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Post Climate and Ecosystem Sciences Division

New Research Demonstrates Method for Rapidly Characterizing Watershed Organization and Function Using Zone-based Approach

March 16, 2022

East River watershed, Colorado CA

More than half of earth’s freshwater comes from mountainous watersheds – areas of land that catch precipitation and drain to nearby streams, lakes, and rivers. These ecosystems provide services such as water filtration, nutrient cycling and carbon storage that can significantly impact the amount of clean, freshwater critical for energy production, agriculture, and municipal water…

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Post Climate and Ecosystem Sciences Division

Dead or alive? Modeling how microorganisms in soil shape the global carbon cycle

March 3, 2022

Microbe images imposed on Earth. Credit Berkeley Lab

Living soil microorganisms are extremely powerful and incredibly diverse biogeochemical engines driving the turnover of organic matter in the terrestrial biosphere. However, it is not only in life that microbes control the future of the global carbon cycle and Earth system productivity. In fact, dead microbial biomass, or necromass, is one of the largest stocks…

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Post Climate and Ecosystem Sciences Division

Eddy Fluxes Are Key to Quantifying How Much More Plants Photosynthesize with Increased Atmospheric CO2

March 1, 2022

  Through photosynthesis, the green leaves of vegetation use the sun’s energy to capture carbon dioxide (CO2), synthesize sugars, and thus sustain life on Earth. Globally, plants have been shown to photosynthesize more with increased atmospheric levels of this heat-trapping gas. But this CO2 fertilization effect (CFE) can be hard to determine without teasing out factors…

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Post Energy Geosciences Division

Carol Chien Makes Impact as Co-Founder of Asian Pacific Islander Employee Resource Group

February 24, 2022

As Programs Operational Analyst in the Energy Geosciences Division and co-founder of the Asian Pacific Islander Employee Resource Group (API ERG), Carol Chien’s efforts have been impactful in both EESA and Berkeley Lab’s employee community.  The API ERG is a group dedicated to help API employees reach their full potential by establishing a support system,…

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Post Energy Geosciences Division

Remote Autonomous Monitoring Developed at the GMF Makes the Difference in Carbon Storage Investigations

February 24, 2022

Back in November 2020 when field research worldwide had more or less grounded to a halt due to COVID related travel restrictions, one team of EESA geoscientists was able to carry through with a key field investigation–and a complicated one at that. Conducted in underground rock laboratories, their work involves activating a geological fault to…

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Post Announcements

Earth and Environmental Sciences Area Leadership Changes

February 15, 2022

Susan Hubbard

A few changes in leadership took effect on February 14 as described below. Susan Hubbard, the founding Associate Laboratory Director (ALD) for the Earth and Environmental Sciences Area (EESA), left Berkeley Lab to begin a new role as the Deputy Laboratory Director for Science and Technology at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) on March 1.…

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Post Climate and Ecosystem Sciences Division

5G Connectivity Gives Scientists Better Access to Data on Atmospheric Processes in Colorado Mountains

February 9, 2022

This article was originally published on the Berkeley Lab Computing Sciences website. By Elizabeth Ball   As winter falls in a remote corner of Colorado, in a mountainous watershed on the Upper Colorado River, hundreds of sensors continue their work, day in and day out: forming a detailed quantitative picture of the watershed by collecting…

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Post GC-Sustainable Earth

Critical Materials and Minerals Discussed in a Lab-wide Town Hall

January 27, 2022

Mike Whittaker, research scientist in the Energy Geoscience Division, is a co-founder of the Lithium Resource Research and Innovation Center-a group that researches how to satisfy the increasing lithium demand as renewable energy sources become essential to achieving net zero emissions.  On January 19, Whittaker led a virtual event, “Critical Materials and Minerals (CMM) Town…

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Post Announcements

Newsha Ajami Joins EESA as Chief Development Officer for Research

January 21, 2022

Newsha Ajami, a recognized scientific researcher and environmental policy expert, has joined Berkeley Lab’s Earth and Environmental Sciences Area (EESA) as the Chief Development Officer for Research. In this role, Ajami will work to advance new and strategic partnerships, projects, initiatives, and impact within EESA. Ajami joins EESA from Stanford University where she was the…

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