Lawrence : Envi Sci Dept, UVA

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Lawrence , Deborah		Research Interests

Associate Professor; Ph.D. Duke, 1998. Biogeochemistry and community ecology, tropical ecology, the biology of conservation and land-use change. 213 Clark Hall 924-0581 lawrence@virginia.edu		The central goal of my lab is to understand the ecosystem consequences of land-use change in the tropics, including interactions between land use change and climate change. My group studies how vegetation and soils respond to land-use change, focusing on feedbacks between vegetation dynamics and nutrient dynamics in (mostly) secondary tropical forests. In Mexico, Costa Rica, and Indonesia, we work at various spatial scales (within stands, across stands, across landscapes) to investigate relationships between the structure of the tree community and nutrient cycling. We explore the effects of disturbance type, disturbance intensity, and time since the last disturbance, spanning years to decades of forest change following shifting cultivation, pasture, and cash crops such as chile, rubber, coffee or fruits. Given the trajectory of continued disturbance in tropical forests, we recognize the importance of studying more than one cycle of disturbance and recovery. Using novel approaches and collaboration with social scientists to determine patch histories, we investigate forest dynamics over periods from decades to centuries. In Indonesia and Mexico, we have shown that forest response to anthropogenic disturbance is contingent on the number of prior disturbance cycles, with important consequences for how we model and manage future forest development. Homepage : http://www.faculty.virginia.edu/tropicalecology/

Selected Recent Publications
Wood T. E., D. Lawrence, D. A. Clark, and R. Chazdon. In press. Feedbacks of litter production on nutrient cycling in a tropical rain forest: A litter addition experiment. Ecology. DeLonge, M., P. D'Odorico, and D. Lawrence. 2008. Feedbacks between phosphorus deposition and canopy cover: the emergence of multiple stable states in dry tropical forests. Global Change Biology 14:154-160. Lawrence, D., P. D'Odorico, M. DeLonge, L. Diekmann, R. Das and J. Eaton. 2007. Ecological feedbacks following deforestation create the potential for a catastrophic ecosystem shift in tropical dry forest.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104 (52):20696-20701. Diekmann, L. O., D. Lawrence, and G. Okin. 2007. Changes in the spatial variation of soil properties following shifting cultivation in a Mexican dry tropical forest. Biogeochemistry 84:99-113. Vester, H., D. Lawrence, J. R. Eastman, B. L. Turner, S. Calme, R. Dickson, C. Pozo, F. Sangermano. 2007. Land change in the southern Yucatan and Calakmul Biosphere Reserve: Implications for habitat and biodiversity. Ecological Applications 17(4): 989-1003. Lawrence, D. 2005. Biomass accumulation after 10 to 200 years of shifting cultivation in Bornean rainforest. Ecology 86:26-33. Lawrence, D. 2005. Regional-scale variation in litter production and seasonality in the tropical dry forests of southern Mexico. Biotropica 37 (4): 561-570. Lawrence, D. V. Suma, and J. P. Mogea. 2005. Systematic change in species composition with repeated shifting cultivation: the role of soil nutrients. Ecological Applications 15: 1952-1967. Lawrence, D. 2004. Erosion of tree diversity over 200 years of long-fallow shifting cultivation in Indonesia. Ecological Applications 14: 1855-1869.

Environmental Sciences Department
291 McCormick Rd
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