Gil Bohrer

About

Gil Bohrer is an atmospheric physicist who focuses on atmosphere-biosphere-hydrosphere interactions. He received his PhD in civil and environmental engineering from Duke University in June 2007, where he developed a computational framework for simulating the dynamics of forest-atmosphere interactions and a detailed model of plant hydraulic architecture. His models were used to study the effects of forest canopy heterogeneity on turbulence and dispersion, as well as to investigate biases in atmospheric point observations from eddy flux towers. Additionally, these models were applied in a project examining the ecological consequences of wind-dispersed seeds in tropical rain forests in Panama. As an Environmental Fellow at Harvard, Gil worked with Paul Moorcroft on biosphere-atmosphere interactions around forest gaps and edges. He is particularly interested in how small-scale forest discontinuities influence large-scale forest processes, especially regarding the exchanges of water, energy, and carbon dioxide that are vital to forest life functions. Gil emphasizes the importance of exploring how structural vegetation heterogeneities, whether naturally occurring or anthropogenically induced, modify these exchange rates, highlighting their significance for boundary layer meteorology, climate variability, plant ecology, and air quality.

Research topics

• Computer Science
• Ecology
• Geography
• Environmental science
• Biology
• Cartography
• Remote sensing
• Database
• Artificial Intelligence
• Mathematics

Selected publications

• The FLUXNET2015 dataset and the ONEFlux processing pipeline for eddy covariance data

  Scientific Data · 2020 · 1726 citations

  , water, and energy exchange between the biosphere and the atmosphere, and other meteorological and biological measurements, from 212 sites around the globe (over 1500 site-years, up to and including year 2014). These sites, independently managed and operated, voluntarily contributed their data to create global datasets. Data were quality controlled and processed using uniform methods, to improve consistency and intercomparability across sites. The dataset is already being used in a number of ap…

  DOI

• Representativeness of Eddy-Covariance flux footprints for areas surrounding AmeriFlux sites

  Agricultural and Forest Meteorology · 2021 · 498 citations

  Large datasets of greenhouse gas and energy surface-atmosphere fluxes measured with the eddy-covariance technique (e.g., FLUXNET2015, AmeriFlux BASE) are widely used to benchmark models and remote-sensing products. This study addresses one of the major challenges facing model-data integration: To what spatial extent do flux measurements taken at individual eddy-covariance sites reflect model- or satellite-based grid cells? We evaluate flux footprints—the temporally dynamic source areas that cont…

  DOI

• Global transpiration data from sap flow measurements: the SAPFLUXNET database

  Earth system science data · 2021 · 180 citations

  Abstract. Plant transpiration links physiological responses of vegetation to water supply and demand with hydrological, energy, and carbon budgets at the land–atmosphere interface. However, despite being the main land evaporative flux at the global scale, transpiration and its response to environmental drivers are currently not well constrained by observations. Here we introduce the first global compilation of whole-plant transpiration data from sap flow measurements (SAPFLUXNET, https://sapflux…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Ecological insights from three decades of animal movement tracking across a changing Arctic

  Science · 2020 · 135 citations

  The Arctic is entering a new ecological state, with alarming consequences for humanity. Animal-borne sensors offer a window into these changes. Although substantial animal tracking data from the Arctic and subarctic exist, most are difficult to discover and access. Here, we present the new Arctic Animal Movement Archive (AAMA), a growing collection of more than 200 standardized terrestrial and marine animal tracking studies from 1991 to the present. The AAMA supports public data discovery, prese…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Biological Earth observation with animal sensors

  Trends in Ecology & Evolution · 2022 · 129 citations

  Space-based tracking technology using low-cost miniature tags is now delivering data on fine-scale animal movement at near-global scale. Linked with remotely sensed environmental data, this offers a biological lens on habitat integrity and connectivity for conservation and human health; a global network of animal sentinels of environmental change.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• UNS: Collaborative Research: Measurement and Modeling of the Pathways of Potential Fugitive Methane Emissions During Hydrofracking

  NSF · $176k · 2015–2019

• Collaborative Research: How structural heterogeneity and connectivity of landscapes affect wind dispersal

  NSF · $25k · 2009–2012

• Collaborative research: Greenhouse gas balance of urban temperate wetlands

  NSF · $186k · 2010–2015

Frequent coauthors

• Timothy H. Morin

  State University of New York

  90 shared

• Christopher M. Gough

  60 shared

• Jorge A. Villa

  University of Louisiana at Lafayette

  57 shared

• Christoph S. Vogel

  55 shared

• Ashley M. Matheny

  The University of Texas at Austin

  52 shared

• Kelly Wrighton

  Colorado State University

  51 shared

• Roland Kays

  North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences

  48 shared

• Sarah C. Davidson

  Colorado State University

  46 shared

Labs

• Harvard University Center for the EnvironmentPI

Education

• Ph.D., Civil and Environmental Engineering

  Duke University

  2007

Awards & honors

• French Environmental Fellow: 2007-2009

Similar researchers at Ohio State University

• Ling Zhangh-77
• Christopher Goldenh-51
• Emily V. Fischerh-51