Jennifer Harden, PhD
Jennifer is a Scientist Emeritus at the U.S. Geological Survey where she has served as research soil scientist since 1982.
Biography
Education
- Ph.D., Soil Science, University of California- Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, 1982
- M.S., Soil Science, University of California-Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, 1979
- B.S., Soil Science, University of California-Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, 1976
Professional Experience
- 2013-present - Scientist Emeritus U.S. Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA
- 1999-2013 - Research Soil Scientist- Carbon cycling in Northern Latitudes, U.S. Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA
- 1993-1999 - Research Soil Scientist- Carbon cycling in soils and sediment, U.S. Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA
- 1982-1993 - Research Soil Scientist- Earthquake hazards and paleoclimate, U.S. Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA
- 1978-1982 - Physical Science Technician- Soil Chronosequences of Western U.S. Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA
- 1976-1978 - Geologic field assistant to Denis Marchand mapping Quaternary Geology of California
- Co-investigator, Bonanza Creek LTER
- Senior research scientist, University of Alaska, Institute of Arctic Biology
- Steering group member, International Soil Carbon Network
- Seed site host, Critical Zone Exploratory Network
- Steering group member/ topic co-lead: Research Coordination Network on the Vulnerability of Permafrost Carbon
Professional affiliations
- 2009-2012 - Biogeosciences Section President, American Geophysical Union
- Fellow - American Association for the Advancement of Science
- 1984-present - Geological Society of America
- 1990-present - American Geophysical Union
- 2005-present - U.S. Permafrost Association
- 2006-present - American Association for the Advancement of Science
- 2012-2016 - Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, advisory board
- 2011 - 2013 - Lund University Centre for studies of Carbon Cycle and Climate Interactions, advisory board
Science and Products
The trajectory of soil development and its relationship to soil carbon dynamics
It has been postulated that the amount of soil organic carbon (SOC) associated with soil minerals exhibits a threshold relationship in response to effective soil moisture (estimated as precipitation less evapotranspiration). To better characterize the role of moisture in influencing mechanisms of SOC storage during pedogenesis, we compare soils...
Lawrence, Corey; Schulz, Marjorie S.; Masiello, Caroline; Chadwick, Oliver A.; Harden, Jennifer W. Generalized models to estimate carbon and nitrogen stocks of organic soil horizons in Interior Alaska
Boreal ecosystems comprise one tenth of the world’s land surface and contain over 20 % of the global soil carbon (C) stocks. Boreal soils are unique in that its mineral soil is covered by what can be quite thick layers of organic soil. These organic soil layers, or horizons, can differ in their state of decomposition, source vegetation, and...
Manies, Kristen L.; Waldrop, Mark; Harden, Jennifer W. An open source database for the synthesis of soil radiocarbon data: ISRaD version 1.0
Radiocarbon is a critical constraint on our estimates of the timescales of soil carbon cycling that can aid in identifying mechanisms of carbon stabilization and destabilization and improve the forecast of soil carbon response to management or environmental change. Despite the wealth of soil radiocarbon data that have been reported over the past...
Lawrence, Corey R.; Beem-Miller, Jeffrey; Hoyt, Alison; Monroe, Grey; Sierra, Carlos; Stoner, Shane; Heckman, Katherine; Blankinship, Joseph; Crow, Susan; McNichol, Gavin; Trumbore, Susan; Levine, Paul; Vinduśková, Olga; Todd-Brown, Katherine; Rasmussen, Craig; Hicks Pries, Caitlin; Schadel, Christina; McFarlane, Karis; Doetterl, Sebastian; Hatté, Christine; He, Yujie; Treat, Claire C.; Harden, Jennifer W.; Torn, Margaret S.; Estop-Aragonés, Cristian; Berhe, Asmeret A.; Keiluweit, Marco; Kuhnen, Agatha Della Rosa; Marin-Spiotta, Erika; Plante, Alain F.; Thompson, Aaron; Shi, Zheng; Schimel, Joshua P.; Vaughn, Lydia J.S. ; von Fromm, Sophie F.; Wagai, Rota Beneath the arctic greening: Will soils lose or gain carbon or perhaps a little of both?
Ecosystem shifts related to climate change are anticipated for the next decades to centuries based on a number of conceptual and experimentally derived models of plant structure and function. Belowground, the potential responses of soil systems are less well known. We used geochemical steady state models, soil density fractionation, and soil...
Harden, Jennifer W.; O’Donnell, J.A.; Heckman, K.A.; Sulman, B.N.; Koven, C.D.; Ping, C.L.; Michaelson, G.J. Networking our science to characterize the state, vulnerabilities, and management opportunities of soil organic matter
Soil organic matter (SOM) supports the Earth's ability to sustain terrestrial ecosystems, provide food and fiber, and retains the largest pool of actively cycling carbon. Over 75% of the soil organic carbon (SOC) in the top meter of soil is directly affected by human land use. Large land areas have lost SOC as a result of land use practices, yet...
