## **Background** - Rainfall and soil water are key controls on Soil Organic Matter stabilization in soils - We still need a mechanistic and predictive understanding of how altered moisture regimes will affect soil carbon persistence ![[Soil forming Factors Diagram.png]] ## **Research Questions** - My work centers around key unknowns regarding climate change and carbon cycling in grasslands and they are: - What will be the impact of changing precipitation patterns (amount and seasonality) on soil forming processes and stabilization mechanisms? - Are grassland subsoils (>1m) vulnerable to changing precipitation patterns? ## **Research Sites** - To answer these research questions, I used a combination of natural gradients and manipulative experiments: - We sampled soils to 1m across a gradient of grasslands across California, where the major difference between these sites is mean annual precipitation - We sampled soils to 3m at a manipulative 20-year experiment at Angelo Coast Range Reserve in California - This experiment used sprinklers to artificially add more precipitation in the Winter and Spring months to test both changing amount and seasonality of precipitation on this grassland ecosystem ![[Gradients and Experiments Figure.png]] ## **Methods** - In my work I have used a combination of isotopic and spectroscopic methods which include: - Elemental and stable isotope analysis - Diffuse Reflectance Fourier Transform Spectroscopy (DRIFTS) - Sequential iron and aluminum extractions - Solid state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) - Density Fractionation ## **Publications on this work** - You can find my work regarding natural gradients [here](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10533-024-01181-9), in Springer Biogeochemistry - You can find a pre-print of my work deep soils (0-3m) and the effects of 20 years of precipitation manipulation [here](https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2025/egusphere-2024-3607/) - Another manuscript regarding the manipulation experiment and how it affects carbon associations with short range order oxides is in prep!