Research scientists in the Fluvial Landscape Lab have diverse interests and skills, organized around a common goal of making new discoveries about aquatic ecosystems by applying cutting-edge quantitative scientific techniques.
Geoffrey Poole
Dr. Geoffrey Poole is the lab director. His research interests include understanding how the hydrology and geomorphology of rivers, wetlands, lakes, and floodplains influence the ecology of these freshwater systems. Geoff is a Professor in the Department of Land Resources and Environmental Sciences at Montana State University and has been an researcher of aquatic systems for 25 years.
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Ann Marie Reinhold
Ann Marie is an Assistant Research Professor on the LRES faculty, working in collaboration with members of the Fluvial Landscape Lab. She started in the Fluvial Landscape Lab as postdoctoral research associate, after earning her Ph.D. studying the responses fish assemblages of the lower Yellowstone River to geomorphic alterations of the river including rip-rap, levees, and dikes. Ann Marie is now developing models of microbial community response to changes the availability of electron donors and acceptors. She is also a collaborator in stream temperature research with the Confederated Umatilla Tribes.
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Byron Amerson
Byron is a Ph.D. student conducting research on hyporheic response to stream restoration. His dissertation seeks to find novel ways to assess how reconfiguration of stream channels via restoration may influence stream temperatures by augmenting hyporheic exchange. Byron's work focuses on a 1.6 km channel realignment on Meacham Creek, a tributary to the Umatilla River in Oregon.
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Sam Carlson
Sam is earning his Ph.D. in the Fluvial Landscape Lab by developing a simulation model of stream respiration and nitrate uptake in stream networks. Based on the hypothesis that log-jams in headwater streams facilitate sediment storage, increased metabolism, and nutrient processing, Sam's simulation modeling research aims to demonstrate stream-network scale implications of reach-scale measurements being made in headwater streams of Colorado.
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Katie Fogg
Katie is a Ph.D. student in the Fluvial Landscape Lab, having completed her M.S. in the lab as well. She has develop a next-generation simulation model to represent the influence of hyporheic exchange on whole-channel water temperature. Katie's simulation approach implements a means of incorporating a residence time distribution within the transient storage zone of rivers. Her work aims to provide a new means of simulating hyporheic influences on river channels using 1D models of stream flow.
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Libby Mohr
Libby is earning a Ph.D. conducting research on the biogeochemistry of flow water systems. Specifically, she is working to build a foundations for a comprehensive theory describing the mechanistic controls on elemental spiraling in streams and along groundwater flow paths. Using a combination of modeling and empirical observation, Libby aims to explain how variation in different physical, chemical, and biological processes interact to influence "spiraling length" as elements are cycled during downstream transport.
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Matt Bain
Matt Bain is an undergraduate researcher in the Fluvial Landscape Lab, working on advancing the capacity of constraint-based models of biogeochemistry using the GANGSTA modeling framework. Matt's work is helping to allow the optimization routines inherent in constraint-based modeling approaches to be responsive to dynamic environmental conditions, such as variation in temperature and pH.
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Alumni from the Fluvial Landscape Lab have conducted a wide array of scientific research, moving on to diverse water science careers, earning faculty positions, joining governmental agencies, and building consulting firms.
Rob Payn (PostDoc)
After completing a postdoc in the Fluvial Landscape Lab, Rob Payn maintained his affiliation with the Department of Land Resources and Environmental Sciences at Montana State University by accepting a tenure-track Assistant Professorship in Watershed Hydrology. While in the lab, Rob worked in collaboration with Drs. Poole and Clem Izurieta to develop the first generation of constraint-based biogeochemical models used in the Fluvial Landscape Lab. He also worked closely with graduate students in the lab, supporting their graduate research. Papers Rob co-authored as a result of his collaborations in the Fluvial Landscape Lab include:
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Ashley Helton (M.S. and Ph.D.)
Ashley Helton is a tenure-track Assistant Professor at the University of Connecticut in the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment. Ashley earned degrees from the University of Georgia; her M.S. working under the co-direction of Dr. Poole and Dr. Judy Meyer, and her Ph.D. under the direction of Dr. Poole. She developed conducted field-based biogeochemical research and developed hydro-biogeochemical models describing the uptake of nitrate in river networks and the interactions between surface- and subsurface-water exchange, temperature, dissolved oxygen, and carbon dynamics in expansive course-grained floodplain aquifers. Prior to her position at the University of Connecticut, Ashley was a post-doctoral research associated at Duke University. Ashley's publications resulting from her time in the Fluvial Landscape Lab include:
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Patrick Della Croce (Ph.D.)
Patrick is now a tenure track Assistant Professor in Biology and Environmental Sciences at Franklin University in Switzerland. He completed his Ph.D. in 2016 working in the Fluvial Landscape Lab studying introgressive hybridization between native cutthroat trout and non-native rainbow trout in Montana streams and rivers. Patrick's dissertation has centered on development of an agent-based computer simulation model of mating and survival within and straying among subpopulations of trout. Patrick's publication record in the Fluvial Landscape Lab includes:
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Alicia Arrigoni (M.S.)
Alicia works for the U.S. Government, assessing security threats associated with water resources. She earned her M.S. in 2004, from UC Santa Barbara, working under the co-direction of Dr. Leal Mertes and Dr. Poole. She conducted research on the Umatilla River, Oregon, understanding how surface- and subsurface-water exchange influences temperature regimes across habitats in alluvial rivers. Her M.S. work was published in the following paper:
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Krista Jones (M.S.)
Krista Jones is now a hydrologist with the U.S. Geological Survey at the Oregon Water Science Center in Portland, Oregon. She received her M.S. in Ecology from the University of Georgia in 2004, working with Dr. Judy Meyer and Dr. Poole. Krista studied the potential affects of reducing riparian forest buffers on stream temperatures in trout streams of the southern Appalachian Mountains. After graduation, Krista stayed on to work as a research technician with Dr. Poole. Her collaboration with Poole resulted in several papers:
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Jordanna Black (M.S.)
Jordanna Black graduated in 2011 and is now an Aquatic Restoration Specialist for the Washington State Department of Natural Resources. Jordanna earned her M.S. through the Fluvial Landscape Lab studying the interaction between aquatic habitat enhancement structures, fish holding patterns, and angler behavior. Her work documented that holding locations for fish that were associated with habitat enhancement structures were targeted more effectively by anglers, suggesting that fish holding in these locations are more susceptible to angling pressure. Jordanna was also instrumental in the design of ENSC448 Stream Restoration Ecology, a course taught annually by Dr. Poole.
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Seth Kurt-Mason (M.S.)
Seth Kurt-Mason is a principle hydrologist at Lotic Hydrological, providing expertise to municipalities, county governments, state and federal agencies, and non-profit organizations involved in water resource management and conservation. He earned his M.S. through the Fluvial Landscape Lab in 2011. Seth studied how the restoration of Silver Bow Creek altered the hydrology of the stream channel. His work is summarized in the following publication:
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