Nancy B. Grimm
Biogeochemistry, Stream-Riparian Ecology, Urban Ecosystems
Dr. Grimm's research concerns the structure and function of ecosystems in arid lands. Her current research focus is on the cycling and retention of the element nitrogen, considered in the context of patch dynamics and landscape heterogeneity. Nitrogen is an important element because it limits productivity of both aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems in the Southwest, it is a potential groundwater pollutant, some gaseous forms of nitrogen are potent greenhouse gases, and nitrogen inputs to the earth from the atmosphere have increased dramatically.
Current projects in Dr. Grimm's research group are 1) plant-microbe-soil interactions and nitrogen transformations in a riparian ecosystem (San Pedro River, AZ; SAHRA project); 2) nitrate retention (using stable isotope experiments) in urban, agricultural, and unmodified streams of the American Southwest (LINX-2 project); 3) biogeochemistry and hot spots of N transformation in urban landscapes; and 4) effects of urban atmospheric deposition on biogeochemical cycling in deserts (Urban BGC project).
Dr. Grimm is Co-Director of the Central Arizona-Phoenix Long-Term Ecological Research Project (CAP LTER), an ecological study of the Phoenix metropolitan area.
Selected Publications
Grimm, N.B., S. H. Faeth, N. E. Golubiewski, C. R. Redman, J. Wu, X. Bai, and J. M. Briggs. 2008. Global change and the ecology of cities. Science 319:756-760.
Grimm, N.B., D. Foster, P. Groffman, J.M. Grove, C. S. Hopkinson, K. Nadelhoffer, D. Peters, and D.E. Pataki. 2008. The changing landscape: ecosystem responses to urbanization and pollution across climatic and societal gradients. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 6:264-272
Harms, T. K., and N. B. Grimm. 2008. Hot spots and hot moments of carbon and nitrogen dynamics in a semi-arid riparian zone. Journal of Geophysical Research–Biogeosciences 113: G01020, doi:10.1029/2007JG000588.
Hall, S.J., D. Huber, and N.B. Grimm. 2008. Soil N2O and NO emissions from an arid, urban ecosystem. Journal of Geophysical Research–Biogeosciences 113: doi:10.1029/2007JG000523.
Kaye, J.P., A. Majumdar, C. Gries, A. Buyantuyev, N.B. Grimm, D. Hope, G.D. Jenerette, W. Zhu, and L. Baker. 2008. Hierarchical Bayesian scaling of soil properties across urban, agricultural, and desert ecosystems. Ecological Applications 18:132-145.
Lohse, K.A., D. Hope, R.A. Sponseller, J.O. Allen, and N.B. Grimm. 2008. Atmospheric deposition of carbon and nutrients across an arid metropolitan area. Science of the Total Environment
402:95-105.
Majumdar, A., J. P. Kaye, C. Gries, D. Hope, and N. B. Grimm. 2008. Hierarchical spatial modeling and prediction of multiple soil nutrients and carbon concentrations. Communications in Statistics – Simulation and Computation 37: 434–453. doi: 10.1080/03610910701792588.
McCrackin, M.L., T.K. Harms, N.B. Grimm, S. J. Hall, and J. P. Kaye. 2008. Responses of microbes to resource availability in urban, desert soils. Biogeochemistry 87:143-155.
Mulholland, P.J., A.M. Helton, G.C. Poole, R.O. Hall, Jr., S.K. Hamilton, B.J. Peterson, J.L. Tank, L. R. Ashkenas, L.W. Cooper, C.N. Dahm, W.K. Dodds, S. Findlay, S.V. Gregory, N.B. Grimm, S.L. Johnson, W.H. McDowell, J.L. Meyer, H.M. Valett, J.R. Webster, C. Arango, J.J. Beaulieu, M.J. Bernot, A.J. Burgin, C. Crenshaw, L. Johnson, B.R. Niederlehner, J.M. O’Brien, J.D. Potter, R.W. Sheibley, D.J. Sobota, and S.M. Thomas. 2008. Stream denitrification across biomes and its response to anthropogenic nitrate loading. Nature 452:202-205.
