Interested in joining the lab? Contact John King at [email protected].
Current Lab Members
John S. King, Professor
John's research focuses on the ecophysiological drivers of forest productivity and how they respond to global environmental change, management, and interaction between biotic and abiotic stress factors. He has worked in the tropical moist forests of Africa (Gabon) and central America (Nicaragua), the "wood basket" pine forests of the U.S. Southeast, the north-temperate and boreal forests of the Upper Great Lakes region, and hardwood forests of central and western Europe. The scale of study ranges from gas exchange and biochemistry of individual leaves and fine roots, to biomass production and partitioning within plants, to stand level NPP and ecosystem cycling of carbon, water, and nutrients. Current investigations include: 1) response of managed and unmanaged forests of the U.S. Southeast coastal plain to sea level rise, extreme events, and changing climate, 2) interaction of biotic-abiotic stress factors in early pine stand establishment and productivity, 3) productivity and water use efficiency of Populus and other species in short-rotation coppice for bioenergy, 4) effects of rising concentrations of carbon dioxide and tropospheric ozone on forest physiology, growth and soil carbon cycling, and 5) effects of genetic tree improvement on early stand establishment, productivity, carbon allocation and cycling. Other work in his lab explores how inter- and intra-specific genetic variation contributes to forest ecosystem productivity and responses to global environmental change.
Maricar Aguilos, Assistant Research Professor
Maricar received her Ph.D. from Hokkaido University, Japan. Her main research interest is the carbon and water exchanges at ecosystem level including impacts of forest disturbances to the overall carbon and water budgets. She uses the eddy covariance approach in carbon flux monitoring and R statistical language tool in data analysis and modeling. Currently, she is a Postdoctoral Researcher with the Tree Physiology Lab working closely with all the members of NC Core Flux Sites under the umbrella of AmeriFlux Network. She is currently investigating long-term ecosystem level carbon and water fluxes and their drivers of change in managed loblolly pine plantation forests and a natural wetland ecosystem.
Maricar's website: https://mmaguilos.wixsite.com/mysite
Maricar's website: https://mmaguilos.wixsite.com/mysite
Jean Christophe Domec, Research Associate Professor
JC's research investigates plant structure and function in relation to xylem transport and how water availability influences plant growth. He addresses research questions by combining two different disciplines, namely plant physiology and wood science. For example, in his physiological studies, JC investigated the phenomenon of root xylem dysfunction and its effects on plant gas-exchange. Plants rely on unhindered water transport to perform photosynthesis. During drought, plant xylem may cavitate causing plants to close their stomata to avoid widespread cavitation throughout their conduits. In this regard, JC recently contributed to the discovery that root xylem cavitation and refilling cycles occur on a daily basis, even when water stress is not apparent, which can lead to stomatal closure (Domec et al. 2009a,b).
JC's current research also focuses on the water and carbon exchange of the lower coastal plain forests in the southeast US using a range of field and analytical techniques. Those projects address the effects of drought, soil type and management choices on forest water use and carbon sequestration. These projects have revealed that hydraulic lift (or redistribution) at night from deeper roots to shallow roots helps maintaining xylem integrity of woody plants (Domec et al. 2010, 2012). These results were unexpected and exciting discoveries that demonstrated that cavitation is a frequent and dynamic process that may have evolved to increase survival during frequent drought cycles.
As part of his latest project and as part of the sources of environmental variability in moisture, JC is focusing on the physiological adaptation of plants to sea-level rise and its effect on ecosystem water and carbon exchange. This new project involves greenhouse experiments as well as field monitoring in the native mixed lowland forests at the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge.
JC's websites: http://fds.duke.edu/db/Nicholas/eos/faculty/jcd34
http://people.duke.edu/~jcd34/
JC's current research also focuses on the water and carbon exchange of the lower coastal plain forests in the southeast US using a range of field and analytical techniques. Those projects address the effects of drought, soil type and management choices on forest water use and carbon sequestration. These projects have revealed that hydraulic lift (or redistribution) at night from deeper roots to shallow roots helps maintaining xylem integrity of woody plants (Domec et al. 2010, 2012). These results were unexpected and exciting discoveries that demonstrated that cavitation is a frequent and dynamic process that may have evolved to increase survival during frequent drought cycles.
As part of his latest project and as part of the sources of environmental variability in moisture, JC is focusing on the physiological adaptation of plants to sea-level rise and its effect on ecosystem water and carbon exchange. This new project involves greenhouse experiments as well as field monitoring in the native mixed lowland forests at the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge.
