Amy Kochsiek

Education:

B.A. Biology, Environmental Studies Concentration
St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota, 2000

Ph.D. in Biological Sciences (Ecology, Evolution and Behavior Section)
University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2010

Areas of interest:

Courses taught: Introductory Biology (101), Ecology and Evolution of the Organism (121), Zoology (330), Ecology (342)

Research interests: I am a global change ecologist with expertise in the relationships between plants, soil, and the atmosphere. My research interests are broad, and I have
experience in temperate grasslands, conventional agricultural systems, as well as the Old World tropics.

I received my Ph. D. in 2010 under the supervision of Dr. Johannes Knops at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Much of my dissertation primarily focused on plant litter carbon cycling and its relation to carbon storage in conventionally managed corn-soybean systems. For my post-doctoral work I was interested in exploring new ecosystems, which lead me to my position with Dr. Sabrina Russo. We investigated determinants of the growth-survival trade-off along gradients in belowground resources, in relation to edaphic specialization of tropical tree species in Malaysian Borneo.

Publications:

Kochsiek, A., and J.M.H. Knops. 2012. Maize cellulosic biofuels: soil carbon loss can be a hidden cost of residue removal. Global Change Biology Bioenergy. 4(2).

Kochsiek, A., Knops, J.M.H., Walters, D., and T. Arkebauer. 2009. Impacts of management on decomposition and the litter carbon balance in irrigated and rainfed no-till agricultural systems. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology. 149: 1983-1993.

Kochsiek, A., Ciganda, V., Bryan, N., Hite, L., and T. Awada. 2006. Ecophysiological responses of Schizachyrium scoparium to water and nitrogen manipulations. Great Plains Research. 16(1):29-36.

Kochsiek, A., Knops, J.M.H., Walters, D., Arkebauer, T. and C. Brassil. In review.. Litter-C pool accretion in three no-till agricultural systems. Soil Science Society of America Journal.

Kochsiek, A. and J.M.H. Knops. In review. Impacts of inorganic nitrogen addition on the decomposition of litter and soil organic matter. British Journal of Environment &
Climate Change.

Kochsiek, A., Tan, S. and S. Russo. In review. Fine root dynamics in relations to nutrients in oligotrophic Bornean forest soils. Oecologia.

*Olney, J., Kochsiek, A., Tan, S. and S. Russo. In prep. Do tree species in a Bornean mixed Dipterocarp forest display preferential uptake of different nitrogen forms.

*Undergraduate lead author