Our research
We want to understand how and why our ecosystems are changing. And more importantly, how we can help mitigate negative consequences.
We study ecosystem function across space and time to better understand ecosystem condition, sustainability, and vulnerability to extremes. This work lies at the intersection of ecology, remote sensing, and data science.
Our goal is to understand the processes that govern ecosystem health at large scales, so that we can predict the impacts of changes in climate, hydrology, and land management.
Major themes in our research
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Carbon Dynamics in Coastal Wetland Ecosystems
While coastal wetlands are important natural carbon sinks, sea-level-rise and shifts in disturbance regimes put these ecosystems at the frontline of global climate disruption. It is essential that these systems are managed for global resilience and long-term sustainability.
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Fire Effects and Post-fire Recovery
Disturbances such as fire, insect outbreaks, drought, and extreme low-temperature events control ecosystem structure and function. In many areas, changes in the disturbance regime (i.e. in the distinctive type, size, severity, and frequency of disturbance over extended spatio-temporal scales) is expected to be among the most severe climate change impacts.
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Projecting Shifts in Species Dynamics with Fluctuations in Climate and Disturbance Regimes
Disturbance events and climate change can result in shifts in resource availability that create long-term stresses, changing the composition of ecosystems. Shifts in community composition will co-occur with changes in function, resilience, ecosystem services.
Current ongoing projects
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The effects of increased freshwater inputs and salt water intrusion on the current and future greenhouse carbon balance of Everglade wetlands
The primary objective of this project is to understand the effects of anthropogenic disturbance (water management) and climate change (temperature, precipitation, salinity) on ecosystem structure, function and carbon dynamics in subtropical freshwater and brackish ecosystems.
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Optimizing fire regimes in everglades fire-dependent ecosystems
In the Florida Everglades, fire is necessary to maintain the unique mosaic of wetland ecosystems. Changes in climate, hydrology, and land management have altered the natural fire regime, putting fire-adapted communities at great risk. We are studying the links between fire history, hydrology, climate, and ecosystem recovery to determine how and why ecosystem recovery rates vary and estimate how they are likely to change in the future.
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Hurricane Irma’s role in increasing methane emissions and the global warming potential in Everglades ecosystems
High wind speeds during Hurricane Irma caused a decline in live vegetation and an increase in dead vegetation in the water column and in large floating mats. Combined with high water levels, the redistribution of organic matter has produced conditions that are capable of supporting higher methane emissions. The primary objective of this research is to understand how changes in C pools influences the greenhouse C balance.
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Disease risk in Great Basin five-needle pines
Five-needle pines in the Great Basin region occupy some of the country’s harshest environments and provide many essential ecosystem services; yet these often ancient trees face substantial threats including climate change and an introduced lethal pathogen that may lead to significant changes in their current distributions. The primary objective of this project is to evaluate changes in suitable habitat and determine where there is an elevated risk of disease.
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Maximizing carbon sequestration for an uncertain future
There are major uncertainties in the effect of agricultural practices and trade-offs between their impacts on greenhouse gas emissions. Managing for soil carbon storage has been proposed as a means to mitigate the rising atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations (e.g. the 4 per mil initiative https://www.4p1000.org/). However, increasing soil carbon sequestration through a variety of agricultural practices can have conflicting effects. In this project we will use the Agro-ecosystem, Biogeochemical cycles and Biodiversity (ACBB)” infrastructure to evaluate how the CO2 balance changes under various management regimes.
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Methane emissions from natural and managed ecosystems
In 2021 atmospheric methane concentrations hit another record high. While there are a lot of ideas about what is leading to rising atmospheric CH4 concentrations, we don’t know if it is caused by changes in sinks or source of CH4. Understanding the sources and sinks of methane (CH4) is critical to both predicting and mitigating future climate change.
Why this work matters
Finding climate solutions that benefit people and wildlife.
To better understand our climate future, we need better understanding of how hydrology and land management practices interact to determine the carbon storage capacity of ecosystems. Our goal is to use data, experiments, and collaboration to develop natural climate solutions that benefit both wildlife and people - in Florida, the United States, and beyond.