Gregory Noe
Research Interests:
Wetland ecosystem ecology, focusing on the interactive influences of hydrology, geomorphology, climate, and biology on nitrogen, phosphorus, carbon, and sediment biogeochemistry and transport in watersheds, as well as plant community ecology and restoration ecology.
Biography
Greg Noe has been a Research Ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Reston, VA, since 2002, where he leads the Wetland Ecosystem Ecology & Biogeochemistry Laboratory (WEEBL) in the Florence Bascom Geoscience Center. Dr. Noe’s research centers on wetland ecosystem ecology and watershed processes. His dissertation research identified the complex controls on annual plant germination in the salt marshes of southern California. This was followed by post-doctoral research on phosphorus biogeochemistry and enrichment effects in the Florida Everglades. When joining the USGS, he started a research program on nutrient cycling, transport, and retention in wetlands associated with flowing waters.
He is currently the President-Elect of the Society of Wetland Scientsts, serves on the Science and Technical Advisory Committee of the Chesapeake Bay Program, serves on the editorial board of Wetlands and previously of Wetlands Ecology and Management, is the recipient of the President's Service Award from the Society of Wetland Scientists, and has served on the program committees of national and international scientific conferences and numerous graduate student committees. Greg is a recipient of the Meritorius Service Award from the Department of the Interior.
Current projects:
-Quantifying and modeling nutrient retention by riverine floodplains from site to watershed scales across the U.S.
-Evaluating the impacts of watershed restoration on water quality and stream health in the Chesapeake
-Identifying the effects of sea level rise, salinization, and sediment availability on tidal freshwater wetland ecosystem resilience along the Atlantic Coast
-Measuring the water quality functions in created wetlands, stream restoration projects, and floodplain restorations, and how to optimize their design
Science and Products
New Review of Sediment Science Informs Choices of Management Actions in the Chesapeake
Issue: The Chesapeake Bay Program (CBP) is pursuing restoration efforts to improve habitats and associated water quality for fisheries, both in the watershed and estuary. Excess sediment decreases light in tidal waters for submerged aquatic vegetation, harms oysters, carries contaminants, and impairs stream health throughout the watershed. The CBP is implementing management...
New information on chemical and physical characteristics of streams and floodplains across the Chesapeake Bay and Delaware River watersheds
Issue: Improving stream health is an important outcome of the Chesapeake Bay Program partnership. Stream conditions are important for recreational fisheries, and mitigating the amount of nutrients, sediment, and contaminants delivered to the Bay.
Impacts of coastal and watershed changes on upper estuaries: causes and implications of wetland ecosystem transitions along the US Atlantic and Gulf Coasts
Estuaries and their surrounding wetlands are coastal transition zones where freshwater rivers meet tidal seawater. As sea levels rise, tidal forces move saltier water farther upstream, extending into freshwater wetland areas. Human changes to the surrounding landscape may amplify the effects of this tidal extension, impacting the resiliency and function of the upper estuarine wetlands. One...
Type of Wetlands Affect How Much Nitrogen is Removed from the Bay’s Tidal Rivers
Issue: Wetlands are important for removing nitrogen from rivers entering the Chesapeake Bay. More information is needed on how much nitrogen wetlands can remove.
Quantifying Floodplain Ecological Processes and Ecosystem Services in the Delaware River Watershed
Floodplain and wetland areas provide critical ecosystem services to local and downstream communities by retaining sediments, nutrients, and floodwaters. The loss of floodplain functionality due to land use conversion and degradation reduces the provisioning of these services. Assessing, quantifying, and valuing floodplain ecosystem services provide a framework to estimate how floodplain...
Tidal wetland resilience to increased rates of sea level rise in the Chesapeake Bay: Introduction to the special feature
The papers in this Special Feature are the result of the first Marsh Resilience Summit in the Chesapeake Bay region, which occurred in February 2019. The Chesapeake Bay region has one of the highest rates of relative sea level rise in the U.S., jeopardizing over 1000 km2 of tidal wetlands along with other coastal lands. The goal of the...
