Project Scientist
Institute of Marine Sciences

slabeden@ucsc.edu

Research interests: Carbon Sequestration in Coastal Wetlands

Research
I am interested in using nature-based solutions to mitigate climate change effects and make our landscapes even more beautiful. I discovered the power of coastal wetlands in sequestering CO2 and I’ve decided to dedicate my research to the study of the role of water dynamics in the carbon budget of salt marshes. My role is to process and analyze the data from multiple Eddy Covariance towers based in five different marshes in Elkhorn Slough and neighboring Moro Cojo Slough. The project aims to estimate the net ecosystem carbon balance of different types of wetlands to understand the seasonal and diurnal patterns of carbon exchange, helping us make inferences about ecosystem functioning and responses to environmental changes.