People

Dr. Gang Shao

My research focuses on the application of emerging remote sensing and geospatial technologies to understand the complex forest ecosystems and their responses to climate change. My major research interests are: (1) Quantifying forest structure and carbon storage with lidar-based remote inventory algorithms; (2) Characterizing the effects of changing climate and land use on forest ecosystems and biodiversity integrating remote sensing and ecological models; and (3). Addressing challenges of forest ecology and management using geospatial big data analysis.

In Stark lab at Michigan State University, I am working on the project to analysis the regional Amazon and North American forest structure variation from airborne lidar. Besides addressing ecological questions, I am also working on the improvement of airborne lidar processing framework with multiprocessor and GPU computation. I earned my M.S. (2012) and Ph.D (2016) from Department of Forestry and Natural Resources at Purdue University, USA. I received my B.S. (2009) from Department of Biomedical Information and Engineering at Northeastern University, China. I enjoy playing soccer and basketball, following sports, and having great food.

Dr. Marielle Smith

I explore how environmental variations in temperature and precipitation affect tropical forest canopy structure, and how this, in turn, affects forest function. Characterising how climatic variations affect forest structure and function is particularly important in tropical forests, which are globally important carbon stores that have already shown vulnerability to climate change. The future of tropical forest carbon stocks is highly uncertain, with plant physiological responses representing the largest source of model uncertainties. As such, my research comprises empirical investigations into how tropical forests will respond to high temperatures and drought. My study sites include the tropical forest biome at Biosphere 2 (B2) and natural sites in the eastern Brazilian Amazon.

I am investigating how tropical forest canopy structure responds to seasonal dry periods and anomalous droughts on seasonal and interannual timescales, using data from ground-based LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging). Combining long-term LiDAR measurements with tree inventory data provides a way to identify the mechanisms (i.e., changes in leaf area and/or woody biomass) responsible for structural changes associated with drought-induced disturbances and subsequent periods of forest recovery.

To understand the response of tropical forests to high temperatures, I am comparing the temperature response of gross ecosystem productivity in an experimentally warmed forest—the B2 tropical forest biome—with natural tropical forests using eddy-covariance data.

I earned my Ph.D. from the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona in 2016, where I was co-advised by Drs. Scott Saleska and Travis Huxman. I earned a Bachelor of Science in Ecology and Environmental Management in 2005 from Cardiff University in Wales, and a Masters in Science Communication at Imperial College, London, in 2006. In a past life I produced radio programmes on science and environmental issues; now I enjoy participating in science communication and outreach alongside my research.

Ms. Dave Minor

Expert researcher and specialist in LiDAR and rapid biophysical characterization, forest regeneration, and many other areas. Bayesian wizard. Leaf and flowering phenology investigator. Bear tracker.