USGS National Wetlands Research Center: Nutrient Dynamics and Biochemical Cycling

Nutrient Dynamics and Biochemical Cycling

small pothole wetland at St Marks NWR Nutrient dynamics and biogeochemical cycling are fundamental properties of ecosystems that can be altered by large-scale human activities such as nutrient enrichment, hydrologic alteration, sea-level rise, and atmospheric carbon dioxide increases. Researchers are investigating alterations in biogeochemical cycling in a diverse range of ecosystems including rivers, lakes, wetlands, and estuaries.

Management of entire ecosystems is emerging as the most effective and cost-effective means of protecting natural resources. Effective ecosystem management requires knowledge of extant ecosystem properties. The biogeochemical cycling of nutrients is one of the fundamental properties of ecosystems. Understanding biogeochemical cycling requires analysis of input and output vectors, and the processes by which elements are recycled within ecosystems. In numerous aquatic ecosystems many of these processes are poorly understood as are their potential interactions with other ecosystem properties such as plant production.

Researchers at the National Wetlands Research Center are working with other federal agencies and universities to study the effects of anthropogenic disturbances on biogeochemical cycling in a diversity of aquatic ecosystems. Ongoing research efforts include effects of nutrient enrichment on euphotic estuarine sediments, effects of exotic invasive plants on lake limnology, enrichment effects of rainfall on lake phytoplankton, and baseline water quality characteristics of the aquatic ecosystems in southern forested wetlands.

Research

Impact of Department of Interior Activities on Carbon Sequestration and Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Natural and Restored Wetlands in the Prairie Pothole Region and the Lower Mississippi River Valley (Drs. Stephen Faulkner and Ned Euliss)
Landscape Position and Carbon Controls Over Denitrification in the Mississippi Delta (Dr. Stephen Faulkner)

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