James Reynolds - US grants

This conference will examine the ecophysiology of arctic plants and soil organisms and consider how this information can be used to understand ecosystem processes in general and the response of arctic ecosystems to impending climate change in particular. The conference will make a significant contribution to bridging the gap between physiological ecology and ecosystem ecology; ecophysiology can provide insight into the controls over ecosystem processes, and ecosystem ecology provides a context in which to evaluate the importance of various ecophysiological traits. The meeting will be held in Churchill, Manitoba, and will last 4 days. It will involve 20-25 presentations by physiological ecologists who have worked in the Arctic. Also included in the meeting will be ecosystem ecologists who have not worked in the Arctic. Their role will be to provide a global context and to ensure that the presentations and discussion remain focused on the link between physiological ecology and ecosystem ecology. Additional discussion will address the types of research at the interface between ecophysiological and ecosystem ecology that will facilitate predictions of ecosystem response to impending climate change. The products of the meeting will be an edited volume, a symposium at the Toronto meeting of the Ecological Society of America, and a summary of research needed to provide ecophysiological insight into the response of arctic ecosystems to impending climate change.

ABSTRACT Duke University requests $700,000 to enhance capabilities of the National Phytotron by the addition of 18 new controlled environment (CE) chambers. The Phytotron, an NSF-funded national research facility established in 1968, consists of 40 artificially lighted CE growth chambers and 6 glasshouses that provide more that 477 m2 of controlled environmental space for advanced research in environmental plant biology. These CE units are used to reproduce different types of environments -- ranging from the arctic to the desert to the tropics. This allows researchers to have precise control over environmental conditions, e.g., air temperature, irradiance, carbon dioxide, relative humidity, and nutrient concentration, thereby providing an opportunity to gain increased understanding of the complex interactions between plants and their environment, which is virtually impossible to do under natural, uncontrolled field conditions. The Phytotron hosts, on yearly average, 17 students, 4 postdoctoral scientists, and 20 senior scientists, 73% of whom are off - campus users. The Phytotron's current CE growth chambers have operated continuously for 25 years. While some have been upgraded, their limited analog controls are not adequate for precise and flexible control of multiple environments variables, e.g., temperature, light, and humidity. In addition, these older chambers lack sophisticated computer-based monitoring capabilities, thus limiting researchers' abilities to monitor experiments and to reproduce short-term, variable environmental conditions, which are critical to understanding processes like carbon allocation, photosynthesis, and acclimation. Over the past decade, the environmental factors that researchers have most frequently manipulated in the Phytotron are the effects of carbon dioxide and temperature -- other factors include drought stress, nutrient availability, photoperiod, UV-B radiation, and salinity. With Excelle nt lighting, digital controls, and real time monitoring, the 18 new controlled environment chambers will provide the flexible, quality-controlled environment needed by a range of projects, including molecular, whole-plant (including such as areas as leaf physiology and growth dynamics), biotic interactions (e.g., plant-plant and plant-animal interactions and pathogens), population genetics, and ecosystem microcosms. Acquisition of these 18 state-of-the-art chambers will have an immediate and substantial impact on U.S. ecological research, particularly studies on the effects of global change on plants and ecosystems, efforts to scale processes across biological levels of organization, and basic molecular and physiological studies of carbon fixation, allocation, and respiration. This instrumentation will build upon and enhance NSF's investment in ecological research and allow the National Phytotron to address national needs in the biological sciences, including graduate and postgraduate education, and to remain one of the most important centers for controlled environment research in ecology in the United States.

This project investigates: (1) recent changes in the nature and strength of the links between academic research and industrial innovation in various industries, (2) differences among small, medium-sized and large firms in the extent to which their innovations are based on recent academic research and in the ways in which they tap into, use, and interact with academic research, (3) differences between U.S. and foreign firms in the extent to which their innovations in recent years have been based on academic research, (4) factors associated with the successful transfer to industry of the knowledge and know how resulting from research carried out by universities, and (5) factors leading academic researchers to do work regarded by firms as being significant contributions to their product and process innovations. The purpose is to shed new light on each of these important topics. Building on our previous work in this area, data from firms in the information processing, electronics, chemical, instruments, pharmaceutical, metals, and petroleum industries is collected and analyzed as well as data/information from a sample of academic researchers who have been cited by firms in these industries as having made particularly significant contributions to their product and process innovations. Based on detailed data of this sort, statistical analyses will be carried out, the results of which should be of u se to decision makers attempting to increase the economic payoff from the nation's academic research.