JC's websites: http://fds.duke.edu/db/Nicholas/eos/faculty/jcd34
http://people.duke.edu/~jcd34/
Asko Noormets, Research Associate Professor
Asko works on carbon cycling, and its regulation by environmental and climate change factors in forest ecosystems. The work relies heavily on measurements of fluxes using eddy covariance and chamber methods, but also integrates biometric, isotopic, modeling and experimental techniques. As water availability limits plant growth even in mesic conditions, many of our studies focus on the mechanisms of drought effects on carbon uptake by and release from the ecosystem. Furthermore, as environmental factors that individually affect plants in contrasting ways, often change together, and untangling their combined effects remains an area of active research. For example, higher temperature and lower water availability associated with droughts have a complex response dynamic for both photosynthesis and respiration. The increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration is often accompanied by other phyto-active air pollutants, like ozone, similarly triggering complex response cascades. And the interaction between atmospheric pollution with climate change factors, like drought, can also result in unexpected outcomes. Some of the combinations of environmental change are more dangerous to forest health than others, because they trigger chronic stress and compromise plant vigor.
The use of forests for stabilizing atmospheric CO2 concentrations and maintaining ecosystem services we depend on requires healthy and resilient ecosystems, with enough functional and structural diversity to absorb smaller disturbances. This diversity is greatly reduced in plantation forests, while their contribution to total forest area continues to increase. In the southern US, it is estimated that the area of intensively managed loblolly pine plantations will increase from the current 55% of all pine forests to over 80% by 2040. While the plantations are clearly more productive in terms of merchantable biomass compared to native forests, it is not clear whether they offer comparable benefits in terms of long-term carbon sequestration, and water and nutrient retention. Evaluating the trade-offs between different ecosystem processes in plantation forests is another major area of our work.
The use of forests for stabilizing atmospheric CO2 concentrations and maintaining ecosystem services we depend on requires healthy and resilient ecosystems, with enough functional and structural diversity to absorb smaller disturbances. This diversity is greatly reduced in plantation forests, while their contribution to total forest area continues to increase. In the southern US, it is estimated that the area of intensively managed loblolly pine plantations will increase from the current 55% of all pine forests to over 80% by 2040. While the plantations are clearly more productive in terms of merchantable biomass compared to native forests, it is not clear whether they offer comparable benefits in terms of long-term carbon sequestration, and water and nutrient retention. Evaluating the trade-offs between different ecosystem processes in plantation forests is another major area of our work.
Margaux Whitley, MS Student
Margaux Whitley is a Masters student in Forestry and Entomology. She completed her Bachelor's degree here at NC State in Plant Biology, where she discovered an interest in trees and forest insect pests. Her research in the Tree Physiology Lab examines the short rotation coppice system of American sycamore trees and their relationship with Japanese beetles. She is studying the phenomenon of 'resistant' trees within the stand, and determining the reason for the apparent resistance by examining condensed tannin levels in the leaves.
Jackson Webb, MS Student
Jackson Webb is pursuing a M.S in Forestry, with his research focusing on the impacts of deferred harvesting on carbon sequestration in Southern Pine Plantations. He is currently using economic models informed by Eddy Covariance data in order to calculate optimal harvesting times to maximize both carbon sequestration, as well as formulating carbon pricing incentives. He received a B.S in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Sewanee: The University of the South
Cameron Carter, Research Assistant
Oliver Watts, Research Assistant
J. Oliver Watts grew up in rural Appalachia and South America where he was without the opportunity to attend middle or high school. Despite facing educational challenges, his love for nature and learning led him to a career in environmental science and education that began with a Associates in Forest management technologies through Haywood Community College in Clyde NC. He now enjoys his work as a research assistant working with Carbon flux Eddy-Covariance systems and as a teaching assistant in Forest Physiology, SIlvics, Dendrology and Wildfire Behavior. He hopes to pursue and share his passion for the wonders of the natural world. Like with his educational Instagram account, @BlackSheepBackpacking. While his journey is a testament to resilience, it is a reminder that “if you know the why, you can live any how” - Friedrich Nietzsche
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Former Lab Members
Maccoy Kerrigan, Undergraduate Research Assistant/MS Student
Maccoy Kerrigan is an undergraduate of North Carolina State University. He extends assistance on numerous research works such as soil sampling and analysis, processing of gas samples and flux tower maintenance activities. He also helps other graduate students in the conduct of their studies/thesis. He also enjoys going to the field to measure tree diameters of short rotation crop American Sycamore for bionergy production. Maccoy earned his M.S. in Forestry may 2023.
