Environmental stressors that impact habitat and wildlife species include: abiotic factors (for example, land use, temperature); soil, air, and water quality (for example, eutrophication, contaminants); and disturbance (for example, fire, drought, hurricanes, species invasions). Understanding how these stressors impact ecosystems is critical to conservation and management.
Chemical and isotopic techniques are very useful for improving our mechanistic understanding of the role of environmental stressors on ecosystems and wildlife species. Studies within this project generally emphasize animal fitness impacts related to stressors, such as food web disruptions, changes in resource quantity and quality, trophic transfer of non-essential elements, and the effects of landscape disturbances.
Tracer data can be used qualitatively and quantitatively to estimate effects, assess risk, and inform management actions. Such approaches are also very amenable to a range of temporal and spatial scales, where previous studies have ranged from discrete river drainages to oceanic basins and retrospective study designs that rely on environmental archives or museum specimens.
Geology, Geophysics, and Geochemistry Stable Isotope Laboratory (GSIL)
Environmental stressors that impact habitat and wildlife species include: abiotic factors (for example, land use, temperature); soil, air, and water quality (for example, eutrophication, contaminants); and disturbance (for example, fire, drought, hurricanes, species invasions). Understanding how these stressors impact ecosystems is critical to conservation and management.
Chemical and isotopic techniques are very useful for improving our mechanistic understanding of the role of environmental stressors on ecosystems and wildlife species. Studies within this project generally emphasize animal fitness impacts related to stressors, such as food web disruptions, changes in resource quantity and quality, trophic transfer of non-essential elements, and the effects of landscape disturbances.
Tracer data can be used qualitatively and quantitatively to estimate effects, assess risk, and inform management actions. Such approaches are also very amenable to a range of temporal and spatial scales, where previous studies have ranged from discrete river drainages to oceanic basins and retrospective study designs that rely on environmental archives or museum specimens.