Joel Carr, Ph.D.
Biography
I am a research ecologist with the coastal processes group currently examining and modelling biotic and abiotic processes controlling marsh upland boundary migration. My background is in environmental sciences and mathematics, with a focus on using modeling to investigate non-linear dynamics in ecosystems. I have a background in vegetation modified transport processes and much of my work focuses on examining the stability and resilience of seagrass (Zostera marina) to environmental drivers/stressors.
My research interests are varied but tend to focus on ecogeomorphic and ecohydrologic feedbacks mechanisms and the emergence of alternate state dynamics, complex networks, human-environment interactions,the population-water-food nexus, inequality, transport processes, sediment dynamics and noise induced phenomena among others
Science and Products
The Response of Coastal Wetlands to Sea-level Rise: Understanding how Macroscale Drivers Influence Local Processes and Feedbacks
The purpose of this work is to advance our understanding of how coastal wetland responses to sea-level rise (SLR) within the conterminous United States are likely to vary as a function of local, regional, and macroscale drivers, including climate. Based on our interactions with managers and decision makers, as well as our knowledge of the current state of the science, we propose to: (a)...
The response of coastal wetlands to sea-level rise: Understanding how macroscale drivers influence local processes and feedbacks
The purpose of this work is to advance our understanding of how coastal wetland responses to SLR within the conterminous United States are likely to vary as a function of local, regional, and macroscale drivers, including climate. Based on our interactions with managers and decision makers, as well as our knowledge of the current state of the science, we propose to (a) conduct a national...
Virginia Coast Reserve Long Term Ecological Research VII
The highly protected Virginia Coast Reserve (VCR) is the largest undeveloped region along the Atlantic seaboard.The VCR is managed by the Nature Conservancy, and was designated a Man and the Biosphere Reserve in 1979, providing a unique environment for which to study coastal impacts of climate change on a variety of coastal ecosystems from barrier islands across back barrier lagoons, mudflats...
Seagrass Vulnerability to Environmental Conditions Under Changing Temperature Regimes
Seagrasses are among the most productive ecosystems on the planet. Water quality degradation and direct human disturbance have caused loss of nearly a third of the seagrass habitat worldwide. These threats are exacerbated by stresses associated with a changing global climate. Predicting how seagrass distribution, abundance, and species composition will change in response to increased...
Vulnerability Assessment of Available Habitat for Wintering Black Ducks within the Refuge System in the Chesapeake Bay
American black duck (Anas rubripes) utilize inland and tidal freshwater and brackish marshes throughout the Chesapeake Bay and are considered to be an indicator species of the ecosystem’s health. Thus, conserving and increasing black duck habitats will subsequently benefit the general health of the bay. The goal of this study was to create a mechanistic model to determine the amount...
Quantifying slopes as a driver of forest to marsh conversion using geospatial techniques: Application to Chesapeake Bay coastal-plain, USA
Coastal salt marshes, which provide valuable ecosystem services such as flood mitigation and carbon sequestration, are threatened by rising sea level. In response, these ecosystems migrate landward, converting available upland into salt marsh. In the coastal-plain surrounding Chesapeake Bay, United States, conversion of coastal forest to salt...
Molino, Grace Damore; Defne, Zafer; Aretxabaleta, Alfredo; Ganju, Neil Kamal; Carr, Joel A.
Mangrove species’ response to sea-level rise across Pohnpei, Federated States of Micronesia
Mangrove forests are likely vulnerable to accelerating sea-level rise; however, we lack the tools necessary to understand their future resilience. On the Pacific island of Pohnpei, Federated States of Micronesia, mangroves are habitat to endangered species and provide critical ecosystem services that support local communities. We developed a...
Buffington, Kevin J.; MacKenzie, Richard A.; Carr, Joel A.; Apwong, Maybeleen; Krauss, Ken W.; Thorne, Karen M. Modelling marsh-forest boundary transgression in response to storms and sea-level rise
The lateral extent and vertical stability of salt marshes experiencing rising sea levels depend on interacting drivers and feedbacks with potential for non‐linear behaviors. A two‐dimensional transect model was developed to examine changes in marsh and upland forest lateral extent and to explore controls on marsh inland transgression. Model...