Omoyemeh Ile, M.S. - PhD Student
Jennifer quantifies the biomass productivity of short rotation coppice culture of American sycamore trees grown with low silvicultural inputs (fertilizer, herbicide and irrigation). She also assessed the effects of sycamore's establishment on the soil health of eroded marginal agricultural fields for potential ion integration into traditional agricultural farming systems.
Mahdis Fallahi, Ph.D. Student
Mahdis Fallahi is a Ph.D. student at the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources, North
Carolina State University. She received two B.S degrees in applied mathematics and civil engineering
and M.S degree in Civil Engineering (Water Resources Management). She is an associate member of the
American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). The spectrum of her research includes climate change impact
on the water resources, uncertainty in flood and drought forecasting, sea level rise impact on coastal
cities, geostatic analysis, model and software preparation for long-term rainfall forecasting, design of
online monitoring system of the river, system engineering, hydrology, and hydroclimatology modeling.
She has worked on several consulting projects as a Professional Engineer in the water resources
engineering field. She also has been involved with water and environmental R&D groups working on
various universities and industries research collaborative projects. She has authored a number of
international journal and conference papers and has published two books “System Engineering” and
“Hydrology and Hydroclimatology” (CRC Press).
Carolina State University. She received two B.S degrees in applied mathematics and civil engineering
and M.S degree in Civil Engineering (Water Resources Management). She is an associate member of the
American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). The spectrum of her research includes climate change impact
on the water resources, uncertainty in flood and drought forecasting, sea level rise impact on coastal
cities, geostatic analysis, model and software preparation for long-term rainfall forecasting, design of
online monitoring system of the river, system engineering, hydrology, and hydroclimatology modeling.
She has worked on several consulting projects as a Professional Engineer in the water resources
engineering field. She also has been involved with water and environmental R&D groups working on
various universities and industries research collaborative projects. She has authored a number of
international journal and conference papers and has published two books “System Engineering” and
“Hydrology and Hydroclimatology” (CRC Press).
Deanna Hardesty, M.S. Student
Deanna Hardesty is a Master’s student in the Natural Resource program at NCSU focusing on hydrology and GIS. She is interested in the effects of changing hydrology on coastal forest ecosystems. Her work involves analyzing groundwater data from coastal North Carolina sites and assessing the relationship between a changing coastline and the loss of forested area. She received a B.S. in Marine Biology from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington in 2016. Before coming to work at NCSU, Deanna worked as a genetic analyst at UNCW and as a cell biologist for the medical school at UNC Chapel Hill.
Kevan J. Minick, Research Scientist
Kevan focuses on understanding feedback between plants and soil microbial community structure and function and how disturbance, land-use, and climate change alter this relationship and fluxes of carbon and nutrients within terrestrial. He worked in numerous terrestrial ecosystems spanning natural forested wetlands to northern hardwood forests to intensively managed pine plantations. He also worked in bioenergy intercropping systems and on studies investigating the amelioration of degraded agricultural soils. Soils are the biogeochemical engine driving many of the baseline processes necessary to support terrestrial ecosystems. They are also an intricate and a generally unseen (e.g., black box) aspect of ecosystems in which myriad biology, physical, and chemical processes occur. Through sound experimental and analytical techniques his goal is to further his understanding of soils and their role in ecosystem function and to bring broad interest to this complex and fascinating world found beneath our feet.
Guofang Miao, Postdoctoral Research Scholar
Guofang received her Ph.D. from NCSU in Aug. 2013. With a diverse background of chemistry, environmental sciences, meteorology and oceanography, she is now focusing on ecological studies in forest ecosystems. She is interested in ecosystem responses under climate change and the difference of responses from various ecosystems. Her research interests are specifically in quantification of the interaction between environmental drivers and ecosystem processes, including development of technology that can continuously measure the variation of environmental drivers and ecosystem processes in different time and spatial scales, and mathematical modeling of the interaction
Eric Ward, Postdoctoral Research Scholar
Eric received his Ph.D. from Duke University in May 2012. His main research interest is the carbon and water cycles of forests, including impacts of climate change. Eric uses a combination of ecophysiological monitoring and ecosystem modeling in his research. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher with the Tree Physiology lab, working on the PINEMAP project. Eric is investigating scaling issues, uncertainties and the connections between water and carbon in ecosystem models of loblolly pine.
