US-Argentina Dissertation Research: The Imprint of Vegetation on Soil Nutrient Pools: The Effect of Afforestation in the Pampas

Duke University, Durham NC

Investigators

Abstract

This U.S.-Argentina dissertation enhancement grant will support Esteban G. Jobbagy, under the direction of Dr. Robert B. Jackson of Duke University, to work with Professor Osvaldo E. Sala at the University of Buenos Aires. The researchers will investigate plant controls on the vertical distribution of soil nutrients using grassland/forest ecosystems in South America that have been little impacted by anthropogenic inputs. The research will address four specific hypotheses regarding the role of plants in mediating the accumulation and vertical distribution of belowground resources in terrestrial ecosystems. The research has the potential to answer the question of how plants alter soil nutrient pools and their distribution. This topic is important for terrestrial ecology and biogeochemistry and has relevance for plant community changes associated with altered patterns of land-use and other aspects of global change. In a broader sense this work contributes to understanding how the soils of the world have developed under the separate influences of vegetation and climate.