Principal Investigator Harold Hemond
Co-investigator Ruben Juanes
Freshwater lakes are believed to be significant, but poorly quantified, sources of the greenhouse gas methane to the atmosphere. Methane is also important to the ecology of lakes, influencing both the food web and the oxidation-reduction chemistry of the waters. Current work focuses on the process of ebullition, or bubbling, which is very poorly understood and is difficult to quantify on account of its patchy and intermittent nature. An improved understanding of the interactions of microbiological methane production and consumption with the physics of organic-rich lake sediments will also lead to better models of global methane cycling and potentially to possibilities for energy harvesting.