Limnology is the study of inland waters - lakes (both freshwater and saline), reservoirs, rivers, streams, wetlands, and groundwater - as ecological systems interacting with their drainage basins and the atmosphere. The limnological discipline integrates the functional relationships of growth, adaptation, nutrient cycles, and biological productivity with species composition, and describes and evaluates how physical, chemical, and biological environments regulate these relationships. Here at Tahoe, much of our limnology research is about Lakes. Our research summarizes how natural variability, long term change, and human activity have affected the lake's clarity, physics, chemistry, and biology. Lake Tahoe is unique, the forces and processes that shape it are the same as those acting in all natural ecosystems. As such, Lake Tahoe is an analog for other systems both in western U.S. and worldwide.

Related Research Projects

Clarity/Secchi
Microplastics
Mysis Shrimp
Dissolved Oxygen
UV/PAR
Periphyton
Periphyton Biomass Modeling
Upwelling
Gyres
Internal Waves
Metaphyton
Upper Truckee River Conceptual Model
Impacts of Landscape Scale Forest Change on Lake Tahoe
Sustainable Recreation
Light (Blueness)
Aquatic Invasive Species
Lake Mixing
Lake Currents
Lake Chemical Processes: Nutrients & Cycling
Distributed Detention Basins