Researcher of the Month

Dr. Mark David

Mark David is a Professor of Biogeochemistry in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences at UIUC, and is also an affiliate with the Center for Water as a Complex Environmental System (CWACES). He joined UIUC in 1985 as an assistant professor in the Department of Forestry. Before arriving at the University of Illinois, Dr. David earned a B.S. in Forest Science from Pennsylvania State University in 1978, an M.S. in Forest Biogeochemistry from the University of Maine in 1980, followed by his Ph.D. in Environmental Science from the State University of New York, College of Environmental Science and Forestry in 1983.

For his M.S. work at Maine, Dr. David studied Sugarloaf Ski Area, which discharges sewage effluent into the surrounding forest. His interest was to explore the effects of this discharge on the forests. Then, for his doctoral work, Dr. David explored the Adirondack Mountains in New York State. In the early 1980s, acid rain was becoming a major environmental topic, and his research focused on how the various constituents of acid rain, such as aluminum and sulfur, cycled through the forests, soils , streams, and lakes of the area. One finding of this investigation was that sulfur contained in acid rain cycled from the forest canopy to lake sediments, and then underwent further transformations within those sediments. Once his Ph.D. work was complete, Dr. David spent two years working for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in Corvallis, Oregon as a project scientist and supervisor, assisting in the launch of acid rain research programs.

Upon arriving at UIUC, Dr. David continued his research on the effects of acid rain, continuing to focus on the forested areas of northern New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine, where he worked at about 15 sites in those areas, with the U.S. Geological Survey, and the U.S. Forest Service. The subject of this work were red spruce trees, and the effects acid rain has had on them, as the effects of acid rain on trees have been particularly acute in this region. Some of the results were published in the journal Nature. During this time frame, Dr. David also examined the biogeochemical cycling of elements such as dissolved organic carbon, aluminum and sulfate in a 10 hectare watershed in eastern Maine, in a project funded by U.S. EPA. Much of this work also focused on the cycling of environmentally introduced elements through soils.

Once he had widespread experience in the New England region, and had established a career examining the biogeochemical cycling of elements in soils and forests, Dr. David switched focus to a new area of research closer to home during the mid-1990s. The new focus was on Illinois water quality and chemistry issues, a direct result of environmental systems manipulated by agriculture. This is a hot topic, of great interest to Illinois farmers and residents. He was involved in a project to build wetlands designed to intercept tile drains, ubiquitous throughout central Illinois, as a way to reduce nitrate and phosphate to stream systems. Other work has focused on understanding how nutrients and chemicals get into tile drainage to better develop methods to reduce these agricultural losses into streams. Much of this work has been done close to home, in southern Champaign County. He has worked with the Illinois state EPA on phosphorus effects on water quality, in an attempt to develop water quality standards. Most recently, Dr. David is part of a newly funded National Science Foundation project in the interdisciplinary biocomplexity coupled human/natural systems program, comprising a small group of physical and social scientists. Dr. David represents UIUC in this effort, with other involved universities that include Cornell, Michigan State, Louisiana State University, and the University of New Hampshire. One of the research objectives is to see how agricultural practices could be changed to better couple nitrogen and carbon so that nitrogen losses to the environment are ultimately reduced, in an effort encompassing both the physical and social aspects of the problem.

           

Dr. David brings what is almost two separate careers in one (soil and forest biogeochemistry, and water quality and chemistry) and work in two very different physiographic environments to his affiliation with CWACES. As CWACES continues to grow and expand in the future, this depth of topical and geographic experience should prove a valuable asset.