I am a faculty member in the Institute of Arctic Biology and the Department of Biology and Wildlife and principal investigator of the Bonanza Creek Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) program. My background is in plant physiological ecology and ecosystem ecology, with current interests in the resilience of social-ecological systems.

My LTER research addresses the controls over successional changes in vegetation and nutrient cycling. In particular, I am interested in the mechanisms of resilience of a given successional trajectory (e.g., as a result of post-fire seed supply) and the triggers for change (e.g., establishment of new species under certain circumstances). This involves studies of tree growth and mortality, and the effects of vegetation on nutrient cycling. My nutrient-cycling studies focus on the effects of vegetation and environment on plant-microbial interactions, with the notion that plant traits strongly determine many of the ecological properties of ecosystems.

In addition to my work in LTER, I direct a graduate educational program in Resilience and Adaptation (http://www.uaf.edu/rap/) and extend my interests in post-fire succession to human-fire interactions in the boreal forest. The central focus of my research is the study of the resilience of regional systems in the face of directional changes in climate, economics, and culture. I believe this is one of the most pressing challenges facing humanity: How do we sustain the desirable features of Earth's ecosystems and society at a time of rapid changes in all of the major forces that govern their properties? This requires an understanding of the mechanisms that tend to maintain the system in its current state vs. factors that cause changes to a new state. It also requires an integration of natural and social sciences because many of the drivers of change involve social-ecological interactions.

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