Duke University requests funds to enhance the National Phytotron. To obtain fundamental understanding and to develop predictive models of the processes that mediate plant activities and exchanges requires access to sophisticated controlled environment conditions. The Phytotron, an NSF-supported national research facility established in 1968, consists of 40 artificially lighted CE growth chambers and 6 glasshouses that provide more than 477 M2 of controlled environmental space for advanced research in environmental plant biology. The Phytotron hosts students, postdoctoral scientists, and senior scientists, most of whom are off - campus users. The CE units are used to reproduce different types of environments -- ranging from the arctic to the desert to the tropics. This allows researchers to have precise control over environmental conditions, e.g., air temperature, irradiance, carbon dioxide, relative humidity, and nutrient concentration, thereby allowing for research on the complex interactions between plants and their environment, which is virtually impossible to do under natur al uncontrolled field conditions. This proposal would provide for new monitoring equipment for the CE units, new growth chambers to meet newer demands for environmental controls, upgraded glasshouse materials and control units, and salaries for technical and oversight needs. The continued support of the National Phytotron enhances NSF s investment in ecological research, including graduate and postgraduate education, and will allow the National Phytotron to remain one of the most important centers for controlled environment research in ecology in the United States.

9524058 Reynolds Predicting the Response of Terrestrial Ecosystems to Elevated CO2 and Climate Change: A Modeling and Experimental Collaboration As a result of increasing atmospheric concentrations of CO2, the global climate of the Earth is predicted to change in the future more rapidly than it has over any comparable period of human history. This change is expected to have significant impacts on both natural and agricultural ecosystems. Society's ability to prepare for such changes depends in part on our success in developing predictive simulation models of ecosystem responses that have sufficient confidence and lead time. This study will test the strengths and weaknesses of a suite of existing ecosystem models by comparing their predictions to two on-going terrestrial field projects. One of these projects is a study of the effect of rising CO2 on carbon accumulation and nutrient cycling in a scrub-oak ecosystem in Florida and the other is a study of regional and seasonal variation in CO2 fluxes in northern Russia. Both of these field projects will, in turn, benefit from the development and application of these models to test hypotheses concerning the effect of elevated CO2 and climate on carbon budgets of terrestrial ecosystems. This research is an important "next step" in our efforts to build and apply models to develop a better understanding of the effects of elevated CO2 and climate change on terrestrial ecosystems. ??

An episode of fetal hypoxia, even early on in pregnancy, can produce severe neurologic and behavioral deficits in postnatal life and may be involved in the etiology of conditions such as cerebral palsy. These deficits may result from alterations in the amount or function of neurotropic factor(s) in developing brain. L-glutamate (Glu), an excitatory amino acid, plays a key role in brain development. Some evidence suggests that alterations in the amount of Glu can produce aberrant growth promotion and possibly neuronal death. While in vitro studies support this proposal, until recently it has not been possible to determine if hypoxia alters Glu release in the intact fetal brain. To that end, we developed the novel technique of in utero fetal microdialysis, in which microdialysis probes are implanted into the fetal sheep cerebral cortex. Using the surgically-recovered instrumented pregnant sheep, the release of Glu can be measured under basal and pathologic conditions in the absence of anesthetic agents. A further clinical concern is that pharmacologic treatments employed in high-risk pregnancy may affect fetal well-being during pathophysiologic insult. One such drug is magnesium sulfate (MgSO4), which is commonly used in premature and preeclamptic parturients. Such patients often have an ongoing increased risk of experiencing an episode of fetal hypoxia. Previous experimental studies have suggested that MgSO4 may impact negatively on the fetus during fetal/maternal stress. However, magnesium ion can interact at Glu receptors and may actually protect the fetal brain from a hypoxia-induced increase in Glu release. The overall aim of this proposal is to investigate the actions of MgSO4 on the preterm fetus during an episode of acute hypoxia, using in utero microdialysis. We will test two hypotheses: 1) MgSO4 worsens survival of the preterm fetus following acute hypoxia; and 2) MgSO4 changes cerebral cortical Glu release in preterm fetus following acute hypoxia. With qualitative histologic studies, we will also attempt to determine if magnesium sulfate alters the pattern of fetal hypoxic neurologic injury. MgSO4 is commonly used in high-risk pregnancies even though its action in the fetus during stress have not been well characterized. The present study is designed to mimic the clinical obstetrical use of MgSO4: e.g. a preterm parturient receiving MgSO4 who experiences sudden fetal compromise secondary to umbilical cord occlusion. Completion of this study will yield important new information about the effects of hypoxia and MgSO4 on the preterm fetus. These results will be useful in assessing if MgSO4 has potential as a pharmacologic intervention during fetal hypoxia, or, conversely, whether the use of MgSO4 in parturients at risk for an episode of fetal hypoxia should be re-evaluated.

