FACULTY
Statement of Interests and Research:
Pete's main area of research deals with aspects of vegetation change. He continues work on year two of a $150,000 grant from the United States Department of Agriculture's Plant and Environmental Adaptation Program titled "Anomalous 20 th century ponderosa pine growth and potential CO 2 fertilization in naturally-occurring stands in the interior West, USA." The goal of this project is to determine if increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have caused significant increases in the radial growth rates of ponderosa pine, an environmentally and economically important western tree species. Pete, a colleague and graduate students from University of North Carolina-Greensboro, and graduate student Andi Cochran and undergraduate student Jessica Brannock traveled to Utah during June 2006 for two weeks of fieldwork on this project. Laboratory work will continue throughout the 2006-2007 academic year.
Pete is also doing vegetation change work locally. In August 2006 he received a $6000 grant from Grandfather Mountain, Inc. to work on a study titled: "An examination of the age structure and growth patterns of high elevation conifers on Grandfather Mountain , NC." In this study he will be examining the growth rates of spruce trees found on the higher elevations of Grandfather Mountain to determine if acid rain or other environmental perturbations are causing a reduction in how fast the trees grow. He began fieldwork in August 2006, and work on the project will continue through the 2006-2007 academic year.
In addition to the projects dealing with vegetation change, Pete continues to examine purely climatic topics. He has been working on a manuscript with Paul Knapp (UNCG) titled "Trends in Midlatitude Cyclonic Occurrence and Frequency during Fire Season in the Northern Rockies: 1900-2004."
Pete teaches Introduction to Physical Geography, Weather and Climate, Synoptic and Regional Climatology, Quantitative Methods, and graduate courses in Natural Hazards and Quantitative Methods.
A list of Pete's recent publication follows:
P. T. Soulé and P. A. Knapp. "Radial growth rate increases in naturally occurring ponderosa pine trees: a late-20 th century CO 2 fertilization effect?" New Phytologist. V. 171 (2006): 379-390.
P. T. Soulé. "A Comparison of 30-yr Climatic Normals for the Southeastern United States." Southeastern Geographer. V. 45 (2005): 16-24.
P. A. Knapp and P. T. Soulé. "Impacts of an Early Season Freeze Event in the Interior Pacific Northwest (October 30th -November 3rd , 2002) on Western Juniper Woodlands." Journal of Applied Meteorology. V. 44 (2005): 1152-1158.
P. T. Soulé, P. A. Knapp, and H. D. Grissino-Mayer. "Human Agency, Environmental Drivers, and Western Juniper Establishment During the Late Holocene." Ecological Applications. V. 14 ( 2004):96-112.
P. A. Knapp, P. T. Soulé, and H. D. Grissino-Mayer. "Occurrence of Sustained Droughts in the Interior Pacific Northwest (AD 1733-1980) Inferred from Tree-Ring Data. "Journal of Climate. V. 17 (2004): 140-150.
P. T. Soulé, P. A. Knapp, and H. D. Grissino-Mayer. Comparative Rates of Western Juniper Afforestation in South-Central Oregon and the Role of Anthropogenic Disturbance. The Professional Geographer. V. 55 (2003): 43-55.
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