NRESi Colloquium - From ice to soil, how receding glaciers impact carbon cycle in the North Pacific Coastal Temperate Rainforests - Dr. Diogo Spinola
In the North Pacific Coastal Temperate Rainforest, receding glaciers progressively expose fresh rocks and sediments to a perhumid climate, fostering rapid plant colonization. This leads to enhanced weathering and soil formation rates, resulting in substantial accumulation of organic carbon in mineral soils. In this presentation, I explore the co-evolution of soil formation and organic carbon accumulation in southeast Alaska. The results reveal the rapid formation of mineral-associated organic carbon, which persists in soils for millennia. This illustrates the feedback between glacier melting and soil formation in a region where carbon-rich soils support the world's largest temperate rainforest.
Dr. Diogo Spinola is a field-based soil scientist. He earned his PhD from the University of Tübingen, Germany, where he studied fossil soils and paleoenvironments in Antarctica. From 2019 to 2023, he worked as a postdoc at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and the Pacific Northwest Research Station, based in Juneau, Alaska. Diogo joined the Department of Ecosystem Science and Management at ÂÜÀòÉäÇø in January 2024. His research focuses on the interplay of soil geochemistry, mineralogy, and organic carbon dynamics from the microscopic to the landscape scale.
The Natural Resources & Environmental Studies Institute (NRESi) at ÂÜÀòÉäÇø hosts a weekly lecture series at the Prince George campus. Anyone from the university or wider community with interest in the topic area is welcome to attend. Presentations are also made available to remote participants through Zoom Webinar. Go to http://www.unbc.ca/nres-institute/colloquium-webcasts to view the presentation remotely.
Past NRESi colloquium presentations and special lectures can be viewed on our video archive, available here.