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The NIRS Consortium has been
working with Ken Vogel from the USDA-ARS Forage
and Bioenergy Research Unit,
137 Keim Hall, University of
Nebraska, Lincoln, NE 68583 to transfer ARS NIRS calibrations
for Swithchgrass bioenergy
predictions to the NIRSC. In turn NIRSC would make the calibrations
available to any NIRSC member  requesting them at
no charge. Read
more about the agreement from the ARS website. This agreement was
signed between ARS and NIRSC as of 7-28-11 and the calibrations will be
continued to be supported with samples and chemistry from ARS for 5
years. NIRSC will have the opportunity to add samples and update the
equation.
The equations and
supporting data have been sent to NIRSC for preparation. The next
step is to do some tests on the calibrations, which will include sending it
out to 2 test labs within the NIRSC that have switchgrass
samples on hand. After these initial tests and finding how the
calibrations perform, NIRSC will then make the equations available to all
NIRSC members. We hope to have this accomplished sometime in
September, 2011.
A press release from ARS
was made on August 18th, 2011 and can be viewed from the ARS
website in two articles. See the press release
and the magazine
story. A copy of the research paper by Vogel et al., 2011 is available
to NIRSC members upon request. Just contact the business office
(contact information below). The paper lists all of the parameters tested
for Switchgrass biomass composition, methods, and statistics that Ken Vogel
and his lab developed.
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