This project is motivated by the need in the mathematics program for a single focus that can direct mathematics majors' learning throughout their undergraduate education and ultimately prepare them to be independent and life-long learners. As a capstone experience, the previous senior seminar has been intended to display this independence by having students pull together 3 years of instruction into a single presentation. Unfortunately students have not been prepared to meet this challenge. This project has therefore chosen as its organizing principle the need to improve undergraduate research capabilities at every stage of the program. This project improves students' research experiences by improving mastery of mathematical content, creating opportunities to complete extended assignments and self-directed inquiry, and providing modern technological capabilities that facilitate creative investigations. This project identifies courses for which extended assignments and projects are used, creates assignments and projects that are stimulating and relevant to course objectives, increases the expectations for student accomplishment as they advance through the program, and tracks students' progress according to projects completed and mastery levels reached at each stage. The benefits of this project are described in terms of student gains: (a) students learn that mathematics is a dynamic subject that is constantly changing and expanding; (b) students understand how mathematics is created and how mathematical research is conducted; and (c) by attending conferences and giving presentations of their work, students become connected to the greater mathematics community and gain greater appreciation for the beauty and elegance of mathematics. *

PI: J.F. Reynolds and L. F. Pitelka Institution: Duke University Proposal Number: DEB - 9812440 There exist two generally broad categories of forest-growth models: gap models which deal with long-term population dynamics of vegetation structure and stand models, which deal with short- to medium-term physiological processes such as gas fluxes and plant growth. A fundamental question regarding these models is how much physiology from stand models needs to be incorporated into gap models to effectively simulate long-term vegetation responses to global change. A workshop would be help to evaluate this question. It would assemble a range of investigators with experience on both types of models and employ strategies that combine model comparisons and model assessments. The workshop will ensure that forest growth models are developed that are effective in evaluating projected changes in global climate and in elevated carbon dioxide concentrations. This will improve the utility of forest-growth models in developing important management decisions.

The Duke University Phytotron - a national facility for controlled environment research on plants - was established in 1968 with funds from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and Duke University. The Phytotron houses 48 artificially lighted controlled-environment (CE) growth chambers, six research glasshouses, offices, and laboratories for advanced research in environmental plant biology. These growth facilities permit precise control over environmental conditions, e.g., air temperature, light intensity and day length, nutrients, carbon dioxide, etc., which enables researchers to gain increased understanding of the complex interactions between plants and their environment. The mission of the Phytotron is to provide high-quality CE research space, expertise in performing CE research, and routine care of experimental plants to researchers from all over the United States.

The Phytotron is also an important education resource to the scientific community. One-third of all of projects are performed by graduate students as part of their thesis research. Postdoctoral researchers account for 29% of all projects. The Phytotron conducts educational tours to groups from grade school to college age from both on campus and across the region. On average, 500 visiting scientists, students, and teachers tour the facility annually. Continued support for the Phytotron enhances NSF's investment in ecological research and will allow the Phytotron to continue and expand its role as a national facility for controlled-environment research and education.

0107875
Reynolds
This award supports James Reynolds of Duke University and junior and senior researchers from various U.S. universities to participate in a workshop on assessment of the ecological, meteorological, and human dimensions of global desertification. Desertification is the result of a complex mixture of causes, including over-cultivation, overgrazing, fuel gathering, and climate variability. In areas affected, many perceive that the capacity of the land to support human populations, livestock, and wild herbivores has thereby been substantially reduced. Although much international effort has addressed this problem, many uncertainties and misconceptions still exist. A major challenge is to come up with a synthetic assessment framework for identifying what matters where and when in order to extrapolate results from studies in one area to other regions. To meet that challenge, the present workshop will focus directly on the synthetic framework and on forging working collaborations with international researchers from different disciplines. Especially important is that scientists recognize the need for new interdisciplinary approaches for addressing the pressing global problem of desertification and seek to explore a new paradigm for a synthetic framework that goes beyond regional concerns.

