Our research focuses broadly on how global change affects freshwater systems. Our research is highly collaborative and aims to protect water resources facing multiple stressors such as climate change, land use change, and invasive species.
Climate change and freshwaters during the winter
Over the past 150 years, the winter season in the Northern Hemisphere has changed dramatically with shorter seasonal lake ice cover duration and changes in the amount and type of precipitation. Historically, it was expected that lakes were dormant during the winter, non-growing season. Recent work by our lab and collaborators highlights that lakes are biologically active in the winter, that what happens in the winter can shape lake dynamics in the summer, and that lakes provide important cultural ecosystem services to people during the winter.
Combined stressors and coldwater fish habitat
Throughout many parts of the US, including the Midwest, cool- and coldwater fisheries are threatened by anthropogenic stressors (e.g., climate change, eutrophication, and invasive species). We do not understand the magnitude of these stressors on hypolimnetic oxygen in lakes in the Midwest US or if lakes with different characteristics (e.g., geographic position, morphometry) respond to these stressors differently. Current work, in collaboration with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, is examining this pattern across larger gradients of climate (MN, WI, MI) and lake morphometries.