Emeritus SNRE Soils Professor Chien-Lu Ping received the
Soil Science Society of America’s Presidential Award at the society’s annual
meeting in Tampa, Florida.
Chien-Lu Ping poses with his award and soil society president Andrew Sharpley. |
David Weindorf, the executive producer of a climate change
documentary that highlighted Ping’s career, also received the award at the Oct.
24 ceremony. Weindorf, an associate dean at Texas Tech University, taught the arctic
soils field tour (NRM 489) with Ping for several years and will help teach the
course next summer.
According to the society, the award is given to persons who
“have influenced soil science or the practice of soil science so greatly that
the impact of their efforts will be enduring on the future of our science and/or
profession.”
Ping is known internationally for his work on carbon
dynamics in arctic soils. Although he retired from the university in 2015, he has
continued to work with Argonne National Laboratory, studying the structure and
carbon storage distribution of ice-wedge polygons. Ping will continue field
research on the North Slope next summer. He also serves as the major advisor
for three natural resources management graduate students.
Ping has had an eventful year. He attended the March release
of the documentary “Between Earth and Sky: Climate Change in the Last Frontier”
at the Environmental Film Festival in Washington, D.C. Ping said the documentary started out to
chronicle the soils tour for future students and it turned into something really
special, with interviews with scientists, government officials, farmers and
other Alaska residents affected by climate change.
“The producer, Professor Weindorf, did a fantastic job,” he said.
The audience at the film festival was very excited about the
documentary and Weindorf introduced him at the end of the showing. The documentary includes two of Ping’s former
graduate students, retired Natural Resources Conservation Service state soils
scientist Mark Clark and Lorene Lynn, who has established her own environmental
consulting business.
“I feel honored,” he said. “I’m really pleased to have all
those years of effort recognized and to raise the awareness of others to
climate change. I feel like a catalyst.”
Another notable event this year was Hurricane Irma. Ping his
family live in Orlando, Florida, and weathered the hurricane fairly well with no
property damage but they lost their electricity for eight days.
Ping has maintained his commitment to the advancement of
science after his retirement. On the average, he says he receives dozen
requests per year to review manuscripts for scientific journals. In his spare
time, he paints landscapes and wildlife, including dog mushing scenes in oil,
as inspired by his dog mushing experience in the Goldstream Valley.
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