Biography of Barbara Conkling

Barbara Conkling is a soil scientist who has experience in soil chemistry, with extensive experience in writing and editing of technical material. She was appointed in 2000 as a research assistant professor in the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources at North Carolina State University (NCSU). During this time she was a joint venture cooperator with the Eastern Threat Center and the USDA Forest Service Southern Research Station (SRS). She contributed to national reporting efforts of the Forest Health Monitoring Program (FHM) as an editor, technical writer, and analyst. She also contributed to the field guides and public database user manuals of the Forest Inventory and Analysis Program. During 1992-2000, she was a research associate in the same department at NCSU and was a cooperator with the SRS, contributing to national reports of FHM as editor, technical writer, and analyst, and was responsible for production of the FHM Field Methods guides each year. Before coming to NCSU, she spent several years as a soil scientist at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas in the Harry Reid Center for Environmental Studies, where she worked on several large environmental programs including the early stages of the Forest Health Monitoring Program as a document editor and technical writer. She earned a Ph. D. with a major in soil chemistry (1988) and a M.S. with a major in soil chemistry (1984) from the University of Missouri-Columbia (UMC). She also worked at UMC as a research associate in plant pathology (1988), and as a senior research lab technician (1989). She received a B.A in chemistry in 1981 from Ohio Wesleyan University.

Contact Barbara Conkling at barbara.conkling@usda.gov or 919-549-4084.