Peters, D.P.C., P.M. Groffman, K.J. Nadelhoffer, N.B. Grimm, S.L. Collins, W.K. Michener, and M. A. Huston. 2008. Living in an increasingly connected world: a framework for continental-scale environmental science. Frontiers in Ecology and then Environment 6:229-237.
Roach, W.J., J.B. Heffernan, N.B. Grimm, J.R. Arrowsmith, C. Eisinger and T. Rychener. 2008. Unintended Consequences of Urbanization for Aquatic Ecosystems: A Case Study from the Arizona Desert. BioScience 58:715-727. doi:10.1641/B580808
Shen, W., J. Wu, N.B. Grimm, J.F. Reynolds, and D. Hope. 2008. Effects of urbanization-induced environmental changes on desert ecosystem functioning. Ecosystems 11:138-155
Dent, C. L., N. B. Grimm, E. Martí, J. W. Edmonds, J. C. Henry, and J. R. Welter. 2007. Variability in surface-subsurface hydrologic interactions and implications for nutrient retention in an arid-land stream. Journal of Geophysical Research 112, G04004, doi:10.1029/2007JG000467.
Jacobs, S.M., J.S. Bechtold, H.C. Biggs, N.B. Grimm, S. Lorentz, M.E. McClain, R.J. Naiman, S.S. Perakis, G. Pinay, M.C. Scholes. 2007. Nutrient vectors and riparian processing: a review with special reference to African semiarid savanna ecosystems. Ecosystems 10:1231-1249.
Lewis, D.B., and N.B. Grimm. 2007. Hierarchical regulation of N export from urban catchments: interactions of storms and landscapes. Ecological Applications 17: 2347-2364.
Lewis, D.B., N.B. Grimm, T.K. Harms, and J.D. Schade. 2007. Subsystems, flowpaths, and the spatial variability of nitrogen in a fluvial ecosystem. Landscape Ecology 22: 911-924
Li, K., P. Zhang, J. C. Crittenden, S. Guhathakurta, Y. Chen, H. Fernando, A. Sawhney, P. McCartney, N. Grimm, R. Kahhat, H. Joshi, G. Konjevod, Y. J. Choi, E. Fonseca, B. Allenby, D. Gerrity, and P. M. Torrens. 2007. Development of a framework for quantifying the environmental impacts of urban development and construction practices. Environmental Science and Technology 41:5130-5136.
Meixner, T., A. K. Huth, P. D. Brooks, M. H. Conklin, N. B. Grimm, R. C. Bales, P. A. Haas, and J. R. Petti. 2007. Influence of shifting flow paths on nitrogen concentrations during monsoon floods, San Pedro River, Arizona. Journal of Geophysical Research–Biogeosciences 112, G03S03, doi:10.1029/2006JG000266.
Hope, D., C. Gries, D. Casagrande, C.L. Redman, N.B. Grimm, and C. Martin. 2006. Drivers of spatial variation in plant diversity across the Central Arizona-Phoenix ecosystem. Society and Natural Resources 19(2):101-116.
Jenerette, G.D., J. Wu, N.B. Grimm, and D. Hope. 2006. Points, patches and regions: Scaling soil biogeochemical patterns in an urbanized arid ecosystem. Global Change Biology 12:1532-1544.
Kaye, J.P., P. M. Groffman, N.B. Grimm, L.A. Baker, and R. Pouyat. 2006. A distinct urban biogeochemistry? Trends in Ecology and Evolution 21:192-199.
Lewis, D.B., J.D. Schade, A.K. Huth, and N.B. Grimm. 2006. The spatial structure of variability in a semi-arid, fluvial ecosystem. Ecosystems 9:386-397.
Zhu, W., D. Hope, C. Gries, and N.B. Grimm. 2006. Soil characteristics and the accumulation of inorganic nitrogen in an arid urban ecosystem. Ecosystems 9:711-724
Belnap, J., J. Welter, N.B. Grimm, N. Barger, and J. Ludwig. 2005. Linkages between microbial and hydrologic processes in arid and semi-arid watersheds. Ecology 86:298-307.
