Faculty
David Valentine - Professor of Forest Soils, Department Chair: Forest Sciences
Research Interests - ecosystem ecology, biogeochemistry, and element cycling in northern ecosystems, role of soils in forests, grasslands, and wetlands in generating or consuming trace gasses, especially methance, that control Earth's climate, effects of wildfire on soil respiration and carbon blanace
Current Research Programs - bonanaza creek LTER: wildfire effects on soil respiration, influence of disturbance on soil carbon balance, long-term carbon balance assessment from resampling old research site
Research Interests - wood utilization from Alaska species, nontimber forest product research and development, climate change and dendroclimatology, boreal forest ecology and tree species sensitivity to climate, paleoclimates
Current Research Programs - alaska birch project, black spruce dendrochronology, non-timber forest products, marketing forest products
Glenn Juday - Professor of Forest Ecology
Research Interests - relationship of tree growth to long-term eclimate change, community ecology, and the natural and management controls of biodiversity
Current Research Programs - Long-term environmental monitoring, Climate change and forest growth and health, Tree-ring studies, Climate change assessment, Wilderness and natural area management, Forest development following fire, Biodiversity under forest management systems, Old-growth forest ecology, Natural controls of biodiversity, Forest development and ecosystem life history, Bonanza Creek Long Term Ecological Research Site
Scott Rupp - Professor of Forestry & Director, Scenarios Network for Alaska & Arctic Planning (SNAP)
Research Interests - ecosystem and landscape ecology emphasizing secondary succession, regeneration, and disturbance dynamics in subarctic and boreal forests
Current Research Programs - modeling boreal forest dynamics, fuel loading, developing custom fuel models, fire risk analysis, fire-dlimate interactions, long-term ecological research (LTER)
Juan Andres Soria - Associate Professor of Wood Chemistry and Applied Environmental Science and Technology
Research Interests - bio-oil production with supercritical fluids and pyrolysis techniques and thermochemical biomass conversion for specialty chemical extraction and bio-based products
David Verbyla - Professor of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) in Natural Resources
Research Interests - GIS technology for resource inventory and climate change studies, integrating remote sensing and GIS for regional analysis, support for spatial analysis using GIS
Current Research Programs - alaska land cover change, MODIS products evaluation, bonanaza creek long term ecological research (LTER)
John Yarie - Professor of Silviculture
Research Interests - Structure and function of boreal forests, successional processes following catastrophic disturbances, effects of changing environmental conditions on forest ecosystem processes and carbon capture, modeling of forest ecosystem dynamics at the ecosystem and landscape levels.
Current Research Programs - BNZ-LTER, continued monitoring of a 45-year forest growth study, ecosystem modeling with the CENTURY and DAYCENT models, setup and monitoring of long term log decomposition, investigation of the effects of spring and summer drought on forest growth, development of research to study the effects of climate change on boreal forest carbon dynamics, monitoring the carbon dynamics on the 50,000 acre "University Forest" area.
John Fox - (EMERITUS) Associate Professor of Land Resources
Research Interests - modeling hydrologic effects of land-use changes, the intertie between microclimate, mesoclimate and global climate change, the spatial dimension of the concepts of sustained-yield and sustainability
Current Research Programs - modeling the effects of timber harvest and landscape characterstics on stream flow, freezing and thawing of soils, planning and decision-making for forest management