A Legacy of Learning

Alumnus Bryant Low Bequest Funds Soil Analysis Lab

The Bryant Low Soil Analysis Lab Dedication | Photo Credit: Morgan Elia (Agricultural Communication, ’25)

A bequest from Cal Poly alumnus Bryant Low (Biology, ’58) provided generous funding for a lab designed to conduct research related to environmental studies, forest and fire health, production agriculture, carbon sequestration and water quality.  

“Because of this generous support, our soil science researchers, for the first time, will be able to establish and maintain a commercial-grade analytical soils lab in perpetuity,” said Jeremy James, head and professor of the Natural Resources Management and Environmental Sciences (NRES) Department.  

NRES faculty researchers describe the vast impact and opportunities this gift provides. 

Yamina Pressler, associate professor of soil science and restoration ecology, said, "The Bryant Low Analytical Laboratory is an essential resource for our research on soil and restoration in coastal California grasslands. The lab provides unique opportunities for faculty and students to collaborate to answer questions we would not otherwise be able to address without the instrumentation and technical support staff in the lab. As a result, we have been able to collaborate on many timely projects with conservation organizations around the state because we are equipped with the tools to do so effectively."  

Gordon Rees, associate professor of soil science, said, “One of the biggest benefits I anticipate is that it will provide a baseline of support in terms of analytical capacity to try out new things before full grant funding is available for a project. Much of the research I'm able to do starts with an idea that I or one of my students have that we first want to try as a summer project or a guided student research experience. The things we learn from those small projects open the door for new ideas and bigger studies. Knowing that we will have the analytical capacity to implement those initial steps will give us the freedom to give more of those ideas a shot and will lead to more discovery.”  

Chip Appel, professor of soil chemistry, said, “The Bryant Low Analytical Lab endowment is a game changer for our department and Cal Poly. This is because this lab supports a great deal of research across the department faculty and the university. Moreover, for really the first time in my 23-year career at Cal Poly, we have the capacity to do preventative instead of responsive (to a crisis) maintenance on our analytical instruments such as the total carbon and nitrogen analyzer or the ICP-OES (inductively coupled plasma-optical emission spectrophotometer), which can analyze about 80 elements from the periodic table. Each of these instruments, as well as others, is used routinely for research and teaching and need to be regularly maintained in order to be consistently available for use.”  

The details of this historic gift are described in “A Legacy of Learning,” published in Cultivate, Spring 2025, by Cal Poly’s College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences (CAFES).

Read the article here: "Legacy of Learning,” Cultivate Spring 2025 

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