Speaker: Dr. Bin Wang (王斌；Oak Ridge National Laboratory)

Time: 10:00-11:30 a.m., October 20, 2023, GMT+8

Venue: College of Urban and Environmental Sciences Room 362

Abstract:

How do ecosystems and the Biosphere function? After a primitive view of the Biosphere as a “Super Organism”, we now understand the Biosphere and its rich variety of constituent ecosystems as complex adaptive systems. A hallmark of complex adaptive systems, as Nobel laureate P. W. Anderson succinctly put, is “More is Different” (SCIENCE 1972,4047:393-396). In other words, it is “emergence”. The overarching goal of this talk is to demonstrate this notion of emergence in terrestrial ecosystem functioning. Specifically, I will talk about examples of four subsystems: forest, microbiome, soil, and fine-root system. Integrating them together for whole-ecosystem emergence begets complexity. I argue to simplify it with “emergent formulae”.

Biography:

After a PhD at University of Virginia and a postdoc at UC Irvine, Bin Wang is en route to building a research program of data-model-learning the complexity and simplicity of ecosystems and the biosphere as complex adaptive systems to construct an integrative theory of ecosystems and the biosphere of a cross-scale and interdisciplinary nature towards the grand challenge of biosphere stewardship. Thinking globally, he strives to contribute to understanding the biosphere-atmosphere interactions. Acting locally, he focuses on ecosystem composition, structure, and functioning relationships with a balanced perspective of plants and microbes. His work appears in Global Change Biology, Soil Biology and Biochemistry, Ecological Applications, Ecological Modelling, Environmental Research Letters, Nature Geoscience, etc.

Source: College of Urban and Environmental Sciences