After 10 years at the helm of the Jornada Basin LTER, William Schlesinger (Duke University, Department of Botany) will step down, and the next LTER proposal will be prepared under the leadership of Laura Huenneke (New Mexico State, Biology). Laura has a long association with the Jornada Basin LTER site, joining the investigative team in 1988.
While the Jornada Basin investigators are still refining the theme for the renewal proposal, it is clear that a major effort will be directed toward understanding linkages, transfers, and connections within the Jornada Basin.
"This is a logical next step, following a decade of study of plant and patch processes and soil heterogeneity," Schlesinger says. "We need to understand the fate of the materials that are lost from the barren soils in the shrublands." Thus, one goal of the next proposal will be to understand how the Jornada Basin has acted as a source or a sink of atmospheric dust during the vegetation changes of the past century. At New Mexico State, Laura will be joined by Curtis Monger (Agronomy), Deb Peters (USDA) and Kris Havstad (USDA), and a consortium of outside coinvestigators, including Schlesinger.