By:
Chuck Woods (352) 392-1773 x 281Source:
Timothy White tlwhite@ufl.edu, (352) 846-0850
GAINESVILLE, Fla.—William Schlesinger, the James B. Duke professor of biochemistry and dean of the Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences at Duke University in Durham, N.C., will speak April 12 at the University of Florida’s John Gray Distinguished Lecture Series. The topic of his presentation will be “Response of Forests to Changes in Climate and Atmospheric Composition.”
Schlesinger’s lecture, which is free and open to the public, will be at 10 a.m. at the Paramount Hotel in Gainesville.
His lecture keynotes the 36th annual spring symposium for the Florida Division of the Society of American Foresters. Hosted by UF’s School of Forest Resources and Conservation, the symposium begins immediately after Schlesinger’s lecture and concludes April 13. The theme of the symposium is “Natural Disasters: A Recipe for Adaptive Management.” Register for the symposium online or at the hotel (2900 Southwest 13th Street).
Since 1980, Schlesinger has been a faculty member at Duke University where he conducts research on global change ecology. He is the principal investigator for the Free Air Carbon Dioxide Enrichment (FACE) experiment in the Duke forest – a project that will determine how an entire forest ecosystem will respond to elevated levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
From 1991 to 2000, Schlesinger served as principal investigator for the Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) project at the Jornada Basin in Southern New Mexico, which was sponsored by the National Science Foundation.
Schlesinger’s research has been featured on CNN, National Public Radio and the NOVA television series as well as in The New York Times and magazines such as Discover, National Geographic and Scientific American. He also has testified before U.S. House and Senate committees on a variety of environmental issues, including preservation of desert habitats and global climate change.
He is the author or co-author of more than 160 scientific papers and the widely used textbook Biogeochemistry: An Analysis of Global Change. He was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1995, and the National Academy of Sciences in 2003. Schlesinger served as president of the Ecological Society of America from 2003 to 2004.
Prior to joining the Duke faculty, he completed his bachelor’s degree at Dartmouth University in 1972 and his doctoral degree at Cornell University in 1976.
The John Gray Lecture Series was established in 1994 to recognize Gray, who served as director of the UF forestry school from 1963 to 1977. He developed outstanding research and teaching programs that have become models for other universities.
Timothy White, director of the UF school, said Gray’s leadership included development of programs in forest biology, wildlife and range sciences, fisheries, outdoor recreation resource management and cooperative programs with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Florida Forestry Association, the Florida Division of Forestry and the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Fish and Wildlife Service. The school is part of UF’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences.
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