Photosynthesis, Respiration, and Climate Change

Katie M. Becklin: Katie M. Becklin obtained her Ph.D. from the University of Missouri in 2010, exploring the dynamics of plant-fungal symbioses across environmental gradients. Katie then joined Joy Ward's lab at the University of Kansas for her postdoctoral research, focusing on plant physiological responses across a broad CO2 gradient, ranging from low levels experienced during the last glacial maximum to predicted future concentrations. During this time Katie was awarded an NIH IRACDA postdoctoral fellowship to further test the role of mycorrhizal fungi in mediating plant responses to CO2. In 2017, Katie joined the Biology Department at Syracuse University as an Assistant Professor. She has published multiple papers in prominent plant physiology and ecology journals, is a Review Editor for Global Change Biology and Frontiers in Forests and Global Change, and chaired the 2019 Gordon Research Seminar on CO2 Assimilation in Plants. Joy K. Ward: Joy K. Ward received her BS degree in biology from Penn State University, earned her masters and doctorate degrees at Duke University under Professor Boyd Strain, and held a post-doctoral position with Distinguished Professor James Ehleringer at the University of Utah. She was a long-term professor at the University of Kansas for 17 years prior to becoming dean at Case Western Reserve. She was the recipient of a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) from the White House in 2009, a CAREER award from the National Science Foundation, and the Kavli Foundation and National Academy of Sciences also named her a Kavli Fellow. She has served as U.S. chair and planning member for the National Academy's Frontiers of Science in Saudi Arabia, Japan, Oman, Kuwait and has been a scientific delegate to Uzbekistan through the State Department. Joy is internationally recognized for her studies on how plants respond to changing atmospheric CO2 over geologic and contemporary time, and has provided novel insights into how plants respond to long-term environmental change since the last glacial period, as well as understanding how plants will respond to environments of the future. Danielle A. Way: Danielle (Dani) Way obtained her BSc from the University of Toronto in 2002, her PhD at the same institution in Rowan Sage's lab in 2008, and did her post-doctoral work at Duke University with Rob Jackson, focusing on how elevated CO2 altered photosynthesis and plant performance. In 2012, she joined the Department of Biology at the University of Western Ontario, where she was granted tenure in 2018; Dani has also been an Adjunct Assistant Professor at Duke University since 2012, and joined the Terrestrial Ecosystem Science & Technology research group at Brookhaven National Laboratory as a Joint Appointee in 2019. Dani has published nearly 70 papers focusing on how warming and rising atmospheric CO2 concentrations alter photosynthesis, respiration, growth and survival in plants, with a focus on high latitude tree species. She was elected to the College of the Royal Society of Canada in 2018 and was awarded the C.D. Nelson Award by the Canadian Society of Plant Biologists in 2019 for outstanding research in plant biology within 10 years of an independent position. She is the Reviews Editor for Global Change Biology, a Topic Editor for Plant, Cell & Environment, and worked from 2012-2020 as an Editor and Associate Editor-in-Chief for Tree Physiology.