CAREER: Dynamic, Long-term Interactions Among Climate, Vegetation, Carbon Accumulation, Fire, and Permafrost in Northern Biomes

预测和减轻气候变暖的影响需要教学，研究和社区外展的综合计划。 该研究计划的重点是了解植被，气候变化和干扰之间的相互作用在北方生物群落。 这些变量之间的相互作用可能会在下一个世纪产生复杂的植被动态，这与假设气候和植被之间简单相关性的模型不同。 这项工作在加拿大的马尼托巴跨越了广泛的气候梯度，研究了泥炭和湖泊沉积物的长期记录，以重建这些过程在当地，区域和次大陆空间尺度上的时空相互作用。 这项研究将被纳入卡尔顿学院新的全球变化生态学课程，包括生态系统生态学，古生态学，全球变化生物学和植物生理生态学课程。 正在为这些课程开发创新的教学方法，如案例研究、基于探究的实验室和社区服务学习，并将在网上向全国的科学教育工作者传播。

Predicting and mitigating the effects of climate warming requires an integrated program of teaching, research, and community outreach. This research program focuses on understanding the interactions among vegetation, climate change, and disturbances in northern biomes. Interactions among these variables will likely produce complex vegetation dynamics over the next century that are different than models assuming simple correlations between climate and vegetation. This work across a broad climatic gradient in Manitoba, Canada, examines long-term records in peat and lake sediments to reconstruct the temporal and spatial interactions of these processes at local, regional, and subcontinental spatial scales. This research will be integrated into a new global change ecology curriculum at Carleton College, including courses in ecosystem ecology, paleoecology, global change biology, and plant physiological ecology. Innovative teaching methods, such as case studies, inquiry based labs, and community service learning, are being developed for these courses and will be disseminated online for science educators nationwide.