NREL IN THE LIMELIGHT
AWARDS Jeff Welker, NREL Research Scientist, was awarded $420,000 for a 3- year project from DOE-NIGEC/Univ. of Nebraska for “Mixedgrass Prairie Response to Simultaneous Changes in Winter and Summer Climate.” APPOINTMENTS Diana Wall, NREL Director, has been elected Chair of the Council of Scientific Society Presidents. SPECIAL PUBLICATIONS Stohlgren, T.J., T.T. Veblen, K. Kendall, W.L. Baker, C. Allen, A. Logan, and M. Ryan. 2002. The heart of the Rockies: Montane and subalpine ecosystems. Pages 203-218 In: Rocky Mountain Futures: an Ecological Perspective. J. Baron (ed). Island Press. In a paper entitled “The Rich Get Richer: Patterns of Plant Invasions in the United States,” USGS/NREL scientist Tom Stohlgren and coauthors David Barnett (NREL Research Associate) and John Kartesz (Biota of North America Program, Univ. of North Carolina) summarize two large, independent datasets to show exactly the opposite pattern. At multiple spatial scales, but more significantly, at larger spatial scales, hotspots of native plant diversity have been far more heavily invaded than areas of low plant diversity in most parts of the US. The findings suggest that hotspots of native plant species richness are unlikely to repel invasions, and that the threats of species invasion are significant and predictably greatest in species-rich areas. The work was published in the inaugural issue of “Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment,” a new journal of the Ecological Society of America. HAPPENINGS Jill Baron and Alan Covich, Dept. Of Fishery and Wildlife Biology/NREL, are organizing the “Conference on Consequences of Prolonged Severe Drought to Aquatic Ecosystems and Water Quality in the South Platte Basin” to be held April 3-4, 2003. Potential consequences will be explored, both in the context of drought, and current and future societal demands on water resources. Rich Conant presented “Modeling Greenhouse Gases in Rangelands: Influence of Improved Management” at the annual meeting of the Society for Range Management in Casper, WY. Tom Hobbs, NREL Research Scientist, was a Visiting Scholar at the Univ. of Rhode Island in March presenting a seminar and workshop on “Model Selection as an Alternative to Hypothesis Testing in Ecology.” In January, Tom gave a presentation to the Grand Teton National Park and the National Elk Refuge on "Modeling Alternatives for Elk Management" and he gave a presentation to the Point Reyes National Seashore staff on “Regulating Abundance of Wild Ungulates Using Fertility Control.” Tom also had the privilege of giving the Fall Commencement Address for the CSU College of Natural Resources. Jill Lackett, NREL Research Associate, with Gary Peterson, Professor, Dept. of Soil and Crop Sciences, presented “Preparing for a Changing Climate: Adapting to Climate Variability in the Central Great Plains,” at the 39th Annual Colorado Farm Show in Greeley, CO in January. This presentation was based on results from Dennis Ojima’s (NREL Research Scientist) Central Great Plains Climate Change Impacts Assessment project, funded by the US Dept. of Energy. Diana Wall attended the Detritus Working Group, NCEAS, Santa Barbara, CA; the National Research Council Committee - Frontiers in Polar Genomics, in Washington, DC; and the U.S. National Committee on Soil Science in Indianapolis, IN. Diana presented a talk on “Soil Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning” for the Island Press Board in Washington, DC. She also lectured on “Soil Biodiversity and Global Change” as part of a workshop for South American graduate students in Chamela, Mexico. Diana gave the plenary address at the 2003 British Ecological Society Annual Symposium on Soil Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning in March. Jeff Welker attended the NSF-ARCSS LAII synthesis workshop in Victoria, Canada and the NSF-Arctic System Science Workshop in San Francisco. Sayat Temirbekov from Kazakhstan, Sarah Walker from Virginia, and Anita Leahy and Tom Riley from NREL attended a CENTURY modeling workshop conducted by Cindy Keough, Dennis Ojima and Stephen Del Grosso, NREL, in February. In the fall of 2002, NREL donated six used computer monitors to the Lab School for Creative Learning, an elementary “choice” school which focuses on experiential and environmental learning within the Poudre School District. NREL Research Associate, Gary Wockner, organized the donation. The school was very grateful for the monitors as they are used every day by students. GRAD STUDENT NEWS Joyce Dickens was successful in her November 2 MS defense, entitled “Hydrologic, Geomorphic and Climatic Processes Controlling Willow Establishment in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado.” Her advisor is Tom Hobbs. PhD