Palomar College
EN-10: Community Partnerships

Collaboration with University of California Riverside (UCR) conducted between August 2023- August 2025. Palomar College has agreed to provide the San Marcos Campus and its plants as the location and sampling for the research project.

This project focuses on understanding the ecological dynamics of host plant genera and species within the Malvaceae family. There are over 4,000 species of Malvaceae plants and many can be found in backyard gardens, wilderness areas, and public and urban landscapes. The cotton seed bug is a global pest of cotton and feeding by adults and nymphs damages cotton seeds reducing seed size, viability and oil content. Cotton bolls contaminated with CSB nymphs and adults results in stained lint when material is ginned. While this pest is a major threat to the U.S. cotton industry, relatively little is known about population phenology in areas with various suitable host plants over time. An improved understanding of this pest’s population dynamics in California will improve insights and understanding how best to monitor and manage populations more effectively.

The project will identify and use 4-5 different host plant genera/species in the Malvaceae family. Each of these selected genera/species will have multiple plant specimens (minimum of three per selected genus/species) across the campus so that sampling in that particular genus/species is replicated across the campus. Each month thereafter, a student will collect data and enter into a predesigned datasheet.

To determine cotton seed bug activity via flight within the Palomar college landscape, UCR will monitor adult flight with sticky traps. Supplies for the colored sticky card study will be supplied by UC Riverside. 

All data for the phenology/host plant study and attraction to different colored sticky traps, will be taken 
on a predetermined schedule by a student(s) at Palomar College. Mark and Christina Hoddle will mentor 
the students during this process and help collate and analyze these data. The goal is to have this work be 
of sufficient quality for publication in a scientific journal.

San Diego State University Research Foundation (SDSURF) is a nonprofit auxiliary organization chartered to further the educational, research and community service objectives of San Diego State University. Palomar College is partnering with SDSURF to provide scientific research opportunities for Palomar College students and advancing ecological knowledge of its Preserve. In this partnership, Palomar College allows campus access to the SDSURF researchers associated with the research project. The SDSURF research project will perform the proposed research with minimal disturbance to the landscape and make reasonable efforts to engage Palomar College students and faculty in the SDSURF
research project, such as presenting the project to classes, recruiting student researchers and
leading tours of the facilities.

The SDSURF research project will reveal the interactive effects of wildfire, drought and altered plant 
communities on the function and structure of a semiarid ecosystem. By establishing a controlled drought 
experiment soon after an authentic wildfire, this study will be especially relevant for understanding how 
future wildfires will interact with other climate change factors. The responses of plant phenology and soil 
structure to multiple climate change factors will be particularly novel and will form the basis for improved 
modeling of extreme events in semiarid ecosystems. The Millennial Model will help form long-term 
predictions of soil C storage from measurements of the distribution of organic matter among soil physical 
fractions. The involvement of Palomar College students in this research contributes to the program’s 
Service Learning requirement, and our data will support Palomar College and San Diego Habitat 
Conservancy’s goal of managing the preserve.

The proposed research would be conducted between May 2, 2022 to November 30, 2023. This project addresses critical environmental challenges posed by climate change, such as wildfire, drought, and shifts in plant communities.

This project that Palomar Community College is a part of has support and committment from Southern California Gas, UC Riverside, South Coast Air Quality Management District, and PG&E. Under this grant, Enchanted Rock Energy, the University of California Riverside, and Palomar Community College will help develop and advance technologies that can significantly reduce greenhouse gas and other emissions in natural gas generators, helping California meet its renewable energy and zero carbon resource goals, while ensuring electric reliability and affordability. The goal of this project is to develop and demonstrate the Enchanted Rock 450 kWe ICE generator with H2 blending percentages exceeding 30% by volume while meeting NOx and GHG emissions targets. The proposed research would be conducted between Q-2 2024 and Q-2 2027. This project aims to develop and advance technology that significantly reduces greenhouse gas and other harmful emissions from natural gas generators and aligns with California's renewable energy and zero-carbon goals.

Palomar College has agreed to serve as a host site for Enchanted Rock Energy's final field-based testing of equipment. Discussion will also take place regarding the gifting of the equipment to Palomar College as part of our move towards greater sustainability. Palomar will provide the required 20'x20' site area, access to a natural gas line, and road access for installation.

In addition, Enchanted Rock Energy and Palomar College will use this partnership to explore development of customized workforce training for technicians related to hydrogen-fuel generators, and we will mutually seek educational opportunities for research and workforce training related to this innovative technology. Finally, Palomar College District will leverage existing local, state, and federal resources for workforce training to focus on under-represented and disadvantaged students.