CAREER: Learning in the Woods - Decadal Climate, Water Supply, and Fire Frequency in the Great Basin

该奖项资助了“林中学习”项目，该项目旨在采用多方面的方法，将大盆地年际至年代际尺度的环境变化研究和教育结合起来。在大盆地，人口的快速增长正在考验自然和人类主导的生态系统对气候波动的脆弱性。这项研究的主要目标是在过去一千年中，获得供水和火灾制度年际至年代际变化的基线代表。在气候波动的背景下分析野火的时空格局。将针对特拉基河、卡森河、沃克河、欧文斯河和洪堡河流域等选定的流域开发对湿度敏感的树木年轮年表。这些自然档案的年-季节分辨率允许与仪器记录进行精确校准，从而可以获得多年来的年-季节降水和河流流量的长代理序列。此外，每年将为K-12教师和学生举办为期四天的科学体验活动，目标是内华达州的西班牙裔初高中学生。具体的科学和教育目标包括测试大盆地水文气候学年代际变化的空间一致性，确定过去一千年来山间西部选定流域的淡水输入年际至年代际波动的幅度，以年度分辨率审查几个世纪以来与当地和区域气候有关的火灾状况的时空变化，教育新一代了解气候与降水、径流和野火等地表过程在空间和时间上存在的动态关系，开发基于网络的信息系统，显示仪器观测时期和代用气候记录时期大盆地流域降水、水流和火情的空间变异性，并为代表性不足的群体提供激励；在他们的教育生涯早期，为了追求科学事业。

This award funds the 'Learning in the Woods' project which aims to use a multi-faceted approach to integrate research and education on environmental change at interannual to interdecadal scales in the Great Basin, where rapid population growth is testing the vulnerability of natural and human-dominated ecosystems to climatic fluctuations. The primary goal of the research is to obtain a baseline representation, over the last millennium, of interannual to interdecadal changes in water supply and fire regime. The spatial and temporal patterns of wildfire will be analyzed in the context of climatic fluctuations. Tree-ring chronologies from moisture-sensitive species will be developed for selected watersheds, including the Truckee, Carson, Walker, Owens, and Humboldt River Basins. The annual to seasonal resolution of such natural archives allows for accurate calibration with instrumental records, so that multi-century long proxy series of annual to seasonal precipitation and stream flow can be obtained. In addition, a four-day science experience for K-12 teachers and students will be held every year, and aimed at Hispanic middle- and high-school students in Nevada.The specific scientific and educational objectives include testing the spatial coherence of decadal-scale variability in Great Basin hydroclimatology, determining the amplitude of interannual to interdecadal fluctuations of freshwater input to selected watersheds of the Intermountain West over the past millennium, examining spatial and temporal changes of fire regime in connection to local and regional climate at annual resolution for several centuries, educating new generations on the dynamic relationships that exist both in space and in time between climate and surface processes such as precipitation, runoff, and wildfire, developing a web-based information system showing the spatial variability of precipitation, stream flow, and fire regime over Great Basin watersheds for the period of instrumental observations and for the period of proxy climatic records, and providing under-represented groups an incentive, early in their educational careers, for pursuing science careers.