MSc James Weedon

Introduction

I am a PhD student working on microbial ecology in the European sub-arctic. During my undergraduate studies at the University of Adelaide (Australia) I did research on facilitation in arid zone plant communities. My MSc research at the VU Amsterdam included a meta-analysis of the relationship between wood traits and decomposition rates, and molecular characterization of nitrifying bacteria and archaea in agricultural soils and mixed cultures. I have broad interests in community and ecosystem ecology, molecular microbial ecology, biogeochemistry, and statistical computing.

Project

My PhD project investigates the connections between soil microbial community structure and ecosystem function in the context of climate warming in the sub-arctic. In particular I am interested in the effects of warming on the nitrogen cycle, and the microorganisms that control it. We have found that experimental climate manipulations in a ombrotrophic bog in Sweden have led to 100% increases in seasonal organic nitrogen fluxes – but with no apparent changes to the microbial community composition or the pool sizes of soil peptidases. We are following up this surprising result with a controlled laboratory experiment, and more in depth microbial community profiling using next-generation RNA/DNA sequencing technology.

Selected Publications

Weedon J.T., Kowalchuk G.A., Aerts R., van Hal J., van Logtestijn R.K.S.P., Tas N., Röling W. & van Bodegom P. (in press). Seasonal climate manipulations in a sub-arctic peat bog accelerate nitrogen cycling without changing soil peptidase pools or microbial community structure. Global Change Biology, DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2486.2011.02548.x.

Freschet G.T., Weedon J.T., Aerts R., Van Hal J. & Cornelissen J.H.C. (2011). Interspecific differences in wood decay rates: insights from a new short-term method to study long-term wood decomposition. Journal of Ecology.  DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2745.2011.01896.x

Cornwell, W.K., Cornelissen, J.H.C., Allison, S.D., Bauhus, J., Eggleton, P., Preston, C., Scarff, F., Weedon, J.T., Wirth, C., Zanne, A. (2009) Plant traits and wood fates across the globe – rotted, burned or consumed? Global Change Biology, 15, 2431-2449

Weedon, J.T., Cornwell, W.K., Cornelissen, J.H.C., Zanne, A., Wirth, C. and Coomes, D. (2009) Global meta-analysis of wood decomposition rates: a role for trait variation among tree species? Ecology Letters, 12, 45-56

Weedon, J.T. and J.M. Facelli (2008) Desert shrubs have negative or neutral effects on annuals at two levels of water availability in arid lands of South Australia. Journal of Ecology, 96, 1230-1236

Supervisors

Rien Aerts

George Kowalchuk

Peter van Bodegom

Links

ISI researcher ID         

Departmental publications list

Abisko Scientific Research Station

The R Project for Statistical Computing