 recent
analysis for in-cites showed that Dr. Beverly Law entered the
top 1% of scientists in the field of Agricultural Sciences in
the ISI
Essential
Science Indicators
Web product, with 15 papers cited a total of 161 times to
date. Below, Dr. Law discusses her highly cited work in
carbon-cycle science. Dr. Law is a Research Associate
Professor in Ecophysiology and Ecosystem Processes at Oregon
State University’s College of Forestry.
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Why do you think your work is
highly cited?
Carbon-cycle science is an important topic in the realm of
global change and the impacts on vegetation and feedbacks to the
atmosphere. The focus
of my work is the role of forests in the global carbon cycle, and
specifically, the effects of disturbance and interannual variation
in climate on terrestrial ecosystem processes. Our research group
works in forests of the Pacific Northwest U.S., which are some of
the most productive forests in the world.
They have been the subject of debate over the past few
decades regarding habitat loss with the diminishing presence of
old-growth forests ranging from 300 to 800 years of age, and more
recently, various political and environmental viewpoints in how to
deal with the recent incidence of many catastrophic forest fires in
the region. Our research projects are by default smack in the middle
of this tension between ecological knowledge, management, and
political intervention. The articles most cited are also probably of interest because
much of our work is cutting-edge technology which combines
instruments that measure water flow through trees to instruments
that measure carbon dioxide and water vapor exchange of whole
forests over several kilometers. Our multi-scale measurements are in
ponderosa pine forests where drought during the growing season is
typical. The function of plants in typically dry regions is
fascinating in that somehow they have evolved to survive and do
quite well under these harsh growing conditions. Our research sites
in the Metolius area of Oregon are part of a large international
network of research sites: AmeriFlux in North, Central and South
America, and Fluxnet, an umbrella synthesis network of similar
networks. In Oregon, we have a cluster of “flux” sites where we
are examining the relative impacts of disturbance from logging and
fire and climate on carbon uptake, water use, and net exchange
between the forests and the atmosphere. We have found that old
forests in the Pacific Northwest are not necessarily “carbon
neutral” and that they store large amounts of carbon for
centuries. Because we operate at scales ranging from leaf to
ecosystem and landscape scale, we can examine the relative
importance of various processes affecting carbon dioxide and water
vapor exchange, and carbon stocks.
We have contributed quite a bit to understanding of processes
regulating the biogeochemistry of these systems, which has helped to
improve process models that were originally based on leaf-level
experiments.
What are the circumstances which
led you to your work?
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 Because
water has become a critical issue, and global
climate change includes changes in frequency and
amount of precipitation, we need to pay more
attention to the feedbacks between vegetation
and the atmosphere.
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I started working in ecophysiology of woody plants
evaluating response to drought and nutrient availability. I have
been interested in vegetation response to climate under different
environmental conditions, and working at various scales of
integration. I had the
opportunity to participate in early studies on continuous
micrometeorological measurements of whole ecosystem responses across
a climatic gradient, and continued along these lines, adding
research tools to my toolbox. Strategies for understanding the
importance of processes and factors at multiple scales benefit from
a variety of tools, including satellite remote sensing, modeling,
and process level studies, all of which involve highly technical
instruments and complex data analysis methods. Integrated studies
that use a variety of such tools intrigue me the most, and I have
been fortunate to obtain funding from NASA, the Department of
Energy, and NOAA to pursue these research strategies.
Would you describe the
significance of this work for your field?
The significance is probably improved understanding of how forest systems work beyond the level of the individual
leaf or plant, and how disturbance impacts forest processes for
years to decades. We
have shown that uptake of carbon dioxide by vegetation through the
process of photosynthesis is strongly linked to water vapor exchange
from the combination of evaporation from soils and transpiration at
the whole ecosystem scale (Law et al. 2002). This has implications
for water cycling and feedbacks between terrestrial systems and the
atmosphere. Because water has become a critical issue, and global
climate change includes changes in frequency and amount of
precipitation, we need to pay more attention to the feedbacks
between vegetation and the atmosphere.
We also found that soils are the dominant source of CO2
respired back to the atmosphere, such that young regenerating
forests can be net sources of CO2 to the atmosphere
because productivity of the forests that have not yet reached
maximum canopy cover is outweighed by the amount of CO2
respired from soils for 5-20 years depending on rates of recovery
(Law et al. 1999, 2001). This magnitude of soil contributions to CO2
losses has been confirmed at a number of locations.
We learned that within a forest, disturbance has the
largest effect on net carbon dioxide exchange, with important
secondary effects of interannual variation in climate.
Mature forests can become sources of carbon dioxide to the
atmosphere during periods of severe drought or otherwise harsh
climatic conditions.
Where do you see this research
going 10 years from now?
Global change is a serious topic and we are just scratching
the surface of the implications of the magnitudes and rates of
change. We are obligated to provide the public with our best
prognosis for impacts of global change, in hopes that people will
sit up and take notice that they do indeed have impacts far beyond
their own back yards. The
U.S. Carbon Cycle Science Plan for the next 10 years was recently
unveiled by Dr. James Mahoney. Our research will be coordinated
among agencies and research institutions to produce cohesive reports
on the status of our knowledge of the roles of the lands and oceans
in the global carbon cycle, and feedbacks between major
disturbances, climate, and the biosphere.
What lessons would you draw from
your work to share with the next
generation of researchers?
Research
can be both exciting and at times tedious.
It requires visionary planning to make the most rapid
progress. Keep your eye on the big questions while trying to fill in
the cracks in knowledge. Don’t
get stymied by the details, which can paralyze progress.
Interact with people from multiple disciplines and try to
look at problems from their views—sometimes a tangential view will
connect and yield the “eureka!” that we seek.
As individuals, we cannot expect to have all of the answers
at the end of our careers. We can only hope that the research
roadmaps that we have chosen are the most direct way to answer the
tough questions, and that we don’t wait until all of the facts are
in before we give our best prognoses on the future—to wait is to
allow changes to occur that may be irreversible, like extinction,
which is forever.
Beverly
E. Law, Ph.D.
Oregon State University
College of Forestry
Corvallis, OR, USA
Most-cited paper with
38 cites:
Anthoni PM, Law,
BE, Unsworth MH. "Carbon and water vapor exchange of an
open-canopied ponderosa pine ecosystem," Agr. Forest Meteorol.
95(3): 151-68, 23 June 1999.
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cites
