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BIODIVERSITY AND NRELGLOBAL
LITTER INVERTEBRATE DECOMPOSITION EXPERIMENT (GLIDE) The GLIDE Steering
Committee is chaired by Diana Wall and co-chaired by David Bignell
of the University of London, Queen Mary College, UK, and Mark Dangerfield
of BioTrack and Macquarie University, Australia. This Steering Committee,
along with Jim Gosz of the International Long-Term Ecological Research
(ILTER) Network, has been instrumental in identifying 28 GLIDE sites
globally, such as Namibia, Russia, Venezuela, Canada, Burkina Faso,
Australia, Mongolia, and Taiwan. Due to limited funding, sites represent
biomes across latitudes. These collaborators will examine invertebrate
species involved in decomposition of a litter source. Each site
has four plots of six fiberglass mesh (1.0mm) bags/plot of 10g of
Agropyron cristatum. Half of the bags in a plot will be treated
with mothballs to eliminate decomposition by invertebrates. Bags
will be collected three times at intervals dependent on each site’s
environment. After collection, fauna will be extracted from the
litterbags by the Tullgren Funnel method, preserved in ethanol,
and shipped to BioTrack in Australia. Specimens will be sorted to
morphospecies, photographed, and returned to the host country. The GLIDE team
has designed a website,
http://www.nrel.colostate.edu/projects/glide (funded by the
Soil Science Society of America) to educate the public and scientists
on the importance of soil biodiversity and the critical ecosystem
services soil fauna provide. The website’s primary goal is
outreach, but it will also be instrumental in establishing protocols
and coordinating sampling times for site collaborators. For information,
contact GLIDE at glide@nrel.colostate.edu. INTERNATIONAL
BIODIVERSITY OBSERVATION YEAR (IBOY) The launch of
IBOY in January 2001 was marked by a special issue of Trends in
Ecology and Evolution (Vol. 16, No. 1). A press release issued simultaneously
by the IBOY secretariat resulted in at least 16 articles in the
scientific, environmental and popular press in Argentina, Austria,
Brazil, Mexico, Peru, The Philippines, Switzerland, The United Kingdom,
and USA. On March 24, 2001, the IBOY Secretariat and the National
Research Council’s US National Committee on Diversitas sponsored
a symposium and panel on "Human Dimensions of Biodiversity"
at the Annual Meeting of the American Institute of Biological Sciences
in Washington DC, which was reported as the lead story of the May
14, 2001 Issue of The Scientist (Vol. 15. No. 10). AIBS also celebrated
the IBOY by screening the IMAX film "Ocean Oasis" at the
Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History.
Throughout 2001
and 2002, IBOY is sponsoring a series of meetings with the goals
of: (1) developing research recommendations for international biodiversity
challenges in need of integrated research and (2) training biodiversity
scientists on communicating their findings to the media. The first
meeting took place on June 15-17, 2001 at the US Fish and Wildlife
Service, National Wildlife Visitors Center, Patuxent, MD. Over 40
IBOY scientists and educators from around the world shared information
on the latest advances in their fields, identified international
biodiversity challenges in need of integrated research, and received
professional training on communicating with the media. The international
radio program on science and the environment, Pulse of the Planet,
interviewed leaders of IBOY’s research projects at the meeting,
for programs on IBOY and biodiversity research to be broadcast in
Fall 2001. In September 2001, the IBOY Secretariat will host a meeting
at NREL, sponsored by the National Academy of Science, to coordinate
US-wide celebration of biodiversity and biodiversity research in
2002. Also at that time, a show will be broadcast by EarthWatch
Radio, and a feature article published in French Magazine GEO on
IBOY. Visit our website at http://www.nrel.colostate.edu/iboy
for more information. NREL IN THE LIMELIGHTNREL SCIENTIST NAMED TO PRESTIGIOUS ALDO LEOPOLD
LEADERSHIP PROGRAM The Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment,
Committee on Soil and Sediment Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning,
chaired by Diana Wall, published a special issue of BioScience,
Vol. 50, No.12, December 2000, on linkages above and below the surface
of soils and sediments. A Special Issue of Restoration Ecology Volume 8(4S),
the Journal of the Society for Ecological Restoration, was published
in December 2000 with articles written by Francis Singer, John Gross
and Dave Swift. This publication was funded by the National Park
Service and U.S. Geological Survey in cooperation with NREL. Jill Baron will edit a book (Island Press, publisher)
on “Rocky Mountain Futures: an ecological perspective.”
