Grant history of an LTER site
Twenty-five years of intensive study has revealed a Shortgrass Steppe (SGS) ecosystem for which, despite chronic water stress, periods of severe drought, and intensive grazing by large herbivores, the essential ecological structure and functioning remain intact. With global change, however, a range of conditions is anticipated to develop far outside those experienced during the last… Read more »
The Short-Grass Steppe (SGS) was initiated as an LTER project in 1982 and has investigated the influences of climate, physiography, grazing, fire, and land-use on the structure, function, and dynamics of short-grass ecosystems. This research facilitates prediction of vulnerability of grassland ecosystems to on-going environmental change, through integration of experimental and observational studies to provide… Read more »
The Virginia Coast Reserve (VCR) is an extremely dynamic, frequently disturbed landscape which is comprised of elements (e.g. grasslands, marshes) that differ in degrees normally associated with biome-level differences. Because the frequency of disturbance at the VCR is so great the types of ecosystem changes that would normally occur across large distances (continents, biomes) and… Read more »
9411974 Hayden The Virginia Coast Reserve (VCR) is a dynamic, frequently disturbed landscape. The types of ecosystem changes that normally occur across large distances (continents, biomes) and over long periods of time (e.g. glacial and interglacial periods) happen on decadal time-scales. As a result, ecosystem state changes are frequent. The central research theme of the… Read more »
The Virginia coast is an extremely dynamic landscape. The Virginia Coastal Reserve (VCR) LTER focuses on understanding the relationships between natural and anthropogenic forces on the ecology of a coastal barrier island, lagoon and mainland system. Frequent storms, tides, and winds cause sea level variations that affect over 70% of VCR’s land area. Over the… Read more »
The Niwot (NWT) LTER project was initiated in 1980 and since then has provided experimental and observational research designed to understand the dynamics of high-elevation alpine ecosystems in North America. The project has a history of research that has illuminated the responses of organisms and ecosystems to climate and various atmospheric inputs over the range… Read more »
The Niwot Ridge/Green Lakes Valley (NWT) Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) is an interdisciplinary research program with the long-term goals of better understanding ecosystems within high mountain ranges and contributing to a general advance of knowledge in ecology. While twenty percent of the world population lives in river basins fed by melt waters from snow… Read more »
Mountains provide critical services for human society and important habitats for diverse forms of life. They are also changing rapidly: temperatures are rising, leading to shifts in the timing of snowmelt, the amount of water flowing downstream, and the length of the snow-free growing season. While more than one-sixth of the world’s population lives in… Read more »
9632763 Smith This proposal continues, for a second six year period, the Palmer Long-Term Ecological Research program which focuses on the marine ecosystem in the western Antarctic Peninsula region. A central tenet of this research is that the annual advance and retreat of sea ice is a major physical determinant of spatial and temporal changes… Read more »
The Palmer, Antarctica, Long-Term Ecological Research Project (PAL) seeks to understand the structure and function of the Western Antarctic Peninsula’s marine and terrestrial ecosystems in the context of seasonal-to-interannual atmospheric and sea ice dynamics, as well as long-term climate change. The PAL measurement system (or grid) is designed to study marine and terrestrial food webs… Read more »
Since 1990, Palmer LTER (PAL) research has been guided by the hypothesis that variability in the polar marine ecosystem is mechanistically coupled to changes in the annual advance, retreat and spatial extent of sea ice. Since that time, the hypothesis has been modified to incorporate climate migration, i.e. the displacement of a cold, dry polar… Read more »
Since 1990, Palmer LTER (PAL) research has been guided by the hypothesis that variability in the polar marine ecosystem is mechanistically coupled to changes in the annual advance, retreat and spatial extent of sea ice. Since that time, the hypothesis has been modified to incorporate climate migration, i.e. the displacement of a cold, dry polar… Read more »
