Projects Funded in 2009

Working Groups:

A Synthesis of Patterns, Analyses, and Mechanisms of β-diversity Along Ecological Gradients
Jonathan Chase, Nathan Sanders and Amy Freestone

β-diversity, the change in species composition across localities, describes how communities respond to spatial and environmental heterogeneity. As the scalar between local (α) and regional (γ) diversity, β-diversity is fundamental to understanding patterns of biodiversity. However its measurement, analyses, patterns, and mechanisms are much more poorly understood than its local and regional counterparts. Here, we propose a working group that will bring together ecologists with varied expertise in biodiversity and its statistical analysis. We will develop a synthesis of β-diversity metrics and analyses, and then use these to synthesize the patterns of β-diversity along key ecological gradients to understand how and why β-diversity varies spatially, and how it influences the relationship between α- and γ-diversity. Finally, we will develop analyses that will help to discern the relative importance of stochastic and deterministic processes that underlie the patterns of β-diversity in the assembly of communities. 

Long-term Phenological Changes in Tundra Plants in Response to Experimental Warming and Observed Changes in Climate
Steven Overbauer, Tiffany Troxler

Arctic regions are predicted to undergo strong warming in coming decades, and they have
already undergone measurable warming within recent decades. A coordinated international
experiment on the effects of warming on the phenology and growth of individual tundra species
and on plant communities, the International Tundra Experiment (ITEX), started in 1990 to
directly measure the ways in which tundra plants and communities respond to consistent, lowlevel
increases in temperature across the tundra biome. Tundra systems are clearly capable of
responding to climate warming on fairly short time scales, without artificial increases in nutrients,
and these changes will have significant impacts regionally and globally. One aspect of tundra
plants that is highly sensitive to slight changes in temperature is phenology, the timing of key
life-history events such as bud burst, leaf growth, flowering etc. The species phenology, growth
and community data analyzed to date show responses that in many ways mirror patterns seen
along climate gradients, but changes are too subtle and too variable to be detected by most
individual-site studies, some after more than a decade of warming. ITEX as an observing
network provides a unique opportunity to evaluate plant phenology changes at a global scale
across the tundra biome.

In this working group we will evaluate changes in plant phenology across the tundra biome over
the past 10-15 years in two ways:
1) controls plots versus plots subject to long-term experimental warming, and
2) phenology of controls measured during the mid 1990s with controls remeasured during the recent International Polar Year field season.

Human Impacts of Water Infrastructure on Watershed Ecosystems and the Sustainability of Irrigated Agriculture in the Coterminous U.S.
John Sabo, Laura Bowling and Gerrit Schoups

The goal of the proposed working group is twofold:

1) to measure the ecological footprint of freshwater infrastructure in the US (e.g., dams, irrigated agriculture, growing urban centers), and
2) to identify sustainable solutions to potential water shortages given climate change and rapid growth of major US urban areas.

The underlying approach includes synthesis of numerous publicly available datasets describing surface and groundwater hydrology, human population growth, agriculture, economics and ecology. The approach also includes a novel analysis in which we will apply macroscale hydrologic models and IPCC climate forecasts to provide sustainable solutions to water shortages that consider water for cities, farms and biodiversity. The group hopes to publish 2‐3 high impact papers prior to the 25th anniversary of Cadillac Desert: The American West and its disappearing water (Reisner 1986, Penguin Press) in 2011. The activities will culminate in a final workshop in which noted popular press authors and policy makers are invited to write an op‐ed piece to be submitted to the The New York Times. This popular press article will comment on the state of U.S. freshwater infrastructure then (based on Cadillac Desert) and now (based on our scientific work), and propose a policy platform for freshwater sustainability in the U.S.

Towards Understanding Marine Biological Impacts of Climate Change
Anthony Richardson and Elvira Poloczanska

This working group will provide the globally coherent view of marine biological changes in
response to climate change that is currently lacking but so desperately needed. We will bring
together marine experts specialising in diverse ecosystems and robust statistical analysis to address
key questions concerning the vulnerability of marine systems to climate change:

1. What are the similarities and differences between marine and terrestrial systems in terms of types and rates of responses?
2. Which marine species, taxonomic groups and systems (e.g., pelagic, benthic, rocky shore, sandy beach, coral reef) are most sensitive?
3. What are the similarities and differences in the types and rates of responses in tropical, temperate and polar seas?
4. Do multiple human stresses increase vulnerability of species and habitats to climate change?
5. Can we attribute change in marine ecosystems to climate change?