The book will be for non-scientists and will include contributions
by NREL scientists Baron, Dave Theobald, Tom Hobbs, Tom Stohlgren,
and Heather Rueth. Publication is expected in 2002, the UNESCO International
Year of Mountains. Jim Ellis was recently appointed to a six-year term
as a member of the National Research Council, US National Committee
for the International Union of Biological Sciences (USNC/IUBS).
The committee focuses on soil biology, including conservation of
biodiversity in human-dominated ecosystems. Jill Baron was elected secretary of the Ecological
Society of America for a three-year term beginning August 2001.
She was recently appointed to the Grand Canyon Monitoring and Research
Center Science Advisory Board. Keith Paustian is serving on the Planning Committee
for the Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Facility, a major initiative
being considered by DOE to establish ecosystem research facilities
to support significant advances in fundamental understanding of
ecosystem dynamics. AWARDSJason Neff received a Mendenhall Post Doctoral Fellowship
from the USGS and will work part-time in Denver and at NREL. Jason
was also named Biogeosciences editor of EOS - the weekly newspaper
of the American Geophysical Union. In June, 2001, Marlen Eve was the recipient of the
USDA Secretary of Agriculture Honor Award “for significant
contributions to improving the Kyoto Protocol through the consideration
of forest, crop and grazing land management.” HAPPENINGSCarbon
Seqeuestration-Africa Soil
Ecology Meetings Jill
Baron Testifies to Congress Global
Change and Africa Livestock Workshop State
of the National Parks Investigated The
Denver Museum Celebrates IBOY GRAD STUDENT NEWS
Nichole
Barger, a NREL PhD student of Dennis Ojima and Jane Belnap’s
(BLM), working in Canyonlands National Park, Utah received a three-year
scholarship totaling $75,000 from the Canon National Parks Science
Scholars Program. Her research in Canyonlands will examine the impacts
of biological soil crusts on ecosystem N cycling. The program, which
is sponsored by Canon USA, Inc., National Park Service, National
Park Foundation and AAAS, awards up to eight scholarships each year
in the biololgical, physical, social and cultural sciences. Koren
Nydick was a previous recipient. Graduates Dave
Barnett also successfully defended his MS thesis-“A Nested-Intensity
Sampling Design for Plant Diversity." Congratulations! He will
work on projects, such as evaluating invasive species in 509 U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service refuges, with NREL scientist and advisor,
Tom Stohlgren. Meg
Walsh successfully defended her PhD thesis to her committee, Dennis
Ojima, Dave Schimel, and Keith Paustian standing in for Roger Pielke,
on May 11. She is a post-doc intern in Washington DC with the National
Academy of Sciences. Tamara
Hochstrasser has successfully defended her PhD thesis entitled “Pattern
and process at a grassland-shrubland ecotone.” She will be
working with advisor, Deb Peters, at Jornada Experimental Range,
Las Cruces, New Mexico. PEOPLE - WELCOME TO NRELEldor
Paul has recently joined NREL as a Senior Scientist. Paul is one
of the foremost authorities in the world in the fields of soil microbiology
and soil organic matter dynamics. Prior to coming to NREL, Eldor
was department chair for Soil Sciences, University of California,
Berkeley and for Michigan State University. At NREL, he is continuing
his research on soil organic matter dynamics as affected by land
use change, including radiocarbon dating of soils and use of stable
carbon isotopes. Jeff
Welker, Senior Research Scientist, has returned to NREL from the
University of Wyoming. He has brought his projects and two Post-Docs,
Jace Fahnestock and Mark Lyford, as well as two graduate students. Zhiqiang
Gao from the Institute of Remote Sensing Applications, Chinese Academy