Carr, Joel A.; Guntenspergen, Glenn R.; Kirwan, Matthew Impacts of seagrass dynamics on the coupled long-term evolution of barrier-marsh-bay systems
Seagrass provides a wide range of economically and ecologically valuable ecosystem services, with shoreline erosion control often listed as a key service, but can also alter the sediment dynamics and waves within back-barrier bays. Here we incorporate seagrass dynamics into an existing barrier-marsh exploratory model, GEOMBEST++, to examine the...
Reeves, Ian; Moore, Laura; Goldstein, Evan ; Murray, Brad; Carr, Joel A.; Kirwan, Matthew Global virtual water trade and the hydrological cycle: Patterns, drivers, and socio-environmental impacts
The increasing global demand for farmland products is placing unprecedented pressure on the global agricultural system and its water resources. Many regions of the world, that are affected by a chronic water scarcity relative to their population, strongly depend on the import of agricultural commodities and associated embodied (or virtual) water....
D'Odorico, Paolo; Carr, Joel A.; Dalin, Carole; Dell'Angelo, Jampel; Konar, Megan; Laio, Francesco; Ridolfi, Luca; Rosa, Lorenzo; Suweis, Samir; Tamea, Stefania; Tuninetti, Marta The Global food‐energy‐water nexus
Water availability is a major factor constraining humanity's ability to meet the future food and energy needs of a growing and increasingly affluent human population. Water plays an important role in the production of energy, including renewable energy sources and the extraction of unconventional fossil fuels that are expected to become important...
D'Odorico, Paolo; Frankel Davis, Kyle; Rosa, Lorenzo; Carr, Joel A.; Chiarelli, Davide; Dell’Angelo, Jampel; Gephart, Jessica; MacDonald, Graham K.; Seekell, David A.; Suweis, Samir; Rulli, Maria Cristina Exploring the impacts of seagrass on coupled marsh-tidal flat morphodynamics
Intertidal coastal environments are prone to changes induced by sea level rise, increases in storminess, temperature, and anthropogenic disturbances. It is unclear how changes in external drivers may affect the dynamics of low energy coastal environments because their response is non-linear, and characterized by many thresholds and discontinuities...
Carr, Joel A.; Mariotti, Giulio; Fahgerazzi, Sergio; McGlathery, Karen; Wiberg, Patricia Sea level driven marsh expansion in a coupled model of marsh erosion and migration
Coastal wetlands are among the most valuable ecosystems on Earth, where ecosystem services such as flood protection depend nonlinearly on wetland size and are threatened by sea level rise and coastal development. Here we propose a simple model of marsh migration into adjacent uplands and couple it with existing models of seaward edge erosion and...
Kirwan, Matthew L.; Walters, David C.; Reay, William G.; Carr, Joel A. Spatially explicit feedbacks between seagrass meadow structure, sediment and light: Habitat suitability for seagrass growth
In shallow coastal bays where nutrient loading and riverine inputs are low, turbidity, and the consequent light environment are controlled by resuspension of bed sediments due to wind-waves and tidal currents. High sediment resuspension and low light environments can limit benthic primary productivity; however, both currents and waves are affected...
Carr, Joel A.; D'Odorico, Paul; McGlathery, Karen; Wiberg, Patricia L. Tree island pattern formation in the Florida Everglades
The Florida Everglades freshwater landscape exhibits a distribution of islands covered by woody vegetation and bordered by marshes and wet prairies. Known as “tree islands”, these ecogeomorphic features can be found in few other low gradient, nutrient limited freshwater wetlands. In the last few decades, however, a large percentage of...
Carr, Joel A.; D'Odorico, P.; Engel, Victor C.; Redwine, Jed