Fatima Alcantara Valadao

GFI Fellow - Class of 2018

Undergraduate student, environmental systems: ecology, behavior and evolution
UC San Diego

DESCRIPTION

Fatima will serve as a student leader of an Edible Plant Sampling and Analysis Program–a collaborative effort of UC San Diego’s UC GFI and Superfund Research Center. Testing edible plants for toxicants on and off campus addresses public concerns about health where people are growing fruits and vegetables on land that may be contaminated. Fatima will continue work she already has underway:  collecting samples from gardens across campus and San Diego including the Ocean View Growing Grounds (an urban garden located in a food desert in Southeast San Diego). Her tasks include weekly upkeep of the soil lab/plant tissue greenhouse located at Roger's Community Garden on campus. The Edible Plant Sampling and Analysis Program aims to improve the safety and health of gardeners, and in the process, promote community gardening as a way of increasing the consumption of nutritious, locally-grown foods. Fatima will help build teaching and learning modules for UC GFI and San Diego’s Bioregional Center that highlight the importance of this work.