The goal of this exploratory/developmental grant is to use novel technology to determine and differentiate the effects of maternal general anesthesia to those of regional anesthesia on fetal cerebral oxygenation. Maintaining an adequate supply of oxygen and nutrients to the fetal brain is of primary importance during manipulations of the gravid female. Prevailing medical practice encourages the use of general anesthesia for such procedures as non-obstetric related surgery and emergent cesarean section. However, relatively little is known about the effects of inhalational agents (e.g. isoflurane) upon fetal cerebral oxygen status. By extension, one could propose that regional techniques (e.g. epidermal anesthesia) might have reduced fetal effects because of the localization of anesthetic to the maternal CNS. However, this benefit could be counter-acted by the maternal hypotension and with respect to fetal effects, is the impracticability of measuring oxygen levels. To that end, we are developing a means (near infrared spectroscopy; NIRS) of continually measuring in utero fetal cerebral oxygenation in pregnant sheep. An NIRS device was designed specifically for in utero animal experimentation. Currently, we have validated our NIRS methodology by measuring changes in fetal sheep cerebral oxygenation in response to systemic decreases in oxygen levels produced by umbilical cord occlusion. With the present proposal, we plan to further optimize our technology by applying it to answer a clinically-relevant question: Does maternal anesthesia alter fetal cerebral oxygenation? Completion of this study will yield new information regarding the effects of maternal anesthesia on fetal cerebral oxygenation and well-being. In addition, this research will produce clinically relevant data that will be of significant interest to anesthesiologists, obstetricians, and general surgeons who are presented parturients with fetal or abdominal distress. It is expected that the results of these studies will be used to further develop and refine standards of care for anesthetic use during pregnancy. These results will also validate our NIRS methodology, and will allow us to refine-optimize the technology and to develop the appropriate analysis tools to quantitatively evaluate the resultant NIRS data. Finally, the results will serve as the basis for a long-term outcome study designed to identify the optimal anesthetic parameters to be used during an episode of fetal distress, maternal surgery, and eventually fetal surgery.

The Nevada Desert FACE Facility (NDFF) is a long-term research project examining the responses of an intact Mojave Desert ecosystem to elevated CO2. In the first four years of NDFF operation, we found that primary production increased substantially at elevated CO2, but only in wet years, and that an exotic annual grass responded more strongly than did native shrubs and annuals. Therefore, our initial results suggest that an ecosystem type (drylands) that represents 30% of the earth's terrestrial surface area may not respond to elevated CO2 in a simple manner, as predicted by existing models of global change.

In the context of these results and the long-term nature of our desert FACE experiment, we propose to address three overarching questions in this study:

1. Will elevated CO2 alter community composition and structure in the Mojave Desert by continuing to stimulate a disproportionate increase in an exotic annual species?
2. Will the increases in production and changes in nutrient dynamics that we have observed in response to a step-change increase in CO2 be sustained over time?
3. Can we adapt proven models of desert ecosystem function to predict how this Mojave Desert ecosystem will respond to elevated CO2 in the future?

The intellectual merit of this proposal lies in our conceptual approach in which we are focusing on the functional interactions between species composition and ecosystem function, tied together by an explicit modeling component. The model will be an adaptation of an established, validated desert model (PALS, the Patch Arid Lands Simulator) that will be used to develop a synthetic understanding of biotic and abiotic controls on carbon, nitrogen, and water fluxes to elevated CO2 in this arid ecosystem. The broader impact of this proposed study will be an examination of the potential invasion of an exotic species in response to elevated CO2, and how this process may impact ecosystem function, and therefore ecosystem services, in a desert environment. Through this research program, we are also forging a cohesive network between five research campuses. To date, our research group has an excellent record of training undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral scholars at the NDFF, including members of underrepresented groups. This study will similarly train a wide spectrum of students and postdocs, both at the NDFF and in our support laboratories.

There is a great deal of disagreement about the causes and extent of desertification and about what part of
its impact on human well-being is manageable, and how. A new synthetic paradigm for
desertification must be developed, one that is based on the simultaneous roles of the meteorological and
ecological dimensions of desertification (the biophysical factors) and the human dimensions of
desertification (the socio-economic factors). This proposal will establish ARIDnet to provide the
intellectual leadership for developing and testing this new paradigm. Planned activities: ARIDnet will (i)
conduct workshops to debate the Dahlem Desertification Paradigm (DDP)a product of the 2001
Dahlem Conference on desertificationfor critical evaluation and refinement; (ii) formulate working
groups to develop comparative case studies to test the DDP; (iii) conduct a quantitative synthesis of what
matters in desertification, when and where it matters, and why; (iv) recruit new researchers and
stakeholders into ARIDnet so a broad-based and useful approach to desertification problems can be
developed; and (v) maintain a website to support networking activity. Anticipated impact: Arguments
surrounding the topic of desertification create confusion in policy and management programs intended to
help many of the worlds poorest people. Hence, there is an urgent need for new, interdisciplinary
approaches for addressing this global problem. ARIDnet will provide the leadership to support on-going
international discussions and strengthen recruitment of researchers, including undergraduate students, to
study the principles, criteria, and policies related to global desertification, especially as outlined under the
UN Convention to Combat Desertification.

