• Waring Ecology Lab

    Plant, microbial, and ecosystem ecology

  • Lab News

    May 30 2017

    How do historical climate conditions shape soil microbes' contemporary responses to environmental variation? The Hawkes lab used multiple experimental approaches to address this question, and our results have just been published in PNAS.

    January 12 2017

    The Waring lab has grown! Post-doc researcher Kenny Smith has joined the lab to work on a project involving microbial controls on soil organic matter formation. We also have two new undergraduate researchers, Julienne Henrie and Preston Christensen. Welcome everyone!

    November 21 2016

    Our new review of belowground biomass allocation in tropical forests has been published in Forest Ecology and Management.

    October 24 2016

    Our new paper on the microbial mechanisms underlying the Birch effect is out at Environmental Research Letters! Check it out here.

    August 9 2016

    I spoke at the 2016 Ecological Society of America conference about my research on arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi along gradients of nutrient availability. A paper related to this work was recently published here.

    August 1 2016

    I have started my position at Utah State! I am recruiting graduate students, undergraduate students, and post-docs. Contact me at bonnie.waring@usu.edu for more information.

  • Research

    In order to mitigate the effects of global climate change on the environment, we need a predictive understanding of the ecological interactions that drive biogeochemical processes. To that end, we study how plant and soil microbial communities mediate carbon cycling in a diverse array of terrestrial ecosystems .

    The role of soil microbes in the stabilization and cycling of soil carbon

    Soil is one of the most chemically complex substances on earth, and represents the largest terrestrial carbon pool. One of our major objectives is to understand how microbial physiology and community structure influence the formation and turnover of soil C along broad environmental gradients.

    Tropical forest responses to climate change

    Tropical forests exchange more carbon with the atmosphere than any other biome, and are experiencing rapid changes in climate and land use. We use a combination of observational and manipulative experiments to understand how the composition and function of these forests will change under future climates.

    Plant-mycorrhizal interactions

    Mycorrhizal fungi are ubiquitous root symbionts that play a major role in plant nutrient acquisition and influence the cycling of soil carbon. Our goal is to understand how soil nutrient stoichiometry influences the ecological relationship between plant and fungus in both arbuscular and ectomycorrhizal systems.

  • People

    Bonnie Waring

    Assistant Professor, Department of Biology, Utah State University

    Google Scholar

    bonnie.waring@usu.edu

    Kenny Smith

    Postdoctoral Research Associate

    http://kennethsmithecology.weebly.com

    kenneth.smith@usu.edu

  • Publications

     

    2017

    • Hawkes CV, Waring BG, Rocca JD, Kivlin SN. 2017. Historical climate controls soil respiration responses to current soil moisture. PNAS DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1620811114
    • Smith CM, Gei MG, Bergstrom E, Becklund KK, Becknell JM, Waring BG, Werden LK, Powers JS. 2017. Effects of soil type and light in height growth, biomass partitioning, and nitrogen dynamics on 22 species of tropical dry forest tree seedlings: comparisons between legumes and non-legumes. American Journal of Botany 104(3): 399-410.
    • Allen KA, Dupuy JM, Gei MG, Hülshoff C, Medvigy D, Piano C, Salgado-Negret B, Smith CM, Trierweiler A, Van Bloem SJ, Waring BG, Xu X, Powers JS. 2017. Will seasonally dry tropical forests be sensitive or resistant to future changes in rainfall regimes? Environmental Research Letters 12(2): 023001
    • Waring BG, Powers JS. 2017. Overlooking what is underground: root:shoot ratios and coarse root allometric equations for tropical forests. Forest Ecology and Management 385: 10-15

    2016

    • Waring BG, Powers JS. 2016. Unravelling the mechanisms underlying pulse dynamics of soil respiration in tropical dry forests. Environmental Research Letters 11(10): 105005

    • Waring BG, †Rosenthal LR, Gei MG, Powers JS. 2016. Plant-mycorrhizal interactions along a gradient of soil fertility in tropical dry forest. Journal of Tropical Ecology 32: 314-323
    • †Schilling E, Waring BG, Powers JS. 2016. Forest composition modifies effects of litter chemistry on decomposition in regenerating tropical dry forests. Oecologia 182: 287-297
    • Sinsabaugh RL, Turner BL, Talbot JM, Waring BG, Powers JS, Kuske CR, Moorhead DL, Follstad Shah J. Stoichiometry of microbial carbon use efficiency in soils. 2016. Ecological Monographs 86: 172-189
    • Averill C, Waring BG, and Hawkes CV. 2016. Historical precipitation predictably alters the shape and magnitude of microbial functional response to soil moisture. Global Change Biology doi: 10.1111/gcb.13219
    • Livingston G, Waring BG, Pacheco LF, Gilbert L, Buchori D, Jiang Y, Jha S. 2016. Perspectives on the global disparity in ecological science. BioScience doi: 10.1093/biosci/biv175

    2015

    • Waring BG, Adams R, Branco S, and Powers JS. 2015. Scale-dependent variation in nitrogen cycling and soil fungal communities along gradients of forest composition and age in regenerating tropical dry forests. New Phytologist DOI: 10.1111/nph.13654
    • Waring BG, Alvarez-Cansino L, Barry K, Becklund K, Dale S, Gei M, Keller A, Lopez O, Markesteijn L, Mangan S, Riggs C, Segnitz M, Schnitzer S, and Powers JS. 2015. Pervasive and strong effects of plants on soil chemistry: a meta-analysis of individual plant ‘Zinke’ effects. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B 282: 1-8
    • Powers JS, Becklund KK, Gei MG, Iyengar SB, Meyer R, O'Connell CS, Schilling EM, Smith CM, Waring BG, and Werden LK. 2015. Nutrient addition effects on tropical dry forests: a mini-review from microbial to ecosystem scales. Frontiers in Earth Science DOI 10.3389/feart.2015.00034
    • Waring BG, Becknell JB, and Powers JS. 2015. Nitrogen, phosphorus, and cation use efficiency in stands of regenerating tropical dry forest. Oecologia 178(3): 887-897
    • Waring BG & Hawkes CV. 2015. Short-term precipitation exclusion alters microbial responses to soil moisture in a wet tropical forest. Microbial Ecology 69(4): 843-854

    2014

    • Waring BG, Weintraub SR, and Sinsabaugh RL. 2014. Ecoenzymatic stoichiometry of microbial nutrient acquisition in tropical soils. Biogeochemistry 117(1): 101-113

    2013

    • Waring BG, Averill C, and Hawkes CV. 2013. Differences in fungal and bacterial physiology alter soil C and N cycling: insights from meta-analysis and theoretical models. Ecology Letters 16(7): 887-894.
    • Waring BG. 2013. Exploring relationships between enzyme activities and leaf litter decomposition in a wet tropical forest. Soil Biology and Biochemistry 64: 89-95.
    • Kivlin SN, Waring BG, Averill C, and Hawkes CV. 2013. Tradeoffs in microbial carbon allocation may mediate soil carbon storage in future climates. Frontiers in Terrestrial Microbiology 4 Article 261
    • Lucas RW, Salguero-Gomez R, Cobb DB, Waring BG, Anderson F, McShea WJ, and Casper BB. 2013. White-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) positively affect the growth of mature northern red oak (Quercus rubra) trees. Ecosphere 4(7) Article 84

    2012

    • Waring BG. 2012. A meta-analysis of climatic and chemical controls on leaf litter decay rates in tropical forests. Ecosystems 15(6): 999-1009.

    †Student mentee co-author

  • Field and lab photos