students (Diana Wall advisor), Mark St. John and Todd Wojtowicz successfully passed their preliminary PhD exams. Please welcome our new grad students: Khishigbayar Jamiyansharav, Dennis Ojima, advisor, comes from Mongolia. She graduated from Mongolian State Univ. in 1995 as a chemical technologist. She would like to conduct research on the Mongolian urban air quality issue. Tom Stohlgren is advisor to three new grad students: Erin Bergquist will investigate the effects of Coal Bed Methane development in the Powder River Basin, WY. Tracy Davern will work with the NPS to improve maps and predictive models of Tamarisk invasion. Jim Graham comes from Hewlett-Packard and specializes in computational ecology. VISITORS Diana’s Wall’s group has hired two new Postdoctoral Research Scientists: 1) Emma Broos will be working on the Antarctic and soil biodiversity projects. Emma received her Ph.D. at the Univ. of Western Sydney, Australia with a soil, microbial and nematode ecology focus. She recently spent three months in Switzerland where she studied nematode community structure and abundance under organic, bio-dynamic, and conventional farming treatments at the DOC long-term field trial for the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture; and 2) Johnson Nkem, received his PhD in Soil Ecology from the Univ. of New England, Armidale, New South Wales, Australia. Rod Chimner, a new Postdoctoral Research Associate, is working with Jeff Welker on the NIGEC mixedgrass prairie manipulation study in SE Wyoming. Rod has been working on carbon cycling in peatlands and received his PhD from CSU in 2000. Bruce Lubow is a new Research Associate working on projects with Tom Hobbs and Francis Singer. He will be modeling dynamics of populations of deer infected with Chronic Wasting Disease and will be developing methods for censing wild horses. His experience includes population and optimization modeling, as well as statistical design and analysis of field studies. Bruce has masters and bachelors degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering. He received his PhD from Fishery and Wildlife Biology at CSU and he has been involved with several funded projects as a postdoctoral fellow at CSU for the past 3 years. Jaysharee Ratnam has joined the NREL as a Postdoctoral Research Scientist with an interest in the interaction of large herbivore grazing patterns, tree-grass dynamics, and ecosystem function. She earned her PhD in animal foraging strategies from the Univ. of Syracuse. Robin Reid, a newly affiliated NREL Research Scientist, is a Systems Ecologist and Programme Co-ordinator for the People, Livestock and the Environment Programme at the International Livestock Research Institute in Nairobi, Kenya. Joe VonFischer, Research Scientist, is a graduate of Augustana College, Sioux Falls, SD (BA in Biology), PhD in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from Cornell Univ., and a NOAA Climate and Global Change Postdoctoral Fellowship at Princeton. His interests include climate-biology interactions, and the ecology and biogeochemistry of soil microbial communities as related to greenhouse gas production. Geneva Chong, is now a NREL Research Scientist working with Tom Stohlgren. She is continuing to investigate the effects of pre-fire fuel reduction treatments and burn severity on post-fire processes and conditions. Erik Hardy, is a new Research Associate working on a project with Tom Hobbs, Gary Wockner, Roy Roath, and the CDOW Habitat Partnership Program to address issues of cross-boundary management and sustainable habitat use by both domestic and wild ungulates in Jackson County, CO. Erik received his BS in Geology with a Biology minor from James Madison Univ. in Harrisonburg, VA and recently received his MS from CSU. Anita Lahey works as a Research Associate with Niall Hanan, on his NSF “Biocomplexity in African Savannas” project. She looks at niche partitioning and competition between trees and grasses in savanna ecosystems. Alain Plante, Research Associate for Keith Paustian, NREL Research Scientist/Soil and Crop Sciences Professor, on soil aggregate dynamics and carbon sequestration projects. Canadian of origin, he completed his PhD at the Univ. of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta on the dynamics of soil macroaggregates and their role in protecting soil organic matter. Alain spent the past year and a half in Versailles, France working as a postdoctoral research associate at the National Institute of Agronomy Research characterizing the passive pool of organic carbon in soil clays. Tom Riley is a new research associate working with Dennis Ojima, on the “Land Use in Temperate East Asia” project doing GIS and remote sensing analysis. Tom received his BA in history in 