Research

Our research addresses the interfaces between biogeochemistry, hydrology, and society at local to regional scales. Current research addresses three themes:​

Theme 1: Biogeochemistry of urban social-ecological systems

How does urban design affect material fluxes and transformation in urban watersheds?

• Stormwater infrastructure design (Hale et al. 2014, 2015, Macek, Hale, and Baxter 2020)
• Density and diversity of urban vegetation (Hill et al. Accepted!; Hill et al. in Prep)
• Urban stream metabolism (Gauthier MS research)
• NSF Award: Collaborative Research: Scales and drivers of variability in dissolved organic carbon across diverse urban watersheds

What are the social processes underlying changes in urban design over space and time?

• Stormwater management paradigm shifts over time (Hale et al 2014, Hale 2016)
• Variation in stormwater management challenges and objectives across climates (Macek, Hale, and Burnham in prep)

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Theme 2: Biogeochemical consequences of streamflow intermittency

How does spatiotemporal variation in  streamflow intermittence affect ecosystem processes? 

• Sources, transformation, and transport of carbon​ (Hale and Godsey 2019)
• NSF Award: Network-scale streamflow intermittence controls on dissolved organic carbon concentrations and processes
• NSF EPSCoR Track II Aquatic Intermittency effects on Microbiomes in Streams (AIMS) project
  

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Theme 3: Social-ecological consequences of large-landscape conservation

How do agricultural stream restoration practices affect ecosystem function?

• Stream metabolism (Honious et al. 2021)
  
• Denitrification and sedimentation (Millard and Hale in prep)

How do different stakeholders perceive conservation objectives and outcomes?

• Defining restoration success in rangeland streams (Millard, Hale, and Burnham In Revision)