The global trend of increased urbanization will alter biogeochemical cycles of nutrients in rivers, oceans, and groundwater. My research goal is to explore the effects urbanization and human populations on multiple temporal, spacial, and ecological scales. Parsing out which impacts are a result of direct human activities and which are a result of inert urban infrastructure gives us the opportunity to make predictions in a changing future. I am particularly interested in dissolved silica and how human induced changes in this underrepresented nutrient change downstream autotrophic assemblages.
Research
I am a quantitative ecologist who works to define how humans are changing biogeochemical cycles of nutrients. Specifically, I am interested in the cascading downgradient effects of when humans alter land-use within watersheds. The primary challenge is that causes and effects I investigate are separated in time, space, and media. The approach I use is to incorporate multiparameter field campaigns which quantify changes to nutrient cycles (e.g., silica, nitrogen, phosphorus, and sulfur) in probabilistic models. These models tell us how the magnitude and timing of nutrient delivery is altered by human choice and how this impacts aquatic ecosystem function. My research is grounded in quantitative methods and my publications include a variety of frequentist, Bayesian, and machine learning techniques.
My Most Recent Work
Specialized Projects
I am a quantitative ecologist who works to define how humans are changing biogeochemical cycles of nutrients. Specifically, I am interested in the cascading downgradient effects of when humans alter land-use within watersheds. The primary challenge is that causes and effects I investigate are separated in time, space, and media. The approach I use is to incorporate multiparameter field campaigns which quantify changes to nutrient cycles (e.g., silica, nitrogen, phosphorus, and sulfur) in probabilistic models. These models tell us how the magnitude and timing of nutrient delivery is altered by human choice and how this impacts aquatic ecosystem function. My research is grounded in quantitative methods and my publications include a variety of frequentist, Bayesian, and machine learning techniques.
My Most Recent Work
Specialized Projects
Photo credit: BU Today, Jackie Ricciardi
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Urbanization and Groundwater
Standing on a busy city street usually our eyes are drawn up. The city looms above us, cabs and buses zoom around us, and a cacophony of smells assault us. But below our feet quietly lies the historic fill which converted the open water, mud flat, and salt marsh of the past to the city of today. Characteristic of many American cities, the City of Boston, Massachusetts, is a city built on such fill. Starting ~250-years ago this community started filling and transformed the skinny peninsula familiar to the Puritan founders to the sprawling metropolis today. The when, where, how, and why of this filling has imparted a nutrient signature to the groundwater under our feet that echos through the water quality of today. I am quantifying nutrient concentrations in groundwater in these disparate fill areas and trying to connect our history with our chemistry. Read more |
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Municipal Waste Water and Dissolved Silica
There are few things in this world that are constant, one however is the fact that where ever you find humans you will find sewage. To fully understand the impact of municipal waste water on downstream ecosystems I am quantifying the amount of dissolved silica discharged from the Deer Island Treatment Plant in Boston, Massachusetts. Dissolved silica is a key macro-nutrient used by terrestrial vegetation and especially by diatoms. Diatoms are an important component to healthy New England coastal ecosystems. I am also interested in the mass carried by the treatment plant influent compared to the effluent to determine if modern sewage treatment removes silica and determining where the silica within the sewage is coming from. Read more |
Photo Credit: Timothy J. Maguire
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Photo Credit: Blue Hills Observatory
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Climate Change Research
Humans are impacting the environment globally. Environmental manipulations such as Free Air Carbon Enrichment (FACE) experiments which increase the amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide in a forest and winter climate change manipulations which remove snow pack from forest plots give us a glimpse into possible futures. By collaborating with scientist involved in these large experiments (Dr. Adrien Finzi and Dr. Pamela Templer) I am describing how trees will alter their silica content in the future and scale these changes up to whole watersheds. Read more |