1992 from Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri. He spent the next ten years working as a US Forest Service wilderness ranger in several locations around Colorado. Tom then received a MS in forest sciences from CSU in May 2002. Heidi Steltzer is a new Postdoctoral Research Associate working with Jeff Welker on his NSF Biocomplexity project in NW Greenland. Heidi has been working in Alaska on successional dynamics and studied alpine ecology at CU as part of her PhD. LEAVING Andy Parsons has also moved back to England, yet is maintaining his affiliation to NREL as a Research Scientist. Stella Salvo is now a graduate student with Soil and Crop Sciences at CSU. GIFTS TO NREL We are still collecting donations for the James E. Ellis Humans and the Environment Scholarship. |
||||||||||||
The
Colorado Front Range GK-12 Project, funded by the U.S. National
Science Foundation, is a joint effort of the University of Northern
Colorado, Colorado State University, Weld County and Poudre School
Districts, and other collaborators. The theme of the project is
“human impacts on ecosystems along the Front Range.”
The project provides funding for graduate students (the GK-12
Fellows) at the two universities to be involved in curriculum
development and delivery within the local public school systems.
It also funds summer research opportunities for public school
teachers to enhance their understanding of the scientific process.
The emphasis is on ensuring that public school students (and their
teachers) are exposed to experiences in the field, making learning
a hands-on, interactive, question-driven experience. This brings
the excitement of university research into public school classrooms
and forms links between the universities and the school systems.
John Moore of UNC and Dave Swift of CSU are both NREL scientists
and Principal Investigators on the GK-12 Project. Fellows are
involved in a variety of science classes at all levels within
the school systems. 
A
recent project with Loveland High School is another good example
of the way the GK-12 project works. In January, we created a module
dealing with winter ecology that gave students exposure to professional
scientists and provided an opportunity to conduct field research.
This project was designed to be short, hands-on, and tied to the
State of Colorado’s learning standards. Students in Honors
Biology classes spent a week immersed in the winter ecology of
the Rocky Mountains. The first part of the module required students
to spend time researching such winter ecology terms and topics
as subnivean space, Krumholtz effect, and hibernation. Next, students
listened to presentations about winter ecology research by guest
speakers from CSU, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the
Rocky Mountain Bird Observatory. After hearing about real research,
students were required to design authentic research projects of
their own. Students were shown numerous pieces of field equipment,
given descriptions of field sites available to them, and were
mentored by GK-12 fellows as they planned group research projects.
The highlight of the project was a field trip to the YMCA of the
Rockies where the students conducted their research projects.
Projects included a comparison of the water chemistry of the Big
Thompson and Clear Creek Rivers, an examination of the tree species
used or avoided by beavers, and an examination of relative heat
loss by using baked potatoes (simulating small mammals) in various
microhabitats. GK-12 fellows and volunteers from NREL mentored
the students during their field trip. To cap off the experience,
students wrote summaries of their projects and completed a post-assessment
of the effectiveness of the module as a teaching tool. Feedback
from the teacher and students was overwhelmingly positive. The
students demonstrated an improved understanding of scientific
methods and ecological concepts, while also having a great time!
Experiments that the students created were fun, exciting, and
hands-on. GK-12 fellows are now packaging the protocols from the
experiments so that they can be used by other schools in our area.
Niall
Hanan, NREL Research Scientist, organized a workshop
on African savanna ecology, funded by his NSF project “Biocomplexity
in African Savannas.” The workshop took place in South Africa
in January with about 30 participants, including leading African
savanna ecologists from Africa, the US, and Europe, as well as
graduate students and managers. Products from the workshop include
on-going analyses of continental-scale patterns that contrast
savanna ecology and dynamics in the different regions of Africa,
and a special section on African savannas planned for the Journal
of Biogeography. |
Natural
Resource Ecology Laboratory |