The Cedar Creek Long Term Ecological Research program is designed to understand how the prairie grasslands and forests of the Midwest function and how this functioning may be influenced by human activities. The research combines large, well-replicated, long-term experiments with long-term observations in native ecosystems, and uses the results to develop and test theories of ecosystem dynamics and functioning. The experiments focus on how and why the loss of native species, shifts in fire regimes, climate change, elevated atmospheric CO2, and elevated rates of nitrogen deposition affect the productivity, stability and functioning of prairie and forest ecosystems.
The results of this research will help to provide solutions to some of the environmental problems the nation and world face as global population approaches 9 or 10 billion people. Some human actions are decreasing the ability of ecosystems around the world to provide goods and services vital to humanity. Cedar Creek research addresses how human activities alter the ability of natural and managed grasslands and forests to remove carbon dioxide from the atmospheric and store it in soils and plants, purify groundwater, produce sustainable biofuels, and increate soil fertility; and seeks ways that these abilities can be improved and restored. The program will continue its history of creative dissemination of results to the broader public and of advising government official and agencies. Its signature professional development program trains both K-12 teachers and students, and included 6000 teachers and students in 2011. The site's education program will continue partnerships to train educators of Native American students and strengthen engagement with urban, underserved schools. Diverse undergraduate students from across the country together with graduate students and postdoctoral researchers will be trained through this highly integrative program.
