Environmental Internship Program - 2019 Booklet

Kasey Bowyer ’21
NEUROSCIENCE
Certificate: Environmental Studies
CLIMATE CHANGE AND
ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE
PROJECT TITLE
Impacts of Sea-Level Rise
on the Halogenated Organic
Compound Production in
Mangrove Ecosystems*
ORGANIZATION(S)
Myneni Group, Department
of Geosciences,
Princeton University
LOCATION(S)
Princeton, New Jersey;
Menlo Park, California
MENTOR(S)
Satish Myneni,
Professor of Geosciences;
Danielle Schlesinger, Ph.D.
candidate, Geosciences
I worked to understand how increasing sea-level
rise has affected the production of halogenated
organic compounds in various coastal
environments, including mangroves. Bromide
and chloride from seawater react with organic
carbon in the soil to create compounds called
organohalogens. Organohalogens are toxic to
plant and animal life in local ecosystems and
catalytically destructive to the stratospheric
ozone layer, which contributes to global
warming. However, the relationship between
organohalogen production and sea-level rise
is not well understood. I studied soil and leaflitter
samples from coastal mangrove forests
in Panama, Punta Galeta and Bocas del Toro.
I performed synchrotron analyses (XANES
and microspectroscopy), along with X-ray
fluorescence (XRF), to identify the speciation of
organochlorine and organobromine compounds
in the samples and to determine the degree to
which halogenation reactions are occurring in
mangrove ecosystems. The Myneni Group also
is interested in how this reaction occurs and
what catalyzes it. I studied the role of iron redox
chemistry in catalyzing halogenation reactions
by incubating soils with various naturally
occurring substances.
* This internship is connected to the PEI Water
and the Environment Grand Challenges project,
“Impacts of Sea-Level Rise and Associated
Saltwater Intrusion on the Coastal Biogeochemical
Processes and Greenhouse Gas Emissions.”
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