The principal goal of this project is to evaluate the ability of ethyl nitrate to attenuate the reduced tissue perfusion and respiratory acidosis produced during carbon dioxide pneumoperitoneum. The studies will use a novel method of drug delivery: inclusion of ethyl nitrate in the insufflating gas. Laparoseopy has rapidly become the method of choice for surgical intervention to correct abdominal pathologies. However, pneumoperiteneum, the act of insufflating the peritoneal cavity with gas, is not without physiologic consequence: pulmonary function is impaired and organ blood flows altered. In addition, due to its plasma solubility, insufflation with CO2 will increase pCOz and decrease blood pH, actions that can produce respiratory acidosis, tachycardia, and arrhythmia. The overall effects can become profound in the presence of underlying vascular disease, in[ the elderly, if the patient is pregnant, and/or when the duration of surgery is extended. In all situations, tissue ischemia and fetal ischemia (where applicable) can produce significant morbidity. To control this, it is a logical supposition that administration of a vasoactive agent to increase tissue blood flow and gas exchange would be beneficial. For the purposes of this study, we propose to introduce a nitric oxide donator (ethyl nitrate; E-NO) into the insufflating gas. As the released nitric oxide can act locally (i.e. within the peritoneum) as well as entering the systemic circulation and, in the case of the gravid patient, the fetal circulation (either by diffusion or maternal-fetal exchange), this would appear to be an ideal methodology to abate the CO2 pnenmoperiteneum-mediated changes in physiologic status. Such abatement is expected to be of long-term benefit to all laparoscopic patients including the parturient and her fetus. To evaluate this novel therapy, we will test two research hypotheses: 1. In the non-gravida, inclusion of E-NO in the insufflating gas attenuates the tissue perfusion changes produced by CO2 pneumoperitoneum; and 2. In the parturient, inclusion of E-NO during maternal pneumoperitoneum stabilizes fetal physiologic status. Studies will utilize adult swine and pregnant sheep. Completion of this investigation will produce clinically-relevant information that will be of significant interest to surgeons With patients in need of laparoscopic surgery and to obstetricians who are presented with parturients in abdominal distress. It is expected that the results of these studies will be used to further develop and refine standards of care for human laparoscopy and will lead to a novel therapy for controlling the blood flow changes produced during pneumoperitoneum.

The goal of this R21 Exploratory/Development grant is to quantify the fetal cerebral and systemic effects of maternal ecstasy (methylenedioxymethamphetamine; MDMA) consumption. The popularity of the entactogenic methamphetamine derivative MDMA continues to increase even as the use of other illicit drugs decreases (or at least remain constant). This MDMA trend is particularly noticeable in adolescent and young adult populations. Of specific relevance to this application is the elevated incidence of reported consumption by women of child-bearing age and by those who are actually pregnant. Results from various human and animal studies indicate that exposure to MDMA during pregnancy can harm the fetus and while several processes have been implicated in producing these behavioral anomalies the actual responses of the fetus to maternal MDMA exposure are not known. The purpose of this proposal is to utilize in utero technologies (e.g. near-infrared spectroscopy and fetal microdialysis) in combination with more standard monitoring techniques to determine the acute fetal responses to maternal MDMA exposure. Experimental Goals: 1. To determine the effects of maternal MDMA exposure on fetal cerebral oxygenation, fetal dopaminergic and serotonergic neurotransmission, and fetal (and maternal) cardiovascular function, body temperature, arterial blood gas status, and neuroendocrine factors; 2. To relate the physiologic changes to changes in fetal CNS and fetal/maternal blood levels of MDMA; 3, To assess preterm and nearterm brain histopathology following maternal MDMA exposure and to correlate the severity (and type) of fetal neuronal injury with the observed physiologic changes. Experiments will compare the effects of MDMA exposure to saline-infused animals. Mimicking a regimen that is consistent with some reported human dosage patterns, 2 mg/kg treatments of MDMA will be thrice administered to each ewe at 3 h intervals for a total dose of 6 mg/kg. The fetal and maternal responses will monitored up to 12 h after the last dose. Achievement of the experimental goals will yield a significant amount of new information regarding the effects of MDMA upon the fetus. Such information will be of interest to MDMA researchers, clinicians, and substance-abuse workers as we anticipate that this research will help elucidate the health risks of MDMA consumption during pregnancy.