This is part of an ongoing collaborative, student-led seminar series hosted by T-RUST (Transformative Research in Urban Sustainability Training) at WSU and GLIER (Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research) at the University of Windsor. The seminar series is titled Transformative Change in Environmental Sustainability and occurs biweekly on Fridays at 10am.

Title: A clearer view through murky waters? Eutrophication risk, resilience and recovery

Speaker: Dr. Helen Jarvie, University of Waterloo

When: Friday, November 6, 10am

Where: Virtually on Zoom, register here: http://bit.ly/WindsortoWayne. The Zoom link will be sent to the email used for registration two days before the seminar.

Phosphorus (P) and nitrogen (N) are limiting nutrients for food production, yet we face an overabundance of P and N entering our rivers and lakes, from agricultural production and from wastewater discharges. This impairs water quality, undermines the health of aquatic ecosystems, and threatens water security. This seminar explores the challenges we face in eutrophication management. Changing patterns in nutrient use and management have led to a conundrum of simultaneous nutrient excesses and deficiencies, and the build-up of nutrient legacies in our watersheds, with varying residence times. The chronic release of P and N from these legacy stores may continue to impair river water quality for decades. Using the U.S. Western Lake Erie river tributaries as an example, we show how conservation measures designed to reduce nutrient losses from agricultural land may have inadvertently accelerated the accumulation of labile P at the soil surface and the losses of dissolved P, contributing to the ‘re-eutrophication’ of the western Lake Erie basin. In seeking solutions to eutrophication, there is a pressing need to better quantify nutrient sinks and sources in watersheds, and to ensure realistic expectations for mitigation strategies and timescales for recovery.

Helen Jarvie joined the Water Institute at the University of Waterloo, in January 2020, as Professor of Water and Global Environmental Change. Before relocating to Canada, Helen worked for the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology for 25 years. Helen’s research explores the drivers of eutrophication and water-quality impairment, from UK to global scales. She has particular interest in the sources and biogeochemical cycling of nutrients in rivers, and how safeguarding the functional integrity of rivers and watersheds can help build resilience in water-quality and water-resource security, within the context of climate variability and land-use change.

This is part of an ongoing collaborative, student-led seminar series hosted by T-RUST (Transformative Research in Urban Sustainability Training) at WSU and GLIER (Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research) at the University of Windsor. The seminar series is titled Transformative Change in Environmental Sustainability and occurs biweekly on Fridays at 10am.

Title: Re-shaping our thinking about urban forests as public health infrastructure

Speaker: Dr. Janani Sivarajah, Environmental Sustainability Research Centre, Brock University

When: Friday, October 23, 10am

Where: Virtually on Zoom, register here: http://bit.ly/WindsortoWayne. The Zoom link will be sent to the email used for registration two days before the seminar.

Urban trees provide many ecosystem services along with psycho-socio-cultural, health, and economic benefits to humans. Given the increases in urban development and the COVID-19 pandemic, it is timely to consider urban planning issues and equitable access to these greenspaces and the benefits they provide. Now more than ever, we are more dependent on urban trees and greenspaces for our well-being. The growing trend in current thinking about urban forests as public health infrastructure has elevated the importance of trees in public health and urban greening policies and standards. In this talk, I will draw upon my previous research, highlighting the importance of urban trees as a critical public health infrastructure that impacts academic performance to cancer prevention. I will give some insight on the transdisciplinary nature of my work, conveying it towards different audiences and how it is being applied in the real-world. I will touch upon some of my ongoing work building ecological and community resilience within urban and sub-urban developments. Overall, I will elaborate on how we can work with the health, social, and education sectors to incorporate landscape ecology approaches to aim for greater connectivity between people and nature.

Dr. Janani Sivarajah is an urban forestry and greening researcher, educator, and consultant. She is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Environmental Sustainability Research Centre, Brock University and Vineland Research and Innovation Centre. She has a Master of Forest Conservation and Ph.D. in Forestry from the University of Toronto. Her transdisciplinary research explores the ecosystem services of urban trees and public greenspaces, and finds greening solutions to improve the socio-ecological resilience of cities. She is the President of the Ontario Urban Forest Council, Research Associate at the Department of Architectural Science, Ryerson University, and member of the Ontario Professional Foresters Association and the City of Toronto’s Shade Policy Steering Committee. She also lectures at Daniel’s Institute of Forestry and Conservation at the University of Toronto.

Please join us for the second installment of the Green Street virtual seminar series, hosted by the Wayne State University Office of Campus Sustainability. This week, Dr. Donna Kashian (Director of Environmental Science and T-RUST) will present an introduction to arctic amplification, and participate in a discussion with Sierra Club activist Justin Onwenu on climate change and environmental justice.

Register here: https://linktr.ee/sustainability_wsu

To learn more about Green Street and for information regarding other upcoming seminars, please visit the Green Street homepage: https://sustainability.wayne.edu/engagement/green-street.