State researchers use artificial intelligence to increase the accuracy of lumber evaluation.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture award funds an innovative research project in MSU's Department of Sustainable Bioproducts that aims to improve lumber grading systems with a machine-learning model. The research will identify characteristics that human graders and current auto-grading technologi...
Tâmara França, assistant professor in Mississippi State's Department of Sustainable Bioproducts in the College of Forest Resources, has been selected as a woman ambassador of wood science.
In 2021, the Society of Wood Science and Technology (SWST) sought calls for nominations for "Women Ambassadors Creating the Future of Wood Science." França was nominated and then selected by the SWST committee as one of 16 wome...
The International Academy of Wood Science is honoring Mississippi State's Rubin Shmulsky with the designation of fellow, recognizing his significant scientific achievements and research contributions to the field.
Newly elected for 2022, the Warren S. Thompson Professor of Wood Science and Technology and head of the MSU's Department of Sustainable Bioproducts joins 145 IAWS Fellows throughout the U.S., in addition to international ho...
It's easier to understand trees when you're surrounded by forests. At least, that's the case for Dr. Brian Brashaw, 2014 sustainable bioproducts alumnus.
The Laona, Wisconsin native said the link between forests and the forest products industry became evident early on.
"I grew up in the Nicolet National Forest. My dad worked for Connor Forest Products and many family friends worked for the U.S. Forest Service," he recalled. <...
For a team of Mississippi State researchers, concrete design isn't set in stone.
Jilei Zhang, Warren S. Thompson Professor of Wood Science and Technology, and a team of MSU Department of Sustainable Bioproducts researchers have rethought the material's design and cemented their product's status by participating in the Mississippi Development Authority's inaugural V-Quad competition, a U.S. Department of Energy-sponsored initiative to...
Picking a two-by-four from a lumber stack at your local home improvement store only takes a minute. How that piece arrived there, however, is part of a much larger story. Lumber is one of Mississippi's most important commodities and part of a $13.12 billion-dollar industry that employs over 61,000 people in Mississippi alone. Researchers in MSU's Forest and Wildlife Research Center hope to untangle how knots—remnants of where branches gr...
Alan Sherrington grew up on the north bank of the Columbia River in Vancouver, Washington, just outside of Portland, Oregon. He was raised in a forest products family but didn't necessarily see himself in the industry when he left the Pacific Northwest to attend Spring Hill College in Mobile, Alabama.
"My dad has worked in the forest products industry for the last 30 years, many of which have been at Weyerhaeuser, so I grew up familiar ...
The life of a railroad crosstie sees nearly 20 years of service. Through harsh conditions such as rain, heat, and snow, the backbone of the rails is built to last. But just how long should they carry the load?
Researchers from the Forest and Wildlife Research Center and the Railway Tie Association have set out to determine how durable railroad ties are by exposing them to different conditions and preservatives.
Dr. Beth Stokes, a...
By day, Adam Wade is finding better ways to identify wood species using artificial intelligence as a sustainable bioproducts doctoral student. At night, he's crafting a custom guitar out of poplar and maple.
"The guitar design I'm working on replicates a Fender Stratocaster. I'm making everything from scratch using rough-sawn lumber. The guitar's body is made of poplar with a soft maple top. The neck and fretboard are hard maple. I'm usi...
Fossil fuels are decayed plants and animals that have been converted to oil, coal, and natural gas through years of exposure to heat and pressure in the earth's crust. Petroleum, a common fossil fuel, is used to create over 6,000 different products.
There are issues related to the extended use of petroleum including environmental pollution and global warming. Add to this the diminishing reserves of fossil fuels. So, how do we replace t...
Wood pellets are big business as an export item. Europe consumes much of the U.S. wood pellet market to generate energy according to the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service. In fact, in 2018, the combined value of sales from the U.S. exports of wood pellets totaled $812 million or 6.04 million metric tons with transfers to the U.K. topping $646 million or 4.71 million metric tons. Since much of the pellet production in the U.S. comes from southe...
A new building material is making its way into the U.S. market. Cross-laminated timber, or CLT, which has been used to construct large buildings in Europe for the last two decades is experiencing growth as a building material in the U.S. and Canada.
"As of March 2019, there are currently 545 buildings in North America either built or in the design phase using mass timber products such as CLT," said Dr. Beth Stokes, scientist in the Fores...
Mississippi State is now home to one of the nation's largest wood collections, making the university a prime training ground for research on rare and exotic species.
MSU's Department of Sustainable Bioproducts in the College of Forest Resources has acquired the 32,000-specimen David A. Kribs wood collection, the fourth largest in the U.S. according to the International Association of Wood Anatomists. This acquisition also makes MSU home ...
Oftentimes, we'll take the stairs to get in those few extra steps. As we climb toward better health, do we consider how much strength lies in the wood beneath our feet? While we may not think twice about the actual steps we take, there are others who do. The Stairbuilders and Manufacturers Association has partnered with scientists in the MSU Forest and Wildlife Research Center to assess the wood commonly used in constructing stairs.
Dr...
It is estimated that the average single-family home in the U.S. includes 16,000 board feet of lumber for framing. Architects and engineers select grades and sizes of lumber for various components in construction of housing and buildings based on design values.
In 2013, afer several years of testing and reassessment, the design values for southern pine dimension lumber were adjusted. This change impacted the utility value of several lumbe...
Amid the COVID-19 outbreak, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has identified the wood products industry as an essential critical infrastructure workforce.
Mississippi State has the only research program in the state dedicated to expanding the service and use of wood products, delivering research to the state's forest industry. While the way the research is being conducted may have shifted temporarily, researchers are leaning i...
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