Carmella Vizza
Hawaii Pacific University, HI·Earth & Environmental Science
Methane is a potent greenhouse gas, and wetlands produce 50–80% of the methane released naturally to the atmosphere. Some global models predict that wetland methane emissions could double by 2100.
- Fields
Earth & Environmental Science
Ecology & Evolution
Microbiology & Immunology
- Topics
methane
greenhouse gases
coastal wetlands
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jul 2028
What they work on
- Test whether saltwater introduction lowers methane emissions because sulfate-reducing bacteria outcompete methanogens, comparing freshwater control, saltwater-treated and naturally intertidal ponds in Hawai'i.
- Test whether intermediate salinities create methane emission hotspots by suppressing methanotrophs, the salt-sensitive microbes that consume methane, using quantitative PCR to track key microbial groups.
- Determine whether the dominant plant species mediates salinity's effect on methane, by measuring production rates, water concentrations and chamber-based emissions over two years.
- Characterize how microbial communities and water chemistry, including sulfate, nitrogen, phosphorus and dissolved organic carbon, shift after saltwater introduction, using 16S amplicon sequencing.
More about the research
As sea levels rise, however, saltwater is moving into coastal wetlands, and that could lower their emissions. The usual explanation is that in salty water, sulfate-reducing bacteria outcompete methanogens, the microbes that make methane. Recent studies challenge this view. This project uses a real saltwater introduction to find out how salt changes water chemistry, microbes and methane.
Why it matters
Coastal managers and climate modelers need to know whether sea-level rise will increase or decrease methane released from wetlands. Results from Hawai'i ponds could improve predictions of wetland greenhouse gas emissions. They could also guide conservation projects that use saltwater to control invasive plants and restore habitat for endangered waterbirds.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Shawn Fraver
University of Maine, ME·Earth & Environmental Science
Identify how methanogens (methane-producing microbes) and methanotrophs (methane-consuming microbes) in Howland Forest soils drive methane flux across moisture and other environmental gradients, using microbial community profiling.
Yu-Ping Chin
University of Delaware, DE·Earth & Environmental Science
Measure how stemflow, the rainfall channeled down tree trunks to the soil, changes across a transect running from healthy coastal forest to saltwater-killed ghost forest.
A Joshua Leffler
South Dakota State University, SD·Ecology & Evolution
Manipulate temperature, flooding and goose grazing in a large field experiment in Alaska's Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta to measure how these factors interact to change coastal and inland wetland plant communities.
The school
Hawaii Pacific University: 1 labs on PI Pages, $4M a year on research.
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