A Path Toward an Environmentally Secure Future through Ecosystem Science and Monitoring

University Of Toledo, Toledo OH

Investigators

Abstract

This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5). This project involves the renovation of laboratories in the south wing of the Bowman-Oddy Laboratories Building at the University of Toledo, in Toledo, Ohio. Constructed over 40 years ago, these laboratories currently serve as the research facility for faculty from the Department of Environmental Sciences. The renovated space will become the Center for Biosphere Restoration Research. The new Center will conduct interdisciplinary, collaborative research on the ecosystem processes that drive the biosphere and on the impacts of human activity. The design encourages the development of holistic approaches to research. Examples include: the linking of field ecology with remote sensing and predictive models; and the collaboration of soil biochemistry with plant ecological physiology to gain greater understanding of the plant‐soil system. The renovation will include: interior construction and renovation of laboratory case-work; refurbishment of electrical, plumbing, heating, cooling, air-handling, and hood ventilation; and network wiring. NSF is contributing part of the overall cost of a portion of the renovation that is associated with research and research training. The following are examples of areas of research to be conducted in the Center: how forest management practices can be used to enhance carbon sequestration while maintaining the productivity of the forest for timber and recreational use; the ecological principles underlying community assembly of insect populations in managed environments and their implications for the ecology of agricultural systems in tropical forests; a search for ecological markers predictive of the sustainability of the ecosystem services provided by wetland and aquatic ecosystems; the study of fluxes from the natural landscape that are related to the carbon cycle; the role of environmental factors such as fire, drought and climate variations on heterotrophic and autotrophic soil respiration, and hence on the carbon sequestration potential of forest ecosystems; the evolution of soil microbial communities under varying inputs of litter quality, carbon dioxide concentrations, temperature, and exogenous nitrogen in order to predict the ability of soils to sequester carbon under varying environmental conditions; how extreme heat stress, elevated carbon dioxide, and water availability affect photosynthetic productivity; developing and deploying genetic and biomolecular techniques for the in situ detection and community fingerprinting of environmental bacterial pathogens; the study of the persistence of environmental contaminants such as hormones and antibiotics from concentrated animal feeding operations, pharmaceuticals and personal care products that are residual in sewage sludge applied to agricultural lands, and acrylamides arising from waste created by the greenhouse industry; the development of electrochemical devices for environmental sensing. The award will help the university to maintain a vibrant program of graduate and undergraduate research in the environmental sciences. In addition to providing infrastructure for research and research training, the renovation will provide a resource that will be used for summer research programs involving school teachers. The upgraded research capabilities will enhance the collaborations of Center faculty with partners at other academic institutions and at government agencies with environmental portfolios.