The decline of enrollments in agronomy programs across the United States has been a concern for more than a decade. In an effort to reverse this trend, the Agronomy Department at Iowa State University (ISU) launched the "I'm An Agronomist" marketing campaign in 2006. This article reports on these efforts and the change in the…

Energy is relevant to all areas of human life; energy sustains us through food, drives our transportation, warms and cools our buildings, and powers our electrical gadgets. In nature, ecosystems function by capturing and transforming energy. Agroecosystems are formed when humans manipulate the capture and flow of energy for food, fiber, and fuel…

Plants that bear less familiar names such as switch grass, "Miscanthus," and kenaf, are not much to look at, having weathered Iowa's winter snows. But Iowa State researchers see these crops as seeds of change in alternative fuels. Rows of experimental crops line the test plots at Iowa State University's research farm. Although corn is…