Max Yusen
Undergraduate Fellow
“At a very young age, I was really into animals and that evolved into conservation, being sustainable, that type of thing. And I'm majoring in environmental science.”
Are you more interested in the conservation side or research?
“That's what I'm trying to figure out. This summer's given me a good sense of what field research would be. I don't really want to do lab research. I just don't want to be inside. I'm trying to figure out if there's a way to combine conservation and research, but that’s a little different from what I'm doing here.”
What's the inspiration for your independent project?
“One of the studies that Jonathan's lab is working on is why biodiversity differs along latitudinal gradients. Why are there more species in the tropics as compared to where we are here or at the poles? His team is focusing a lot on plant and tree species specifically. I'm interested in the soil microbial communities. Soil types vary depending on where you are in the world. I'm curious about how tree species and microbe combinations will affect how many other species would be there. This past year I took a soil science class and it was actually, surprisingly one of my favorite classes I've taken. I just find it really interesting.”
What was interesting about it?
“It's a subject that you don't really learn that much about. Obviously, you know there's dirt, there's stuff under the plants, but just to understand that it undergoes its own processes and it combines a lot of things I'm interested in like physics, chemistry, biology. Then there's a lot of conservation-based stuff with it and it affects agriculture and ecology, just everything I'm interested in.”