Meet The Team
Benton Taylor (he/him)
Principal Investigator
Assistant Professor
Organismic and Evolutionary Biology
The Arnold Arboretum
Our research focuses on how terrestrial ecosystems respond to various global change drivers such as rising CO2, nutrient pollution, human land use, and extreme weather events, and how these ecosystem responses, in turn, influence the trajectory of global change. Our work spans from tropical rainforests to the tundra and encompasses scales from physiology to ecosystems. The influence of symbiotic nitrogen-fixing plants on ecosystem dynamics, the below-ground responses of trees to elevated CO2, and the processes that drive soil carbon storage are particular foci of our work. We combine field and greenhouse experimental manipulations, large-scale observational studies, and global data analyses to illuminate the web of interactions between human activity, terrestrial ecosystem processes, and global change.
Contact Information
email: bentontaylor@fas.harvard.edu
Weld Hill Research Building
1300 Centre Street
Boston, MA 02131
Lindsay McCulloch (she/her)
Postdoctoral Fellow
Harvard University
Brown University, Ph.D.
Colgate University, B.S.
Lindsay is an ecologist interested in how species interact to affect biogeochemical cycles and ecosystem function. She uses greenhouse studies, field experiments, DNA sequencing, and quantitative analyses to probe how the environment (soil nutrient, water, and/or light availability) influence how plants interact with other organisms and the implications this has for forest function and global change.
Contact Information
email: lmcculloch@fas.harvard.edu
Weld Hill Research Building
1300 Centre Street
Boston, MA 02131
Cecilia Prada
Postdoctoral Fellow
Harvard University
Brown University, Ph.D.
Colgate University, B.S.
Ceci's research focuses on the influence of abiotic and biotic factors on tree species composition, distribution, and biogeochemical processes, with a specific emphasis on filling research gaps in soil-plant-fungi interactions in tropical forests.
Contact Information
email: cpradacordero@fas.harvard.edu
Weld Hill Research Building
1300 Centre Street
Boston, MA 02131
Calvin Heslop (he/him)
Graduate Student
Harvard University
University of Alaska Fairbanks, M.S.
Western Washington University, B.S.
Calvin is an ecosystem ecologist interested in the effects of nitrogen fixing plants on both above and below ground community structure and function. His research interests are focused on the linkage of the N and C cycle in high latitude ecosystems. More specifically, he studies how the N-fixing shrub Siberian alder influences community composition, N cycling, and C balance in arctic Alaska. He is also a proponent of information theoretic approaches to statistical inference in ecological research.
Contact Information
email: cheslop@g.harvard.edu
Weld Hill Research Building
1300 Centre Street
Boston, MA 02131
Nikhil Chari (he/him)
Graduate Student
Harvard University
UC Berkeley, B.S.
Nikhil is a Ph.D. student interested in carbon and nutrient cycling governing terrestrial ecosystems. His current research interrogates the relationships between climate change, plant root exudation, and soil organic matter dynamics.
Contact Information
email: nchari@g.harvard.edu
Weld Hill Research Building
1300 Centre Street
Boston, MA 02131
Carina Berlingeri (she/her)
Graduate Student
Harvard University
Cornell University, B.S.
Carina is engaged in several projects studying how different global change drivers (nutrient pollution, disturbance, and rising CO2) alter below-ground symbioses and plant resource-acquisition strategies. Her research is motivated by understanding how below-ground dynamics will influence ecosystem responses and processes in the face of global environmental change.
Contact Information
email: carinaberlingeri@g.harvard.edu
Weld Hill Research Building
1300 Centre Street
Boston, MA 02131
Lauren Church (she/her)
Research Assistant
Harvard University, B.A.
Lauren is a research assistant in the Taylor lab, and helps with sample processing, data analysis, as well as field work (her favorite part). Lauren completed her thesis in the Taylor lab looking at the impacts of fertilizer treatments on soil bacterial communities, plant health and soil nutrients. Her research interests include sustainable agriculture, global change biology, and human-environmental interactions.
Contact Information
email: laurenchurch@college.harvard.edu
Weld Hill Research Building
1300 Centre Street
Boston, MA 02131
Nick Daley (he/him)
Undergraduate Thesis Student
Harvard University
Nick is a senior at Harvard College completing his thesis in the Taylor lab. He spent his summer in northern Alaska collecting data on tundra plant community composition relative to alder.
Contact Information
email: ndaley@college.harvard.edu
Weld Hill Research Building
1300 Centre Street
Boston, MA 02131
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Alaina Bisson (she/her)
Research Assistant
University of Connecticut, M.S.
University of Connecticut, B.S.
As a research assistant in the Taylor Lab, Alaina assists with graduate student projects and data collection, management, and analysis. Alaina received her BS in Environmental Science from the University of Connecticut, where her independent research focused on soil carbon stability in Connecticut coastal wetlands. Alaina also received her MS in Natural Resources from the University of Connecticut, where her thesis focused on greenhouse gas dynamics at the surface-groundwater interface along stream corridors.
Contact Information
email: alainabisson@gmail.com
Weld Hill Research Building
1300 Centre Street
Boston, MA 02131
Anaí Morales (she/her)
Undergraduate Thesis Student
Harvard University
Anaí is a senior at Harvard College completing her thesis on native North American orchids and their mycorrhizal symbionts. This summer, she interned in the Molecular Ecology Lab at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, where she collected and processed data for several ongoing orchid conservation projects.