Jeff Chanton

Research

My research focus is fairly broad but follows the focus of either methane and carbon dioxide production, emission and cycling and/or stable isotope analysis. Listed below are some of the topics that I work on.

1. Wetlands. My colleagues and I are looking at permafrost decomposition in the northern boreal zone. What happens when frozen soils melts? We're finding enhanced methane production and rooting out its causes. I've also been fascinated with the way methane is transported from wetlands. Turns out that the vegetation can play a huge role in this. We also use stable isotopes and radiocarbon to examine the ways that methane is produced.

2. Food webs. Stable isotopes are fantastic tools for learning about trophic relationships in estuaries (who eats what) and also where and how animals live. We've used the technique in estuaries across the state.

3. Reducing methane emissions to the atmosphere. Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas, 26 times as strong as carbon dioxide. Yet its lifetime in the atmosphere is only 10 years, compared to the 100 year lifetime of CO₂. I think we can attach the problem of human production of greenhouse gases by reducing methane emissions to the atmosphere. Landfills are a point source of methane. I'm working with the FSU/FAMU college of engineering to design landfill cover soils which will promote the growth of methane consuming bacteria.

4. Methane Gas Hydrates. At the high pressures found on the seafloor, methane and water form an ice-like compound called a gas hydrate. Some estimate that these deposits may be a large reservoir of fossil fuel which could be mined. With colleagues at the University of Mississippi, the University of North Carolina and Woods Hole Oceanographic, I am working to establish a sea floor observatory to monitor gas hydrate sea floor stability.

5. Pine Forests in the southeastern-USA are a large sink for excess carbon dioxide. We are using stable isotopes to learn about variations in ecosystem respiration in differing age stands. The work has implications for estimates of the variation in the relative importance of terrestrial versus oceanic sinks for CO₂.

6. Groundwater discharge to the coastal zone is an overlooked process which is important to the nutrient budgets of coastal waters. Colleague Bill Burnett and I use natural and artificial tracers to study the input of groundwater and to determine rates and direction of contaminant flow in the subsurface.