Harden, Jennifer W.; Hugelius, Gustaf; Ahlström, Anders; Blankinship, Joseph C.; Bond-Lamberty, Ben; Lawrence, Corey; Loisel, Julie; Malhotra, Avni; Jackson, Robert B.; Ogle, Stephen M.; Phillips, Claire; Ryals, Rebecca; Todd-Brown, Katherine; Vargas, Rodrigo; Vergara, Sintana E.; Cotrufo, M. Francesca; Keiluweit, Marco; Heckman, Katherine; Crow, Susan E.; Silver, Whendee L.; DeLonge, Marcia; Nave, Lucas E. A sequential selective dissolution method to quantify storage and stability of organic carbon associated with Al and Fe hydroxide phases
Stabilization of SOM (soil organic matter) is regulated in part by sorption and desorption reactions happening at mineral surfaces, as well as precipitation and dissolution of organo-metal complexes. Fe and Al hydroxides play a particularly significant role in SOM stabilization in soils due to their ubiquitous distribution and their...
Heckman, Katherine; Lawrence, Corey R.; Harden, Jennifer W. A decade of boreal rich fen greenhouse gas fluxes in response to natural and experimental water table variability
Rich fens are common boreal ecosystems with distinct hydrology, biogeochemistry and ecology that influence their carbon (C) balance. We present growing season soil chamber methane emission (FCH4), ecosystem respiration (ER), net ecosystem exchange (NEE) and gross primary production (GPP) fluxes from a 9-years water table manipulation experiment in...
Olefeldt, David; Euskirchen, Eugénie S.; Harden, Jennifer W.; Kane, Evan S.; McGuire, A. David; Waldrop, Mark P.; Turetsky, Merritt R. Rapid carbon loss and slow recovery following permafrost thaw in boreal peatlands
Permafrost peatlands store one-third of the total carbon (C) in the atmosphere and are increasingly vulnerable to thaw as high-latitude temperatures warm. Large uncertainties remain about C dynamics following permafrost thaw in boreal peatlands. We used a chronosequence approach to measure C stocks in forested permafrost plateaus (forest) and...
Jones, Miriam C.; Harden, Jennifer W.; O'Donnell, Jonathan A.; Manies, Kristen L.; Jorgenson, Torre; Treat, Claire C.; Ewing, Stephanie Radiocarbon constraints imply reduced carbon uptake by soils during the 21st century
Soil is the largest terrestrial carbon reservoir and may influence the sign and magnitude of carbon cycle-climate feedbacks. Many Earth system models (ESMs) estimate a significant soil carbon sink by 2100, yet the underlying carbon dynamics determining this response have not been systematically tested against observations. We used 14C data from...
He, Yujie; Trumbore, Susan E.; Torn, Margaret S.; Harden, Jennifer W.; Vaughn, Lydia J.S. ; Allison, Steven D.; Randerson, J.T. Decadal and long-term boreal soil carbon and nitrogen sequestration rates across a variety of ecosystems
Boreal soils play a critical role in the global carbon (C) cycle; therefore, it is important to understand the mechanisms that control soil C accumulation and loss for this region. Examining C & nitrogen (N) accumulation rates over decades to centuries may provide additional understanding of the dominant mechanisms for their storage, which can...
Manies, Kristen L.; Harden, Jennifer W.; Fuller, Christopher C.; Turetsky, Merritt
Soil data for a vegetation gradient located at Bonanza Creek Long Term Ecological Research Site, interior Alaska
Boreal soils play an important role in the global carbon cycle owing to the large amount of carbon stored within this northern region. To understand how carbon and nitrogen storage varied among different ecosystems, a vegetation gradient was established in the Bonanza Creek Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) site, located in interior Alaska. The...
Manies, Kristen L.; Harden, Jennifer W.; Fuller, Christopher C.; Xu, Xiaomei; McGeehin, John P. Estimating heterotrophic respiration at large scales: Challenges, approaches, and next steps
Heterotrophic respiration (HR), the aerobic and anaerobic processes mineralizing organic matter, is a key carbon flux but one impossible to measure at scales significantly larger than small experimental plots. This impedes our ability to understand carbon and nutrient cycles, benchmark models, or reliably upscale point measurements. Given that a...
Bond-Lamberty, Ben; Epron, Daniel; Harden, Jennifer W.; Harmon, Mark E.; Hoffman, Forrest; Kumar, Jitendra; McGuire, Anthony D.; Vargas, Rodrigo