Sudol, Taryn A; Noe, Gregory B.; Reed, Denise J Mapping stream and floodplain geomorphic characteristics with the Floodplain and Channel Evaluation Tool (FACET) in the Mid-Atlantic Region, United States
Quantifying channel and floodplain geomorphic characteristics is essential for understanding and modeling sediment and nutrient dynamics in fluvial systems. The increased availability of high-resolution elevation data from light detection and ranging (lidar) has helped improve methods for extracting these metrics at a greater accuracy across...
Metes, Marina J.; Hopkins, Kristina G.; Ahmed, Labeeb; Lamont, Samuel; Claggett, Peter R.; Noe, Gregory B. Sediment dynamics and implications for management: State of the science from long‐term research in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, USA
This review aims to synthesize the current knowledge of sediment dynamics using insights from long‐term research conducted in the watershed draining to the Chesapeake Bay, the largest estuary in the U.S., to inform management actions to restore the estuary and its watershed. The sediment dynamics of the Chesapeake are typical of many impaired...
Noe, Gregory B.; Cashman, Matthew J.; Skalak, Katherine; Gellis, Allen; Hopkins, Kristina G.; Moyer, Douglas L.; Webber, James S.; Benthem, Adam; Maloney, Kelly O.; Brakebill, John; Sekellick, Andrew; Langland, Michael J.; Zhang, Qian; Shenk, Gary Wynee; Keisman, Jennifer L.D.; Hupp, Cliff R. Modeling soil porewater salinity response to drought in tidal freshwater forested wetlands
There is a growing concern about the adverse effects of saltwater intrusion via tidal rivers, streams and creeks into tidal freshwater forested wetlands (TFFW) due to sea‐level rise (SLR) and intense and extended drought events. However, the magnitude and duration of porewater salinity in exceedance of plant salinity stress threshold (2 practical...
Wang, Hongqing; Krauss, Ken W.; Noe, Gregory B.; Stagg, Camille L.; Swarzenski, Christopher M.; Duberstein, Jamie A.; Conner, William H.; DeAngelis, Donald L.
Sustaining Environmental Capital Initiative summary report
Federal agencies need credible scientific information to determine the production and value of ecosystem services in an efficient and timely manner. The U.S. Geological Survey addresses this scientific information need through the Sustaining Environmental Capital Initiative project. The project has relied on U.S. Geological Survey expertise...
Huber, Christopher; Meldrum, James R.; Schuster, Rudy M.; Ancona, Zachary H.; Bagstad, Kenneth J.; Beck, Scott M.; Carlisle, Daren; Claggett, Peter R.; Franco, Fabiano; Galbraith, Heather S.; Haefele, Michelle; Hoelting, Kristin R; Hogan, Dianna M.; Hopkins, Kristina G.; Kern, Tim; Lawrence, Collin B.; Lischka, Stacy; Loomis, John B.; Mueller, Julie M.; Noe, Gregory B.; Pindilli, Emily J.; Quay, Brian; Semmens, Darius J.; Sinclair, Wilson; Spooner, Daniel E.; Voigt, Brian; St. John White, Barabara Patterns of denitrification potential in tidal freshwater forested wetlands
Limited evidence for spatial patterns of denitrification in tidal freshwater forested wetlands (TFFWs), seemingly due to high spatial variability in the process, is surprising considering the various spatial gradients of its biogeochemical and hydrogeomorphic controls in these ecosystems. Because certain physical environmental gradients may be...
Korol, Alicia R.; Noe, Gregory B. The Life of P: A biogeochemical and sociopolitical challenge in the Everglades
• Phosphorus (P) is an essential element for all life forms, yet to understand its life cycle and impact we need to grasp not only the biogeochemical life of P, but also how P intersects with human activities and values. • Phosphorus is the limiting nutrient in the oligotrophic Everglades ecosystem. Thus, the anthropogenic addition of P to the...
