What is the Climate & Ecosystem Science research cluster?
The Climate & Ecosystem Science research cluster at Case Western Reserve University works to understand how a changing planet impacts its inhabitants and how they in turn shape it—and find ways to then mitigate those effects.
The cluster brings together researchers who integrate field observations, lab experiments and modeling to investigate changing organisms in changing ecosystems. Cluster members study sites ranging from Ohio to the Arctic, land to ocean, and the geological past to modern-day Earth. They investigate processes that play out across scales that vary over orders of magnitude—from nanometers to kilometers, seconds to millennia, and molecules to ecosystems. By working across these diverse data streams, members of the Climate & Ecosystem Science cluster seek to understand the drivers, the mechanisms, the limits, and the consequences of biological response to change.
Problems that Climate & Ecosystem Science is Working to Solve
Labs in the Climate & Ecosystem Science cluster share an interest in the role of microbial organisms as ecosystem engineers. Cluster members are interested in microbes as environmental tracers, as organic synthesis labs, as biodegraders, as symbionts supporting human and soil health, and as agents of ecosystem resilience and change. The team connects this interest to expertise in isotope chemistry, bioinformatics, molecular separation, and artificial intelligence/machine learning to tackle pressing problems like these:
- How resilient are Earth's climate and ecosystems to tipping points and what are the potential environmental impacts?
- How does Earth respond to climate and carbon cycle feedbacks over timescales from tens to millions of years?
- What triggers algal blooms to produce toxins?
- Are there novel algal toxins with therapeutic potential?
- How will electrification of transportation and greening of the power grid influence urban air quality and public health?
- How can we track nutrient cycling in natural and disturbed environments?
- How do contaminants transform and persist across environments? What shapes their risks?
- How can infrastructure be designed to promote healthy microbiomes?
- How do microbes respond to environmental change?
- What stabilizes microbial ecosystems, and what sets the bounds of that stability?
Explore Climate & Ecosystem Science Collaborations
Climate & Ecosystem Science News
-
October 19, 2026A changing planet transforms the life within it. That life, in turn, transforms the planet. Case Western Reserve researchers are studying the relationships from every angle -
September 23, 2026This story is the first in a series introducing the research, people and building that will define Case Western Reserve’s next chapter of discovery. Over the coming weeks, we’ll go inside each of the seven research clusters and the resources that make the work possible.Editor's note: This story was… -
June 29, 2026Case Western Reserve University-led study with Ohio State University and DOE Joint Genome Institute reveals how often microbes trade genes—and what it means for climate change
Contact Us
To learn more about Climate & Ecosystem Science, contact cluster faculty lead Sarah Bagby or meet the team of researchers.