To answer these key questions, we will undertake three tasks:
Task 1:
Database assembly - Build a marine climate impacts database employing an innovative tiered approach to classify impacts. The database will be publicly-accessible through the NCEAS data repository, enabling researchers to validate entries and upload new results.
Task 2:
Impacts analysis - Address the first 4 key questions in Task 1 by applying robust meta-analytic techniques (e.g., Parmesan & Yohe 2003) to the marine climate impacts database.
Task 3:
Attribution: Employ the analytical techniques of the IPCC (2007) and Rosenzweig et al. (2008) to attribute changes in marine biological ecosystems to global warming with a high degree of certainty (question 5).

Ecosystem Services on an Urbanizing Planet: What 2 Billion New Urbanites Means For Air and Water
Robert McDonald and Peter Marcotullio

Urbanization is expected to add almost 2 billion new urban residents by 2030. While there is growing awareness that cities affect almost every ecosystem on Earth and are increasingly vulnerable to environmental change, there are few global estimates of urbanization's impact on key ecosystem services. This is particularly true for freshwater availability and clean air, which may be massively impacted by urbanization and may be key future vulnerabilities for urban residents. We propose to assemble an intellectually diverse Working Group to produce the first calculation of the global impact of urban activities on two ecosystem services: freshwater use and availability for drinking and sanitation; and the atmosphere's capacity to absorb pollutants such as particulate matter, ozone, and carbon dioxide from fossil-fuel consumption while remaining healthy to breathe and avoiding extreme climate change. During our meetings scientists and policymakers will synthesize datasets of urban demographic, socio-economic, and biophysical change affecting the supply and demand of these two key ecosystem services. Our calculation of freshwater and atmospheric impacts will be incorporated into a high-profile scientific publication quantifying the ecological impact of future urbanization.

Postdoctoral Associate: 

Darren Johnson
Converting Evolutionary Costs into Ecological Currency: Linking Trait Variation, Natural Selection, and Population Dynamics
Numerous studies in the ecological and evolutionary literature have estimated the magnitude of natural selection. Although natural selection is widespread and often strong, much less is known about the immediate effects of selection on population dynamics. I propose a method that can be used to quantify the direct effects of trait variation and natural selection on population dynamics. This method will be applied to meta-analyses examining the overall influence of selection on demographic components of fitness in a broad variety of organisms. Information from meta-analyses will be combined with models of population dynamics to evaluate how trait variation and selection can affect key population attributes such as size, growth rate, and probability of extinction. This work will be further applied to develop conceptual models of how different modes of selection (i.e., directional, stabilizing and disruptive) influence concurrent population dynamics. This project has clear ramifications for incorporating evolutionary considerations in the management and conservation of living natural resources.

Distributed Graduate Seminars: 

Engaging Undergraduate Students in Ecological Investigations Using Large, Public Datasets
Teresa Mourad, Wendy K. Gram, and Bruce Grant

With easy access to large-volume public datasets now commonplace, high-quality data are available to investigate many ecological questions and issues of interest to scientists, policymakers, and citizens. Many people, however, do not have the experience or skills to search, use, analyze and interpret these data. The Ecological Society of America (ESA), in close partnership with the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON), will facilitate a Distributed Graduate Seminar to focus on examining effective student activities and assessment strategies for using large public datasets in the classroom.

This seminar will build on a preliminary education framework generated at a 2008 ESA faculty workshop, organized to make recommendations to NEON as they developed their education and outreach plan. The seminar will be instrumental in refining this education framework. New teaching activities will be designed, implemented and assessed. Developed with current learning theory in mind, they will emphasize student active-teaching methodologies that are inquiry-based and participatory. The teaching activities will provide undergraduate students the means to better understand ecological concepts, and to gain experience in effectively applying quantitative skills to the analysis and interpretation of large-volume datasets. Gaining fundamentally critical, quantitative ecoinformatics skills will position students well as demand for a data-savvy workforce grows steadily in the 21st century.

The project will also prepare faculty at minority-serving and small undergraduate institutions in the basics of good ecoinformatics practices, enabling them to seize opportunities that will present themselves when data from observatories such as NEON, rich with biotic data, come online.

New teaching tools require assessment strategies. The new teaching activities will be evaluated for their effectiveness in the undergraduate classroom. These key issues will be considered in developing assessment tools:

(1) misconceptions and anxieties that students bring into the classroom related to data manipulation and interpretation
(2) developmental stages of student mastery of critical concepts needed to work with large datasets, and
(3) types of assessments that will authentically measure students' learning progress

Participating Institutions

Alcorn State University
Brown University
Clarkson University
Diné College
Ecological Society of America
Hampton University
National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON)
New College of Florida
Swarthmore College
University of Puerto Rico
Widener University

Seminar: Summer 2009    Project: 2009-2010