Professor Kennedy's Research Flashcards
What areas does she focus on?
Long term environmental history.
She has substantially looked at pollen history, charcoal history, and other proxy data sources
What is a proxy source?
A proxy data source is an indirect source of information.
What does her research aim to do?
Her research aims to reconstruct past (paleo-) environments, e.g., climate, vegetation, fire, hurricanes, human activity, from proxy data sources
What is a project she has worked on?
In 2009, she went with Dr. Campbell to use tree rings, vegetation analysis, and aerial photography to document spatial temporal patterns of tree invasion of grassy balds in the South Appalachians, specifically at Whitetop Mt, VA.
Where is a lot of her work done?
In the tropics
What can lake and wetland settlements do?
Lake and wetland sediments can provide long-term records of prehistoric drought, storm events, fire, forest clearance, and agriculture
What can vegetation do?
Reflect climate and people
Who to paleoenvironmental scientists often work with?
Archaeologists
What was her masters work?
She worked at La Selva Biological Station, Costa Rica: it is possible the most studied rain forest in the world, but little knowledge of its ecology
What did she find in Costa Rica?
She found corn pollen in a place that was labeled as pristine. This proves that people used this place as a garden
What did she do for her PhD?
She moved her research to the Cordillera Central of the Dominican Republic
What does she find in the Dominican Republic?
She discovers lots of evidence of fire in the region
What is an ecological threshold?
A small external change, like frequency of fire, could result in a rapid change in ecosystem..that may be permanent. (like no trees)
What is the appeal of studying in the highlands in the dominican republic?
Region has have very little study because it is remote - takes 2 days to get in.
What is Paleotempestology?
Reconstructs prehistoric hurricanes from geological proxies such as overwash deposits in coastal lagoon sediments
