Climate Change

...now browsing by category

Preserving Salmon in Alaska’s Kenai Lowlands

Wednesday, April 15th, 2020

by Kristen Minogue

“Not everybody in Alaska is a fisherman. But all of us live on salmon land….If you look at a map of the Kenai Peninsula, it just looks like a cardiovascular system. Salmon are like the heartbeat.”

These words, spoken by a young Alaska fisherwoman named Hannah Heimbuch, open a short documentary the Smithsonian created called The Heartbeat. Featured in the D.C. Environmental Film Festival this March, it tells the story of Alaska’s Kenai Lowlands—one of the few places on Earth where sustainable salmon management remains possible. Click to continue »

Posted in Alaska, Climate Change, Fisheries, Publications | Comments Off on Preserving Salmon in Alaska’s Kenai Lowlands

Volunteer Spotlight: Student Activist Kallan Benson on Standing Up for Climate Change

Tuesday, April 14th, 2020

by Kristen Minogue

Teenage girl in blue tie-dye shirt sitting on a bench holding a golden retriever. Posters behind her read "Stop playing with our future" and "Fridays for Future" in rainbow marker.

Kallan Benson with her family’s golden retriever, Osage. The dog is their unofficial “Climate Anxiety Therapy.” (Credit: Carl Benson)

It would be tempting say Kallan Benson isn’t your typical teenage student. Homeschooled since preschool age, she has plenty of memories of doing homeschool programs at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center with her younger brother, Reese.

“We made toothpaste one time,” she recalled. “Reese’s group, him and two of our other friends, their strategy was just put everything in….Every flavor, they just put it all in. No one wanted to taste it.”

But as an organizer for the grassroots climate group Fridays For Future, Kallan is one of thousands. Possibly even tens of thousands. The tidal wave of students striking to demand climate action is gaining momentum, and Benson is among those leading the charge. Click to continue »

Posted in Citizen Science, Climate Change, Ecology, Volunteers | 1 Response »

Christine Arena: Determined Optimism and Letting Science Speak

Tuesday, April 14th, 2020

head and shoulders picture of young woman with brown hair, in a black jacket and white blouse

Filmmaker and science communicator Christine Arena (Photo courtesy of Christine Arena)

A communicator with a passion for environmental and social issues, Christina Arena left her mark on the environmental film world with the 2018 series Let Science Speak. The short documentary videos go beyond the “war on science” headlines to humanize scientists and let them tell their own stories. Today, she’s donating her time and talent to help produce videos for the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC). Her newest short film will premiere this April at the Smithsonian’s digital Earth Optimism Summit April 22-24. In this Q&A, she talks about what gives her purpose and optimism. Click to continue »

Posted in Climate Change, Ecology, Interviews, Volunteers | Comments Off on Christine Arena: Determined Optimism and Letting Science Speak

Intern Jessenia Suarez Talks Heatwave Biology, Being Latina in STEM

Friday, February 14th, 2020

by Alison Haigh

Young woman in a blue jacket standing on hill overlooking ocean

Jessenia Suarez (Credit: Alison Haigh/SERC)

Science comes with some wacky challenges. In the world of marine invasions, that might include sunburns from afternoons tying equipment to docks or worrying about how much seafood powder to feed a plate of invertebrates. But when someone dons a lab coat, they don’t shed their homelife, background, and personal responsibilities. At SERC-West, intern Jessenia Suarez got to know some of those unique challenges while working on her research project. But one of her biggest challenges was outside the lab.

Suarez is a senior marine biology major at San Francisco State University who found her passion for biology in her second year at community college. In summer 2019, she studied how a group of underwater creatures known as the fouling community responds to changes in water temperature. She found the work exciting and refreshing—but she admits that her biggest challenges were balancing the internship with a two-hour commute and finding childcare for her two-year-old daughter, Leia.

“I would spend about an hour and a half with her when I got home, and then it would be time to sleep,” she said. “Not only that, but I was still working my other job [as a CVS pharmacy technician]—very few hours, but it’s still time away from her. It was hard for me, and it was hard for her too.”

Besides caring for her daughter and working a second job, she also had to balance classes. Yet despite a heavier workload than the average intern, Suarez loved the internship experience, and she’s passionate about pursuing research after her degree.