Grimm, N.B., R.W. Sheibley, C. Crenshaw, C.N. Dahm, W.J. Roach, and L. Zeglin. 2005. N retention and transformation in urban streams. Journal of the North American Benthological Society 24:626-642
Hope, D., Zhu, W., C. Gries, J. Oleson, J. Kaye, N.B. Grimm, L.A. Baker. 2005. Spatial variation in soil inorganic nitrogen across an urban ecosystem. Urban Ecosystems 8:251-273
Larson, E.K., N.B. Grimm, P. Gober, and C.L. Redman. 2005. The paradoxical ecology and management of water in the Phoenix, USA metropolitan area. Journal of Ecohydrology and Hydrobiology 5:287-296. (appeared in 2006 with pub date of 2005)
Schade, J.D., J.R. Welter, E. Martí, and N.B. Grimm. 2005. Hydrological exchange and N retention in an arid-land riparian ecosystem. Journal of the North American Benthological Society 24:19-28.
Shen, W., J. Wu, P.R. Kemp, J.F. Reynolds, and N.B. Grimm. 2005. Simulating the dynamics of productivity of a Sonoran ecosystem: model parameterization and validation. Ecological Modeling 189:1-24.
Welter, J.W., S.G. Fisher, and N.B. Grimm. 2005. Nitrogen transport and retention in an arid land watershed: influence of storm characteristics on terrestrial-aquatic linkages. Biogeochemistry 76:421-440.
Dodds, W.K., E. MartR, J.L. Tank, J. Pontius, S.K. Hamilton, N.B. Grimm, W.B. Bowden, W.H. McDowell, B.J. Peterson, H.M. Valett, J.R. Webster, and S. Gregory. 2004. Carbon and nitrogen stoichiometry and nitrogen cycling rates in streams. Oecologia 140:458-467.
Grimm, N.B., and C.L. Redman. 2004. Approaches to the study of urban ecosystems: the case of central Arizona-Phoenix. Urban Ecosystems 7:199-213.
Hope, D., M.W. Naegeli, A. Chan, and N.B. Grimm. 2004. Nutrients on asphalt parking surfaces in an arid urban environment. Water, Air and Soil Pollution: Focus 4:371-390.
Zhu, W., N.D. Dillard, and N.B. Grimm. 2004. Urban nitrogen biogeochemistry: status and processes in green retention basins. Biogeochemistry 71:177-196
Grimm, N.B., S. E. Gergel, W.H. McDowell, E.W. Boyer, C.L. Dent, P.M. Groffman, S.C. Hart, J.W. Harvey, C.A. Johnston, E. Mayorga, M. McClain, and G. Pinay. 2003. Merging aquatic and terrestrial perspectives of nutrient biogeochemistry. Oecologia 442: 485–501.
Hobbie J.E., S.R. Carpenter, N.B.Grimm, J.R. Gosz, and T.R. Seastedt. 2003. The US Long Term Ecological Research Program. BioScience 53:21-32.
Hope, D., C. Gries, W. Zhu, W.F. Fagan, C.L. Redman, N.B. Grimm, A. Nelson, C. Martin, and A. Kinzig. 2003. Socio-economics drive urban plant diversity. Proceeedings of the National Academy of Science 100:8788-8792.
McClain, M. E., E. W. Boyer, C. L. Dent, S. E. Gergel, N. B. Grimm, P. M. Groffman, S. C. Hart, J. W. Harvey, C. A. Johnston, E. Mayorga, W. H. McDowell, and G. Pinay. 2003. Biogeochemical hot spots and hot moments at the interface of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. Ecosystems 6:301-312.
Sanzone, D.M., J.L. Meyer, E. Marti, E.P. Gardiner, J.L. Tank, and N.B. Grimm. 2003. Carbon and nitrogen transfer from a desert stream to riparian predators. Oecologia 134:238-250
Webster, J.R., P.J. Mulholland, J.L. Tank, H.M. Valett, W.K. Dodds, B.J. Peterson, W.B. Bowden, C.N. Dahm, S. Findlay, S.V. Gregory, N.B. Grimm, S.K. Hamilton, S.L. Johnson, E. Martí, W.H. McDowell, J.L. Meyer, D.D. Morrall, S.A. Thomas, and W.M. Wollheim. 2003. Factors affecting nitrogen retention in streams – an inter-biome perspective. Freshwater Biology 48:1329-1352.