• Home
  • About us
  • People
  • Research
    • Projects >
      • Macro-scale drivers of Coastal Wetland Extent
      • Self-organization of karst wetlands and landscapes: Big Cypress Preserve
      • Landscape Resilience in the Florida Everglades
      • Urban Homogenization
      • StreamPULSE: Continental Scale Analysis of River Metabolism
      • Urban land use
      • Florida Springs
      • Sonoran Desert Wetlands
    • Topics >
      • River metabolism and nutrient cycling
      • Wetland resilience
      • Urban Ecosystems
    • Facilities
  • Teaching
    • Stream Ecology Syllabus
    • Ecological Resilience and Ecosystem Management Syllabus
    • Urban Ecology Syllabus
  • Publications
  • Joining the Lab
    • Positions currently available
    • MEMs in the lab
  • Links
  • Contact Dr. Heffernan
The Heffernan Lab at Duke University

Florida Springs (and other Rivers)

North Florida supports the highest density of large artesian springs in the world.  Fed by the karstic Floridan Aquifer, these springs and the rivers that flow from them support dense beds of aquatic vegetation, and are extremely stable in terms of flow, temperature, and chemistry.  Springs served as early model systems for studies of ecosystem energetics (Odum 1957), and our work builds on that tradition.  Like many other streams and rivers, they are also changing chemically and biologically.  Our research has addressed the causes of algal blooms in springs, used high-frequency measurements to understand interactions between metabolism and nutrient cycling, and quantified biogeochemical processes in groundwater based on the chemistry of springs.  
We have also used springs in comparative studies to understand the effects of terrestial organic matter on aquatic nutrient cycling.

Despite our intensive study of these systems, there is lots more to do.  We are also working to take approaches developed in springs and apply them to a variety of other ecosystems, including streams and rivers right here in North Carolina.
Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.