Nicholas School of the Environment
Master's projects by Nicholas School of the Environment students, including the Duke Marine Laboratory.
The masters project is done in partial fulfillment of the degree requirements for the professional Master of Environmental Management or the Master of Forestry degree. While the MP may include original laboratory or field research, it may also take the form of management plans, handbooks, educational curricula, or other such products. Each student is advised by a faculty member who reviews and approves the project prior to completion.
A masters projects that is original research should not be as large as a masters thesis although it should be of publishable quality but not necessarily comprehensive enough to stand alone as a publication. A masters projects that does not follow the usual format for scientific research should follow a framework that is considered good practice in an appropriate field.
Duke migrated to an electronic-only system for masters projects between 2006 and 2010. As such, projects completed between 2006 and 2010 may not be part of this system, and those created before 2006 are not hosted here except for a small number that have been digitized.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Recent Submissions
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Supporting Underserved Landowners in the Southeast with Conservation and Economic Goals
(2022-12-16)African American and other “historically underserved” landowners, as defined in the 2008 Farm Bill, have experienced unprecedented rates of agricultural and forest land loss due in large part to discrimination by the United ... -
Magic school bus, deploy! Cleaner air and cost savings in North Carolina with electric school buses.
(2022-12-16)The purpose of this project is to evaluate ways to assist the deployment of electric school buses (ESB) across the state on behalf of the client, the North Carolina Clean Energy Fund (NCCEF). In part one of this report, ... -
Legacy Pb contamination in the soils of three Durham city parks: Do secondary forest organic horizons effectively blanket Pb in city park soils contaminated by historic waste incineration?
(2022-12-16)Lead (Pb) has historically been used in many products such as gasoline, paint, batteries, ceramics, pipes and plumbing, solders, and cosmetics, and Pb contamination from these materials and their waste streams is widespread ... -
CLIMATE IN THE PULPIT: EFFECTIVENESS OF SERMONS TO INFLUENCE ATTITUDES ON CLIMATE CHANGE AND CREATION CARE
(2022-12-16)As moral messengers and trusted institutions, houses of worship can be effective messengers on climate change and “creation care.” The sermon provides a uniquely impactful place for an intervention into the educational life ... -
RURAL GABONESE USES AND RELATIONSHIPS WITH NATURAL RESOURCES AND ANIMALS
(2022-12-16)Human relationships and perceptions of nature and wildlife differ greatly across the modern world. These relationships are dependent on a variety of complex factors and conditions such as daily use, proximity, culture, ... -
Impacts of Genetic Variation and Silvicultural Treatments on Loblolly Pine Water Use
(2022-12-15)Loblolly pine (Pinus taeda) is of high ecological and economical value in the U.S. for its abundance and rapid growth. P. taeda has adapted to a wide range of sites, exhibiting considerable plasticity in its physiology and ... -
Viability and improvement of constructive wildlife corridors in tropical forests, proposing a new method for evaluating corridors geospatially using MaxEnt
(2022-12-14)Habitat corridor ecology remains a new and developing field in wildlife and forest management. Little is known about how corridors statistically work or how they should be established and monitored. Stuart Pimm and his non-profit ... -
A Site Prioritization for Shortleaf Pine Restoration in Duke Forest
(2022-12-10)Historically, shortleaf pine forests spanned some 70-80 million acres in the U.S. Since then, the species has declined dramatically—today, only 6 million acres of shortleaf-dominated forests remain, roughly 10 percent of ... -
Potential Biodiversity and Climate Benefits of Voluntary Carbon Market Tree-Planting Projects
(2022-08-05)This research explored the potential for voluntary carbon markets to benefit forest biodiversity and climate change by directing funding to tree-planting projects. This research topic is important because voluntary carbon ... -
Impact of Extreme Weather Events on the Grid
(2022-04-22)The rise in temperature due to climate change has increased the frequency and severity of extreme weather events in the past few years. The 2010s in the US saw a total of 119-billion-dollar disasters, with an estimated cost ... -
U.S. Market Prospects for Long Duration Energy Storage Technologies
(2022-04-22)Often thought of as the ultimate solution to renewable energy intermittency, energy storage has been one of the most sought-after technologies for a clean energy future. The market for long duration energy storage, or LDES, ... -
Evaluating the Marketing and Conceptualization of Farmed Oysters Along the NC Oyster Trail
(2022-04-22)North Carolina’s shellfish industry has grown due to increased attention to shellfish farming, specifically for oysters, through legislative actions by the North Carolina General Assembly and support from non-profit ... -
Participatory Planning: Addressing the Disconnect between Local and External Stakeholders
(2022-04-22)Participatory approaches are being increasingly utilized in conservation projects. The idea stems from critiques of previous practice being too exclusionary resulting in poor outcomes. A broad theme in these critiques relates ... -
Commercializing Kelp: Marketing and Growth Strategies for the Crop of the Future
(2022-04-22)Domestic kelp as a cultivated crop and as a consumer good in the US faces a variety of hurdles as it scales to meet the demands of the US market. Atlantic Sea Farms (ASF) has led the way in establishing kelp in the US and ... -
Nitrogen addition to a mixed pine-broadleaved forest under elevated atmospheric CO2 exacerbates phosphorus and potassium deficiencies
(2022-04-22)Forests are vital ecosystems because they capture and store carbon from our atmosphere; this is essential for maintaining the balance between carbon uptake and release in the global carbon cycle. However, human activities—mainly ... -
Solarizing the Island of Culebra, Puerto Rico: Rate-Design Model and Analysis
(2022-04-22)Power on the island of Puerto Rico has historically been served through a centralized generation system that has largely failed to provide reliability— ability of the grid to provide the right quantity and quality of electricity ... -
Regionalizing the Financial, Environmental, and Social Impacts of Water Scarcity on the Fresh Produce Industry
(2022-04-22)Water scarcity is a regionalized issue that threatens community wellbeing and agricultural operations. By sector, agriculture is the largest source of global water withdrawals. Life cycle assessment (LCA) has been used to ... -
Evaluating an Environmental Sustainability Program and Related Metrics at a Continuing Care Retirement Community
(2022-04-22)Xinyi Guo (MEM Cadindate) and Chelsea Sloggy (MEM/MBA Candidate) Charlotte Clark (Advisor) Spring 2022 Masters Project Executive Summary Evaluating an Environmental Sustainability Program and Related Metrics at a Continuing ... -
Incorporating Environmental Equity into NC DEQ’s Regulatory Impact Analysis
(2022-04-22)Incorporating Environmental Equity into NC DEQ’s Regulatory Impact Analysis is a project in collaboration with the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s (NC DEQ) Division of Water Resources (DWR) Planning ... -
Nags Head Electric Vehicle Action Plan
(2022-04-22)The number of electric vehicles (EVs) on the road in the United States is growing at a steady rate. More electric cars will necessitate more electric car chargers, both in public spaces and in private homes and rental properties. ...
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