“I had an idea that I liked doing research, but being in charge of my own project brought it to a whole new level, ” Suarez said. “I now know what to expect, and have a feeling that I can handle it.” Click to continue »

Posted in California, Climate Change, Ecology, Extreme Weather, Fisheries, Interns, Tidings from the Sunset Coast | Comments Off on Intern Jessenia Suarez Talks Heatwave Biology, Being Latina in STEM

Eight Ways We Can Save the Ocean’s Oxygen

Tuesday, December 10th, 2019

by Kristen Minogue

School of beige and blue fish swimming over a reef

Brown Chromis fish in Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary. (Credit: Emma Hickerson/NOAA)

The ocean is losing its breath. Two years ago, an international team of scientists known as GO₂NE (the Global Ocean Oxygen Network) published a report in Science with a stark picture of oxygen loss in Earth’s waters: In the open ocean, the amount of water with zero oxygen has spiked fourfold since the mid-20^th century. In coastal water bodies, places with dangerously low oxygen (2 milligrams per liter or less) have increased more than 10-fold. It’s a problem not just for animals, but for people and economies—especially those that rely on tourism or subsistence fishing.

On Dec. 7, a new report emerged from the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. The ocean could lose 3-4% of its total oxygen by the end of the century if nothing changes, with losses even higher in the top, biodiversity-rich 1,000 meters. Large fish like tuna, sharks and marlin are among the most vulnerable. In the closing chapter, led by Denise Breitburg of the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, they created a massive blueprint for resuscitating the ocean.

We’ve pulled out the highlights below, but the key lies in cracking two global conundrums—nutrient pollution and climate change. Nutrient pollution happens when chemicals like nitrogen and phosphorus stream into the water and fertilize massive growths of algae, which suck oxygen out of the water. Climate change’s role is more subtle, but just as powerful: Warmer water can’t hold as much dissolved oxygen. Warm water also doesn’t mix as well, so oxygen from the atmosphere that’s abundant near the ocean surface doesn’t reach everywhere that needs it.

Fortunately, these two problems are linked. Cleaning up nutrient pollution can help solve climate change, and vice-versa—and the ocean will breathe easier for it. Here are eight highlights from the new report: Click to continue »

Posted in Climate Change, Ecology, Fisheries, Publications, Water Quality | Comments Off on Eight Ways We Can Save the Ocean’s Oxygen

Sarah Donelan: How Parents Prep Offspring for Tough Lives Before Birth

Friday, November 22nd, 2019

by Kristen Minogue

Sarah Donelan in red hoodie on sandy beach

Sarah Donelan in Wellfleet, Massachusetts.
(Credit: Patricia Donelan)

Every parent wants to give their children the best shot at life. But sometimes, this means more than protecting newborns after birth. Some species can prepare offspring for tough conditions before they enter the world. It’s called transgenerational plasticity. Sarah Donelan, a Smithsonian Environmental Research Center postdoc, has spent years piecing together how it works. This November she published a new article highlighting how humans could be changing this age-old parental strategy. Discover more in the Q&A here.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. Click to continue »

Posted in Climate Change, Ecology, Interviews, Publications | Comments Off on Sarah Donelan: How Parents Prep Offspring for Tough Lives Before Birth

What’s the Perfect Temperature
to Bake Your Soil?

Friday, November 15th, 2019

Woman and man standing in marsh; man holds up long soil core.

SERC postdoc Genevieve Noyce (left) and senior scientist Pat Megonigal hold up a soil core from SERC’s Global Change Research Wetland. (Credit: Sairah Malkin/Horn Point Laboratory)

by Kristen Minogue

Soils don’t get much credit for their work powering the environment. Even among scientists, they’re routinely overshadowed by their flashier plant neighbors. But as the planet heats up, hidden soil microbes are on the verge of giving plant growth a serious boost.

However, there’s a hiccup in the system. In a new global warming study, ecologist Genevieve Noyce discovered soils and plants are just a couple degrees out of synch.

It boils down to one crucial ingredient: nitrogen. Plants need nitrogen to grow, so it’s a major component of most fertilizers. In the absence of fertilizer, plants get their nitrogen from soil microbes. But they’re at the mercy of supply and demand. In most environments on land today, soil microbes can’t produce nitrogen fast enough to meet plant demand.

In a futuristic experiment, Noyce and her colleagues baked patches of wetland soil to see if that would change in a warmer world. Click to continue »

Posted in Climate Change, Ecology, Publications, SERC Sites and Scenes | Comments Off on What’s the Perfect Temperature
to Bake Your Soil?

