Sherri Heck

Graduate Research Assistant
TIIMES - EOL - ASP
BEACHON

Contact Information:
PO Box 3000, Boulder, CO 80307-3000
Office: FL2 - 3106f & Jeffco
Telephone: 303-497-8284 & Jeffco: 303-497-1079
Email: sheck@ucar.edu
Home Page / EOL Home Page

Project Summary:

Carbon Dioxide Instrumentation, Data Analysis, Education and Outreach in Kenya, Africa and Navajo Reservation, US

Principle Investigators: Sherri L. Heck, University of Colorado & Britton Stephens, NCAR

Click on picture to view the entire figure.

The Breathing Forest: Exploring the Carbon Cycle and Climate Change in the Classroom using Rocky RACCOON carbon dioxide data.

I am a graduate student in the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences at the University of Colorado, Boulder working on my doctoral thesis with Dr. Britton Stephens of TIIMES and EOL.  My research entails a combination of studying regional carbon dioxide surface fluxes of forest ecosystems in complex terrain and an education and outreach (E&O) component.  I am focusing on underrepresented people in terms of the E&O and under-sampled areas in terms of the carbon dioxide data.

In October 2007, in cooperation with the Bureau of Indian Affairs and Marnie Carroll, the Dinè (Navajo) College Environmental Science Director, we deployed the Autonomous Robust CO2 Analyzer (AIRCOA, designed by Britt Stephens and Andy Watt) at Roof Butte on the Navajo Nation in Northeastern Arizona in order to determine the regional carbon dioxide surface fluxes in this southwestern mountainous area.

In 2008, a second carbon dioxide analyzer will be deployed atop Mount Kenya, Africa in order to study the regional carbon dioxide fluxes at this mountain site and to also help fill a key gap in available African carbon dioxide data.  This project is in cooperation with Mr. John Mwikya, Deputy Principal, of the University of Nairobi and Ngotho Nyaga Ephantus, Deputy Director of the Kenya Meteorological Department.

In partnership with The Digital Library for Earth System Education (DLESE) and the Earth Exploration Toolbook (EET), I have created curriculum that utilizes the data from each of our sites entitled “The Breathing Forest: Exploring the Carbon Cycle and Climate Change in the Classroom using Rocky RACCOON carbon dioxide data”

Website: Rocky Raccoon: Using Data to explore Carbon in the Rocky Mountains