University of Texas Rio Grande Valley 2 articles published in JoVE Environment Visualizing Oceanographic Data to Depict Long-term Changes in Phytoplankton Patricia S. Thibodeau1, Jongsun Kim2 1Graduate School of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island, 2School of Earth, Environmental and Marine Sciences, The University of Texas - Rio Grande Valley Here, we present a protocol for converting phytoplankton microscopic images into vector graphics and repetitive patterns to enable visualization of shifts in phytoplankton taxa and biomass over 60 years. This protocol represents an approach that can be utilized for other plankton time series and datasets globally. Chemistry Molten-Salt Synthesis of Complex Metal Oxide Nanoparticles Jose P. Zuniga1, Maya Abdou1, Santosh K. Gupta1,2, Yuanbing Mao1,3 1Department of Chemistry, University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, 2Radiochemistry Division, Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, 3School of Earth, Environmental, and Marine Sciences, University of Texas Rio Grande Valley Here, we demonstrate a unique, relatively low-temperature, molten-salt synthesis method for preparing uniform complex metal oxide lanthanum hafnate nanoparticles.