How Gassy is the Ground? SERC Intern Burps Baby Forests for Greenhouse Gases

Wednesday, October 2nd, 2019

Young man kneeling in forest with yellow gas sampler

Smithsonian Environmental Research Center intern Chaz Rhodes samples gases in the soil with equipment he helped design and install. It’s part of a new long-term study seeking to untangle what drives changes in the methane budget in forest soils.

by Alison Haigh

When it comes to forests, most people think of soil as a static ingredient in a recipe for growing trees. But talk to any forest ecologist, soil scientist, or biogeochemist, and you’ll get a radically different idea about dirt.

Soils are more like living, breathing ecosystems. Their most abundant residents aren’t plants or insects—they’re microbes. Microbes may be small, but they play a mighty role, especially in the carbon budget: They help make forests the largest carbon sink on the planet. Click to continue »

Posted in Climate Change, Ecology, Interns | Comments Off on How Gassy is the Ground? SERC Intern Burps Baby Forests for Greenhouse Gases

High Carbon Dioxide Can Create “Shrinking Stems” in Marshes

Wednesday, September 25th, 2019

Marshes Grow Shorter, Denser Stems Under High Carbon Dioxide, Which Can Help Them Resist Sea Level Rise

by Kristen Minogue

Man in sunglasses and green T-shirt sitting in a marsh holding a measuring stick

Ecologist Meng Lu measures green blades of sedge in SERC’s Global Change Research Wetland in Maryland. Lu led a discovery that under higher carbon dioxide, sedges like these grow shorter and thinner stems. (Credit: Maria Sharova/SERC)

For most plants, carbon dioxide acts like a steroid: The more they can take in, the bigger they get. But in a new study published Sept. 25, scientists with the Smithsonian discovered something strange happening in marshes. Under higher levels of carbon dioxide, instead of producing bigger stems, marsh plants produced more stems that were noticeably smaller.

“I don’t think anybody expected this,” said Meng Lu, lead author of the new study in the journal Nature Climate Change. For years, scientists had known that carbon dioxide was bulking up the total biomass of marsh plants, so it seemed natural to think individual plants were getting bigger too. “Everyone thought, okay, [plants] increased, biomass increased, so the height, width, all should increase. But that’s not the case in a marsh,” he said.

Click to continue »

Posted in Climate Change, Ecology, Publications, SERC Sites and Scenes | Comments Off on High Carbon Dioxide Can Create “Shrinking Stems” in Marshes

Global Change is Triggering an Identity Switch in Grasslands

Monday, August 19th, 2019

Landscape view of grasslands under blue, cloudy sky

Konza Prairie Biological Station in northeast Kansas. (Credit: Kim Komatsu/SERC)

Scientists Discover Species Turnover in Study of More Than 100 Grassland Experiments

by Kristen Minogue

Since the first Homo sapiens emerged in Africa roughly 300,000 years ago, grasslands have sustained humanity and thousands of other species. But today, those grasslands are shifting beneath our feet. Global change—which includes climate change, pollution and other widespread environmental alterations—is transforming the plant species growing in them, and not always in the ways scientists expected, a new study published Monday revealed.

Grasslands make up more than 40 percent of the world’s ice-free land. In addition to providing food for human-raised cattle and sheep, grasslands are home to animals found nowhere else in the wild, such as the bison of North America’s prairies or the zebras and giraffes of the African savannas. Grasslands also can hold up to 30 percent of the world’s carbon, making them critical allies in the fight against climate change. However, changes in the plants that comprise grasslands could put those benefits at risk.

“Is it good rangeland for cattle, or is it good at storing carbon?” said lead author Kim Komatsu, a grassland ecologist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center. “It really matters what the identities of the individual species are….You might have a really invaded weedy system that would not be as beneficial for these services that humans depend on.” Click to continue »

Posted in Climate Change, Ecology, Publications | Comments Off on Global Change is Triggering an Identity Switch in Grasslands

Shorelines

Life and science at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center

Climate Change

...now browsing by category

Preserving Salmon in Alaska’s Kenai Lowlands

Volunteer Spotlight: Student Activist Kallan Benson on Standing Up for Climate Change

Christine Arena: Determined Optimism and Letting Science Speak

Intern Jessenia Suarez Talks Heatwave Biology, Being Latina in STEM

Eight Ways We Can Save the Ocean’s Oxygen

Sarah Donelan: How Parents Prep Offspring for Tough Lives Before Birth

What’s the Perfect Temperature
to Bake Your Soil?

How Gassy is the Ground? SERC Intern Burps Baby Forests for Greenhouse Gases

High Carbon Dioxide Can Create “Shrinking Stems” in Marshes

Global Change is Triggering an Identity Switch in Grasslands