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Robert Walkeris a professor of Geography at Michigan State University , with a Ph.D. in Regional Science from the University of Pennsylvania . He grew up in Florida , where he take to assess the wilds of nature , but also see the price of ill design development . Walker studies dry land - cover change , and in special the red ink of tropic forests in Amazonia . His research plan of attack is one of " charge on the earth , " and he draws noetic nourishment from grueling field crusade in Amazonia ( the Amazon rainfall forests ) . In conducting his inquiry , Walker has spoken with yard of frontier residents , including farmers , ranchers , lumberman , gold - miners , Indians and fellow adventurers . In the process , he ’s traveled by jeep down many of the roads in the region , logging thousands of nautical mile . Walker can not imagine a summer without an chance to rough in - it south of the border , but he is always grateful to deliver home to his wife and family in Michigan , and the restore waters of the Great Lakes . Read Walker ’s answer to the ScienceLives 10 question below .
This photo depicts a waterfall on the Juma River near the town of Apui, in Amazonas State. Sweating from the hike to reach it, Walker swam across the pool at its base, only to worry halfway to the other side about possible anacondas lurking in the depths. He was seized by momentary panic before continuing on his way, as quietly as possibly, trying not to disturb the water.
Name : Robert WalkerAge:59Institution : Michigan State UniversityField of Study : Geography and Environment
What inspired you to choose this athletic field of study?I was urge to study environmental problems by my personal experiences with environmental abjection in the State of Florida , where I grew up . I saw at first hand the eradication of pine flatlands , mesic hammocks , mangrove estuaries , and coral reefs , and I could never sympathise why the great unwashed would want to commute the ferocity of the landscape for a built surround . I also witnessed the channelization of the Kissimmee River to make way for Disney World , which seemed completely illegitimate to me as a child . Through the fifties and 1960s , I saw Florida modification from a beautiful tropic - subtropical Eden to a farming of strip malls , theme parks and modular housing . It was enough to make me give care , and leave . I know that people need to bring down on nature for subsistence and livelihood . I also know that they require nature for other purposes .
What is the best piece of advice you ever received?My best musical composition of advice was that one must never give up , or admit defeat , in pursuing a cherished objective . Someone once told me that winner is the ability to run in the facial expression of uninterrupted nonstarter . This is my motto , and it has sustained me through proposal of marriage review cycles , holograph rejection , and lidless night wonder where the monetary resource will make out from to continue my work .
This photo depicts a waterfall on the Juma River near the town of Apui, in Amazonas State. Sweating from the hike to reach it, Walker swam across the pool at its base, only to worry halfway to the other side about possible anacondas lurking in the depths. He was seized by momentary panic before continuing on his way, as quietly as possibly, trying not to disturb the water.
What was your first scientific experiment as a child?My first scientific experiment involve a skill fair project examining the liveliness cycle of shipworms . When all of them fail in my aquarium , I changed my experiment to a study of the link between mortality and saltiness .
What is your preferred thing about being a researcher?My best-loved matter about being a researcher is being allow to have my idea weave , and to see pattern and symmetry that I had n’t seen the day before . I often wake in the break of the day , enquire what new insights will recognize me through the course of the twenty-four hours . I have the same ace when sit down to a manuscript in preparation , get it on that a white pageboy is also a field of thought , and therefore a pleasure . A researcher ’s aliveness is a life of continuous imagination .
What is the most crucial characteristic a research worker must demo for be an effective researcher?The most important characteristic is persistence , combine with exclusive - apt purpose . tidings plays a role , but much less than one might imagined .
What are the societal benefits of your research?The societal benefits of my enquiry are that it affords insight into a operation of environmental change of global concern , namely the passing of our tropical timberland . To be effectual in addressing problems , policy must be found on an sympathy of the human existence whose actions consist at their ascendent . This is especially so with disforestation , for trees just devolve down in massive light - swing of their own volition . Environmental insurance , in this case , must incentivize multitude away from such actions , which can only be done if it is known why they absorb in them in the first place .
Who has had the most influence on your thinking as a researcher?I can cite three people here . The first was Howard Odum , the ecologist , who taught me that the world is a organisation of organization of systems , ad infinitum . The second was Daniel Vining , a social scientist at the University of Pennsylvania . He taught me to question everything and strike nothing , to approach problems from the basis up , to distrust receive wisdom . The third was Ronald Miller , an mental process research specialist , also at the University of Pennsylvania . He learn me mathematics , and gave me the desire to translate what I learn into ordered structures .
What about your field or being a investigator do you think would surprise people the most?I suppose it would surprise multitude to realize how little is really known about the world we live in , that there are research frontiers in every direction . I believe it would also storm people to realize that methodology is scarce limit , that scientific approaches all have a seat - of - the gasp constituent , that hazard study and inspiration roleplay huge part in any scientific endeavour . I recollect talk with a politician mayhap ten years ago about deforestation . He was astonished when I tell him there was controversy about rates of woods loss . He assumed that because it was such a global job , the scientific discipline would have been whole nailed down , end of account . He was n’t that concerned in learning about measure error , or problem with cloud - book binding , either . Not to mention all the disagreements about what was causing the trouble .
If you could only deliver one affair from your burn role or lab , what would it be?I would quickly download all of my manuscripts and datum onto an outside cause , and campaign like inferno . I cognise I ’m only allowed to take one matter here , but on my dash from the function I ’d also snaffle an armful of Brazilian books , documents , and maps that are impossible to get by in library or store in the United States , stuff it ’s train me eld to collect through opportune encounters , or purchases in distant places .
What music do you flirt most often in your research lab or car?I play Brega , which is a working - class Brazilian euphony from the Amazonian amber - mine . It ’s fast - paced and rather raunchy , and would never be aired in the United States if the songs were sung in English , because the lyric can be crude . In fact , Brega is slang for " lowly - class . " But , the medicine ’s great , whether by Banda Calypso , Banda da Lourinha or even Fruta Sensual .
To learn more about Walker ’s research in the Amazon , check out out this National Science Foundationarticleand anarticlein the Michigan State University Alumni Magazine . Watch a video below describing Walker ’s inquiry and experience in the Amazon .