Milan Fischer, Postdoctoral Research Scholar
Milan received his PhD from Mendel University, Brno, Czech Republic, in 2012, and transferred to NCSU as a postdoctoral research scholar in 2013. His expertise is in quantifying productivity, and monitoring carbon and water cycling, in short-rotation coppice systems (SRC) used for bioenergy production. He has worked with Populus species, American sycamore, pines and switchgrass inter-cropping. Milan has expertise in a wide range of ecophysiological and meteorological methods to characterize plant and ecosystem water cycling including: leaf-level gas exchange, sap flow systems, eddy covariance, Bowen-ratio, and surface renewal.
Wen Lin, Ph.D. Student
Wen Lin is a PhD student at Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources, North Carolina State University. She receives her Masters degree from Virginia Tech in 2009. Now she is working for the project "Integrating research, education and extension for enhancing southern pine climate change mitigation and adaptation" from the US Department of Agriculture's Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (USDA-AFRI). Her research focuses on analyzing 13C- and 18O-based water use efficiency data collected from different loblolly pine genotypes throughout southern USA, as well as conducting and analyzing soil respiration data from a subset of sites in the northern subregion of the study area.
Suna Morkoc, M.S. Student
Suna Morkoc came to North Carolina State University under the Tree Ecology and Ecosystem Science Lab to finish her Master of Science in Forestry. Her study focuses on understanding soil carbon cycling and partitioning of soil respiration of American Sycamore grown in short-rotation coppice for bioenergy in the Piedmont of North Carolina.
Elissa Ashley, M.S. Student
Elissa Ashley is a Master’s Student in the Natural Resources Department at North Carolina State University. She received her B.S in Biology with a focus in Environmental Sciences at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, FL. Elissa’s primary research focus at State is bioenergy productivity of Sycamore in the piedmont. Elissa’s past research has been with ecosystem monitoring, lagoon restoration, and control of mosquitoes and other arthropods of public health importance.
Charlton (Chase) Brown, M.S. Student
Chase is a Master's student in the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources studying the effects of salinity and ground water table dynamics driving terrestrial ecosystem transition at the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge. He is particularly interested in looking at the impacts of sea-level rise and extreme events, such as hurricanes and tropical storms. Chase is also studying the history of wetland policy in the United States. He received his B.S. in Natural Resources from NCSU as well. Through the NC YAIO internship program, he interned with the Division of Marine Fisheries in Elizabeth City, NC which focuses on the Albemarle sound and surrounding rivers, and the Currituck sound down to Oregon Inlet.
Maxwell Wightman, MS, Research Assistant
Max is a research assistant at the North Carolina State University Department of Forest and Environmental Resources. In this role, Maxwell provides support to numerous projects such as the North Carolina AmeriFlux Core Site Cluster. His research focuses on the impact of management activities on the water and carbon cycles of forest ecosystems. Maxwell received a B.S. in forest ecosystem science from the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in 2009 and a M.S. in forest resources and conservation from the University of Florida in 2014.
Jim Williamson, Undergraduate Research Assistant/future MS Student
Jameson Boone, Undergraduate Research Assistant
Samuel "Reid" Trexler, Undergraduate Research Assistant
Lab Alumni
Postdoctoral scholars
Janine Albaugh
Alexia Kelley
J-C Domec
PhD Students
Guofang Miao
Mike Aspinwall
Lee Rhea
Lingli Liu
MS Students
David Zietlow
Andrew Radecki
Emily Wear
Anna Stout
Jack Chapman
Josh Reed
Suna Morkoc
Technical Staff
Aletta Davis
Laura Walker
Jill Zalesny
Paige Wiard
Undergraduate Interns
Ian Thompson
Postdoctoral scholars
Janine Albaugh
Alexia Kelley
J-C Domec
PhD Students
Guofang Miao
Mike Aspinwall
Lee Rhea
Lingli Liu
MS Students
David Zietlow
Andrew Radecki
Emily Wear
Anna Stout
Jack Chapman
Josh Reed
Suna Morkoc
Technical Staff
Aletta Davis
Laura Walker
Jill Zalesny
Paige Wiard
Undergraduate Interns
Ian Thompson