by Monaca Noble
SERC's Green Village during Snowmageddon February 2010 (Stephen Sanford)
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Climate Change
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Snowmageddon vs. Caribbean Creep
Monday, January 9th, 2012Click to continue »
Hurricanes, Snakeheads and Dead Zones: What 2011 Weather Meant for the Chesapeake
Wednesday, October 5th, 2011by Kristen Minogue
Credit: NOAA Photo Library
Marshes, Microbes and the Other Blue Carbon
Tuesday, September 6th, 2011by Kristen Minogue
Tidal marshes have long been lauded as carbon sinks for their ability to pull CO2 from the atmosphere and bury it in the soil, what scientists have taken to calling “blue carbon.” But wetlands are also notorious methane emitters. Now ecologists suspect that only a select few wetland types can reliably act as sinks, and that number may shrink as sea levels rise.
The Kirkpatrick Marsh on SERC's campus in Edgewater, MD. Tidal wetlands both store and release greenhouse gases. Which will prevail as the planet warms is a question ecologists are still trying to answer. (Credit: Gary Peresta/SERC)
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Grimy field work? Give it to the tourists.
Tuesday, July 12th, 2011by Kristen Minogue
Ali Kishwar, a volunteer tourist from Pakistan, navigates the muddy terrain across from SERC’s beaver pond with caution. (Credit: SERC)
For most people, summer vacation means stretching out on a beach in the South Pacific, touring the ruins of ancient Greece, or (for the more outdoors-inclined) hiking the Inca Trail in Peru. It does not usually entail wading through ankle-deep mud to measure the diameters of trees.
Paul Smith, a 63-year-old retired engineer, travelled to SERC all the way from the United Kingdom to do it. So did Ali Kishwar, a Pakistani doctorate student who took a break from studying medicinal plants at the University of Reading in Berkshire, also in the U.K. Smith and Kishwar joined a motley group of seven citizen scientists who paid to spend a week at SERC doing field work.
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Climate Change & Biodiversity: What’s Next?
Monday, April 25th, 2011
Research suggests some species in the tropics and subtropics may be more resistant to climate change than species closer to the poles. (Credit: SERC)
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As the Mangroves March North…
Friday, April 22nd, 2011
Aerial view of Mangal Cay in the western Caribbean – just one of many mangrove havens Ilka Feller has explored.
As global temperatures rise, mangrove forests from the southeastern US are pushing farther north. Scientists don’t know how long, how fast, or what the exact consequences will be, but images from NASA satellites – and $1.3 million – will help them find out.
Ilka Feller, senior ecologist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, will lead the effort to track more than 100 miles of Florida mangrove forests encroaching on their northern neighbors, the salt marshes. Feller has been studying mangroves for almost 20 years, keeping tabs on their progress in Florida, Panama, Belize and Australia. The new grant is one of 15 NASA-sponsored projects that will combine satellite data with field work to give scientists a bird’s-eye view of climate change.
Tracking the Chesapeake Bay’s ‘Beautiful Swimmers’
Tuesday, August 24th, 2010As summer wanes in the Chesapeake Bay, many female blue crabs are preparing for an epic journey. Come September they will walk and swim their way toward the mouth of the Chesapeake to release their eggs. Some will travel more than 150 miles. SERC scientists have studied the blue crab’s migratory patterns for more than a decade. Their findings have revealed new insight into the life history of this important species and have helped inform management policies. Tracking these invertebrates is not easy: it involves thousands of pink plastic tags, a unique collaboration with watermen and a blue crab hotline…
Day at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian Marsh
Thursday, August 5th, 2010
Seal collects data with other interns for Smithsonian scientists who are investigating the impact of global change on tidal marshes.
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Nitrogen Weakens Marshes’ Ability to Hold Back Climate Change
Wednesday, June 30th, 2010Scientists Find Excess Nitrogen Favors Plants That Respond Poorly to Rising CO2
The Smithsonian's Global Change Research Wetland. Photo: SERC
Plants build their tissue primarily with the CO2 they take up from the atmosphere. The more they get, the faster they tend to grow—a phenomenon known as the “CO2 fertilization effect.” However, plants that photosynthesize greater amounts of CO2 will also need higher doses of other key building blocks, especially nitrogen. The general consensus has been that if plants get more nitrogen, there will be a larger CO2 fertilization effect. Not necessarily so, says a new paper published in the July 1 issue of Nature.
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Plants, climate change and the importance of being curious, an interview with Bert Drake
Thursday, February 25th, 2010If you’re looking for a good conversation about science, history or life – talk to Bert Drake. He’s a plant physiologist and renaissance man who’s been with the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center for nearly four decades. Drake retired in January, but will continue his investigations as an emeritus scientist. We caught up with him before he took well-deserved vacation.
Drake's research unfolds at the Kirkpatrick Marsh, located in Maryland on a subestuary of the Chesapeake Bay.
How did you earn a living before you became a scientist?
I was a drummer in a jazz band, a ski guide, the host of a jazz radio program and a high school science teacher.
How did you get drawn to the world of plant physiology?
Nature has always fascinated me and science is about discovering how nature works. I grew up in northern Maine. My father was a barber, but loved the outdoors. I was outside year-round: skiing, canoeing, trapping animals, fishing and taking photos. I knew I wanted to do something connected with biology. I became a science teacher, but it wasn’t until I attended a summer course in ecology that I wanted to get inside a lab and practice science.
In science you almost always get an approximation of an answer because an experiment is only an approximation of reality.