In the News

Department of Geography and Environmental Studies professor Andrew Reinmann and his colleagues at Boston University and the USDA recently published their findings from a long-term winter climate change experiment in the journal Global Change Biology. This research conducted at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest in New Hampshire demonstrates that projected declines in snowpack across north temperate forest ecosystems can reduce the growth of iconic sugar maple trees by 40%. Their work indicates that these declines in tree growth are the culmination of a cascade of ecosystem responses triggered by reductions in an insulating winter snowpack that results in an increased the depth and duration of soil frost during the winter, which damages tree roots and reduces their capacity to take up nutrients. This research has been covered by National Public Radio and most recently the New York Times.

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