Boyer, Joseph N; Davis, Stephen E; Rivera-Monroy, Victor H.; Cattelino, Jessica; Wozniak, Jeffrey R; Schwartz, Katrina; Noe, Gregory B.; Castaneda-Moya, Edward; Koch, Gregory R The effects of restored hydrologic connectivity on floodplain trapping vs. release of phosphorus, nitrogen, and sediment along the Pocomoke River, Maryland USA
River channelization and artificial levees have decreased the hydrologic connectivity of river-floodplain systems around the world. In response, restoration through enhancing connectivity has been advocated to improve the functions of floodplains, but uncertain benefits and the possibility of phosphate release from re-flooded soils has limited...
Noe, Gregory B.; Boomer, Kathy; Gillespie, Jaimie; Hupp, Cliff R.; Martin-Alciati, Mario; Floro, Kelly; Schenk, Edward R.; Jacobs, Amy K.; Strano, Steve Typha (cattail) invasion in North American wetlands: Biology, regional problems, impacts, ecosystem services, and management
Typha is an iconic wetland plant found worldwide. Hybridization and anthropogenic disturbances have resulted in large increases in Typha abundance in wetland ecosystems throughout North America at a cost to native floral and faunal biodiversity. As demonstrated by three regional case studies, Typha is capable of rapidly colonizing habitats and...
Bansal, Sheel; Lishawa, Shane; Newman, Sue; Tangen, Brian; Wilcox, Douglas; Albert, Dennis; Anteau, Michael J.; Chimney, Michael J; Cressey, Ryann L.; DeKeyser, Edward S.; Elgersam, Kenneth J; Finkelstein, Sarah A; Freeland, Joanna; Grosshans, Richard; Klug, Page E.; Larkin, Daniel J; Lawrence, Beth A; Linz, George; Marburger, Joy; Noe, Gregory B.; Otto, Clint R. V.; Reo, Nicholas; Richards, Jennifer; Richardson, Curtis J.; Rodgers, LeRoy; Shrank, Amy J; Svedarsky, Dan; Travis, Steven E.; Tuchman, Nancy; van der Valk, Arnold; Windham-Myers, Lisamarie Sediment trapping and carbon sequestration in floodplains of the lower Atchafalaya Basin, LA: Allochthonous vs. autochthonous carbon sources
Recent studies suggest that about 2 Pg of organic C is stored on floodplains worldwide. The present study indicates the Atchafalaya River, fifth largest river in the United States in terms of discharge, traps 30 mm/y of sediment on average within its floodplain, which is the highest average non‐episodic rate of fluvial deposition on the U.S....
Hupp, Cliff R.; Kroes, Daniel E.; Noe, Gregory B.; Schenk, Edward R.; Day, Richard H. Adaptive management assists reintroduction as higher tides threaten an endangered salt marsh plant
In theory, extirpated plant species can be reintroduced and managed to restore sustainable populations. However, few reintroduced plants are known to persist for more than a few years. Our adaptive‐management case study illustrates how we restored the endangered hemiparasitic annual plant, Chloropyron maritimum subsp. maritimum...
Noe, Gregory B.; Fellows, Meghan; Parsons, Lorraine; West, Janelle; Callaway, John C.; Trnka, Sally; Wegener, Mark; Zedler, Joy Controls of the spatial variability of denitrification potential in nontidal floodplains of the Chesapeake Bay watershed, USA
Identifying floodplains with high rates of denitrification will help prioritize restoration projects for the removal of nitrogen. Currently, relationships of denitrification with hydrogeomorphic, physiographic, and climate (i.e., largescale) characteristics of floodplains are relatively unknown, even though these...
Korol, Alicia R.; Noe, Gregory B.; Ahn, Changwoo
Floodplain and Channel Evaluation Tool (FACET)
The Floodplain and Evaluation Tool (FACET) is an open-source python tool that maps the floodplain extent and derives reach-scale summaries of stream and floodplain geomorphic measurements from high-resolution digital elevation models (DEMs).
Floodplain Ecosystem Service Mapper Released
The Floodplain Ecosystem Service Mapper is a web application that displays field site data and lidar-derived floodplain and stream channel geomorphic metrics in the Delaware River and Chesapeake Bay watersheds.
Urbanization can switch floodplain wetland soils from a sink to a source of greenhouse gases
This article is part of the Fall 2015 issue of the Earth Science Matters Newsletter.