From ceginfo@u.washington.edu Fri Aug 1 15:35:16 2003 Received: from mxu7.u.washington.edu (mxu7.u.washington.edu [140.142.32.165]) by lists.u.washington.edu (8.12.9+UW03.06/8.12.9+UW03.06) with ESMTP id h71MZG2x048362 for ; Fri, 1 Aug 2003 15:35:16 -0700 Received: from mxout2.cac.washington.edu (mxout2.cac.washington.edu [140.142.33.4]) by mxu7.u.washington.edu (8.12.9+UW03.06/8.12.9+UW03.06) with ESMTP id h71MZEZG029208 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=EDH-RSA-DES-CBC3-SHA bits=168 verify=NO) for ; Fri, 1 Aug 2003 15:35:14 -0700 Received: from homer37.u.washington.edu (homer37.u.washington.edu [140.142.16.3]) by mxout2.cac.washington.edu (8.12.9+UW03.06/8.12.9+UW03.06) with ESMTP id h71MZDxu024592; Fri, 1 Aug 2003 15:35:13 -0700 Received: from localhost (ceginfo@localhost) by homer37.u.washington.edu (8.12.9+UW03.06/8.12.9+UW03.06) with ESMTP id h71MZDJS039060; Fri, 1 Aug 2003 15:35:13 -0700 Date: Fri, 1 Aug 2003 15:35:13 -0700 (PDT) From: Civil and Environmental Engineering To: faculty@ce.washington.edu, Subject: General Exam for Mindy Roberts Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-Uwash-Spam: Gauge=IIIIIIII, Probability=8%, Report='__HAS_MSGID, __SANE_MSGID' The General Exam for Mindy Roberts is scheduled for Thursday, August 7 at 2:00 p.m. in More 218 (Faculty Library). Committee: Derek Booth, Chair M. Paul Johnson, GSR Robert Bilby Susan Bolton Michael Brett Abstract: Aquatic ecosystems rely on both allochthonous (external) and autochthonous (internal) sources of energy (Bisson and Bilby, 2001; Murphy, 2001) to support biological processes. Small streams covered with closed canopies primarily depend on allochthonous sources, while autochthonous sources provide the energy for larger streams with open canopies. Stream systems represent a mosaic of disturbance, caused by a variety of natural and anthropogenic processes. Anthropogenic processes alter the disturbance regimes in streams by increasing the intensity, frequency, and spatial scales of disturbance. Few studies have characterized how aquatic systems respond to riparian vegetation alteration in the long term. Urban development, which may maintain a more homogeneous, open-canopy environment, may permanently alter the allochthonous, terrestrial organic-matter pathway. The proposed research addreasses changes to the terrestrial organic-matter energy pathway in response to urbanization by considering in turn the sources, transport, and fate of organic matter in small streams. Urbanization may disrupt allochthonous energy sources directly through manipulation of riparian vegetation, which could alter the mass, timing, or nutritional quality of organic matter reaching small strreams. Urbanization also modifies hydrologic, chemical, or biological processes in small streams, which may indirectly alter the transport and/or the fate of litter. Specifically, the research will address three hypotheses: - The mass, timing, and nutritional quality of litterfall vary along a gradient of development in a selected watershed, Chico Creek, in the Puget Lowland of western Washington. -Leaf litter retention is inversely proportional to the level of urbanization. -The rate of leaf processing varies with level of urbanization. The amount of urban lands continues to increase, and even casual observation suggests that changes to vegetation in the riparian corridor can be profound. Alteration to energy regimes could confound restoration efforts that do not consider these processes. This research will increase the broad understanding of organic matter dynamics in urban streams, and it will begin to quantify specific changes in the availability of terrestrial organic matter to small streams in response to urbanization. Carole McCutcheon for Marcia Buck Graduate Advising Office ceginfo@u .