Publications

Tidal freshwater forested wetlands (TFFW) provide critical ecosystem services including essential habitat for a variety of wildlife species and significant carbon sinks for atmospheric carbon dioxide. However, large uncertainties remain concerning the impacts of climate change on the magnitude and variability of carbon fluxes and storage across a range of TFFW. In this study, we developed a proces

We present spatially distributed seasonal and annual surface mass balances of Wolverine Glacier, Alaska, from 2016 to 2020. Our approach accounts for the effects of ice emergence and firn compaction on surface elevation changes to resolve the spatial patterns in mass balance at 10 m scale. We present and compare three methods for estimating emergence velocities. Firn compaction was constrained by

Grain size is an important textural property of sediments and is widely used in paleoenvironmental studies as a means to infer changes in the sedimentary environment. However, grain size parameters are not always easy to interpret without a full understanding of the factors that influence grain size. Here, we measure grain size in sediment cores from the Bering slope and the Umnak Plateau, and rev

Application of updated diatom biochronology to the Monterey Formation and related biosiliceous rocks reveals the imprint of both global paleoclimatic/ paleoceanographic and regional tectonic events. A rise in global sea level combined with regional tectonic deepening associated with the development of the transform California margin resulted in the abrupt onset of deposition of fine-grained Monte

Drylands, which cover more than 40% of Earth’s terrestrial surface, are dominant drivers of global biogeochemical cycling and home to more than one third of the human population. Climate projections predict warming, drought frequency and severity, and evaporative demand will increase in drylands at faster rates than global means. Due to extreme temperatures and high biological dependency on limite

Satellite imagery is commonly used to map surface water extents over time, but many approaches yield discontinuous records resulting from cloud obstruction or image archive gaps. We applied the Dynamic Surface Water Extent (DSWE) model to downscaled (250-m) daily Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data in Google Earth Engine to generate monthly surface water maps for the conterm

Observations of woody plant mortality in coastal ecosystems are globally widespread, but the overarching processes and underlying mechanisms are poorly understood. This knowledge deficiency, combined with rapidly changing water levels, storm surges, atmospheric CO2, and vapor pressure deficit, creates large predictive uncertainty regarding how coastal ecosystems will respond to global change. Here

Accelerated sea-level rise and intensifying hurricanes highlight the need to better understand surface elevation change in coastal wetlands. We used the surface elevation table-marker horizon approach to measure surface elevation change in 14 coastal marshes along the northwestern Gulf of Mexico, within five National Wildlife Refuges in Texas (USA). During the 2014–2019 study period, the mean rate

The Milk and St. Mary Rivers are international waterways straddling the United States and Canada and traversing four Tribal Nations before draining into the Missouri and South Saskatchewan Rivers respectively. Management of water resources in the region is challenged by the complexity of stakeholder interests, the limitations of existing management infrastructure, and by a limited characterization

Sea level rise (SLR) and saltwater intrusion are driving inland shifts in coastal ecosystems. Here, we make high-resolution (1 m) predictions of land conversion under future SLR scenarios in 81 watersheds surrounding Chesapeake Bay, United States, a hotspot for accelerated SLR and saltwater intrusion. We find that 1050–3748 km2 of marsh could be created by 2100, largely at the expense of forested

Accelerating relative sea-level rise (RSLR) is threatening coastal wetlands. However, rising CO2 concentrations may also stimulate carbon sequestration and vertical accretion, counterbalancing RSLR. A coastal wetland dominated by a C3 plant species was exposed to ambient and elevated levels of CO2 in situ from 1987 to 2019 during which time ambient CO2 concentration increased 18% and sea level ros

The reconstruction of human impact is pivotal in palaeoecological studies, as humans are among the most important drivers of Holocene vegetation and ecosystem change. Nevertheless, separating the anthropogenic footprint on vegetation dynamics from the impact of climate and other environmental factors (disturbances such as fire, erosion, floods, landslides, avalanches, volcanic eruptions) is a chal