of Sciences, began work at NREL September 1 as a Post-Doc working
with Dennis Ojima. His research will investigate remote sensing
analysis to retrieve land surface parameters for ecosystem and atmospheric
modeling. Laura
Landrum, a new Post-Doc, is working with Jill Baron as a modeler
with the Regional HydroEcological Simulation System (RHESSys) a
model which investigates possible effects of climate change on watershed
and the ecosystem in Rocky Mountain National Park. Laura received
her PhD from the University of Washington in oceanography. Victoria
Dreitz, a recent PhD from the University of Florida, has joined
NREL as a Post-Doc to work on Tom Hobbs’ project on chronic
wasting disease in mule deer populations. She will work on field
studies, model building, and model selection. Kristen
Howerton is working with Keith Paustian as a Research Associate
in developing a database that may be used as a resource for studying
soil carbon levels in various agroecosystems. She received a MS
in Environmental Science - Natural Resource Management from the
University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. In
March, 2001, Marlen Eve left his position at USDA-ARS and was appointed
as a full-time Research Associate with NREL. Melannie
Hartman moved to Red Lodge, Montana in December 2000, and continues
to work remotely for Dennis Ojima and Bill Parton. She drives the
1000-mile round trip from Red Lodge to NREL about every six weeks. Lisa
Schell will be leaving NREL at the end of June after seven extremely
productive years. Lisa was instrumental in the development of the
Modified-Whittaker vegetation sampling plot, and has been an integral
component of Tom Stohlgren’s research, from climate change
to invasive species. We will miss Lisa tremendously. Kelly
Rimar is transitioning from the US Forest Service Forest Health
Monitoring Program into Lisa Schell's position. Karen
Bradley will be retiring from NREL on July 26 which is her 25-Year
Anniversary date. She has served CSU for over 32 years. Needless
to say, she will be missed. Her retirement celebration will be held
3:00 - 5:00 p.m. on July 26 at the University Club, Lory Student
Center. GIFTS TO NRELColbert
E. Cushing, Jr. donated Volume 19 “Tree Crop Ecosystems”
to add to the collection of “Ecosystems of the World”
previously generously received from him. Kurt
Fausch, Professor, Dept. of Fishery and Wildlife Biology, donated
his collection of July 1964 - April 1992 issues of BioScience (which
he inherited from Clarence Carlson) to the NREL graduate students
in November 2000. Jean Gibson graciously donated the $100 door prize that she won at the NREL Holiday Party to the graduate student fund. The fund also received a donation from Terry Allen May of $150. |
The
Global Litter Invertebrate Decomposition Experiment (GLIDE) is a
Core Network Project of the International Biodiversity Observation
Year and a multi-site experiment funded by the National Science
Foundation and the Soil Science Society of America (SSSA). The GLIDE
will assess and examine the relationship of biogeographical patterns
of soil litter biodiversity and decomposition rates. 
January
2001 saw the launch of the International Biodiversity Observation
Year 2001 – 2002. IBOY is chaired by Diana Wall, administered
by Program Director, Gina Adams and staffed by Lily Huddleson and
Stella Salvo at NREL. IBOY is an initiative of Diversitas, the international
program of biodiversity science. Nearly 100 biodiversity research
and education projects are participating in this year for biodiversity.
IBOY is drawing them together in a coalition-building and outreach
campaign to (1) network and integrate research to advance a holistic
understanding of biodiversity and (2) increase communication of
science-based biodiversity information to a broad audience. |
Natural
Resource Ecology Laboratory |