2002 Annual Report
Resources
Facilities
Minnesota and the Twin Cities
Minnesota, 12th in size among the states and 20th in population, is the
industrial and agricultural center of the Upper Midwest. The state’s
terrain ranges from rich farmland in the south to rugged forests in the
north.
Minnesota is a state with great variation in its weather. Although winter
temperatures can dip below zero and summer temperatures often climb well
into the 90s, the average daytime high temperatures are: summer 78°F;
fall 41°F; winter 28°F; and spring 67°F. Average annual snow
fall is 49 inches in the Twin Cities; average rainfall is 22 inches. Except
for November and December, the sun shines more than half the days.
Minneapolis, the largest city in Minnesota, and St. Paul, the state capital,
make up the state’s major metropolitan area, known as the Twin Cities.
The Twin Cities offer numerous entertainment and cultural activities,
including the Minnesota Orchestra and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra,
the Guthrie Theater, the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, the Walker Art
Center, and the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden. Northrop Auditorium at the
University offers many concerts and performances by visiting artists throughout
the year, including an especially distinguished annual dance series.
There are approximately 900 lakes, 500 parks, and three great rivers—the
Mississippi, the Minnesota, and the St. Croix—in the seven-county
metropolitan area. Popular diversions from study and research in the summer
include swimming, canoeing, sailing, water skiing, hiking, and cycling.
By December, Minnesota waters are frozen, and cross-country and downhill
skiing, skating, snowmobiling, and winter camping are favorite pastimes.
The Twin Cities is a national center for both agri-business and high
technology. It is the home of such national and international corporations
as General Mills, Cargill, 3M, International Multifoods, Land O’Lakes,
and many more.
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota is one of the United States’ major research
universities. It regularly ranks among the top universities in receipt
of federal grants for research and development, and its Graduate School
was recently ranked among the six best U.S. public universities.
The University of Minnesota Twin Cities campus, by far the largest in
the University system, is really two campuses–one in Minneapolis
and one in St. Paul. The Mississippi River further divides the Minneapolis
campus into east and west banks, each with a distinctive character.
On the East Bank are the older buildings and the grassy tree-lined central
mall of a traditional college campus. The Institute of Technology and
many departments of the College of Liberal Arts are located on the East
Bank.
The West Bank features most of the University’s newer buildings
such as the Law School, the School of Music, and the Hubert H. Humphrey
Institute of Public Affairs.
The Department of Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering is located
on the St. Paul campus, which includes the Colleges of Agricultural, Food
and Environmental Sciences; Biological Sciences; Natural Resources; Human
Ecology; and Veterinary Medicine. It is situated in the heart of a pleasant
residential neighborhood, which gives it a small-town atmosphere. It is
about ten minutes from the Minneapolis campus, and is easily accessible
by inter-campus bus.
Department Facilities
Department facilities are located in the Biosystems and Agricultural
Engineering Building and the adjacent Engineering and Fisheries Laboratory
Building. We also have a laboratory in the Food Science and Nutrition
Building.
The Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering Building provides approximately
30,000 square feet for classrooms, offices, secretarial and administrative
areas, and laboratories for teaching and research. Approximately 12,500
square feet are available in the Laboratory Building for laboratories,
shop facilities, and large project work areas.
Laboratories for bioprocessing, food engineering, value-added processing,
indoor air quality, grain quality, water quality, land and water resource
modeling, terramechanics, machinery systems, and agricultural safety research
are available. All office and laboratory computers are connected via a
department network. Access to other computers at the University and the
Supercomputer Institute, and to the Internet, is available through the
campus network.
Field research is facilitated through cooperation with five University
experiment branch stations and several other research sites.