Joy Ward

Associate Professor
Plant Physiological Ecology and Global Change
Ph.D., Duke University
Phone: (785) 864-5218
Fax: (785) 864-5860

Ward Lab Webpage

Courses Taught

Biol 408 — Physiology of Organisms
Biol 409 — Physiology of Organisms Laboratory
Biol 420 — Topics in Global Change and Ecology
Biol 701 — Topics in Global Change: Ecological, Physiological, and Isotopic Approaches
Evrn 624 (IGERT course) — Climate Change, Ecological Change, Social Change

Awards and Honors

2009—2014. Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE); Nominated through NSF and conferred by President Obama on January 13, 2010

2009. Lawrence, KS Chamber of Commerce, KU Stars Award

2006—2014. Edward and Thelma Wohlgemuth Faculty Scholar Award. Endowed chair for early career faculty

1998—1999. American Association of University Women (AAUW). American Post-doctoral Fellowship

1997. Perry Prize awarded by the Department of Botany, Duke University, for the outstanding dissertation of that year

Research Interests

• Evolutionary responses of plants to changing CO₂over geologic time scales
• Physiology and genetics of glacial plants preserved within pack rat middens
• Effects of elevated CO₂ on plant flowering time
• Scaling plant evolutionary responses to ecosystem-scale processes
• Paleoecology of the Rancho La Brea tar pits in southern California
• Differential effects of climate change on the genders of dioecious species

Representative Publications

Gerhart, LM, JK Ward. 2010. Plant Responses to low [C02] of the past. Tansley Review. New Phytologist 188: 674-695

Lewis JD, JK Ward, DT Tissue. 2010. Phosphorus supply drives nonlinear responses of cottonwood (Populus deltoides) to glacial through future [CO2]. New Phytologist 187: 438-448

Nippert JB, MB Hooten, DR Sandquist, JK Ward. 2010. A Bayesian model for predicting El Niño events using tree-ring widths and cellulose d18O. Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences 115: G01011

Nippert JB, JJ Butler Jr, GJ Kluitenberg, DO Whittemore, D Arnold, SE Spal, JK Ward. 2010. Patterns of Tamarix water use during a record drought. Oecologia 162: 283-292

Gonzalez-Meler MA, E Blanc-Betes, CE Flower, JK Ward, N Gomez-Casanovas. 2009. Plastic and adaptive responses of plant respiration to changes in atmospheric CO2 concentration. Physiologia Plantarum 137: 473-484

Ward JK, DA Myers, RB Thomas. 2008. Physiological and growth responses of C3 and C4 plants to reduced temperature when grown at low CO2 of the last ice age. Journal of Integrative Plant Biology 50: 1388-1395

Springer CJ, RA Orozco, JK Kelly, JK Ward. 2008. Elevated CO2 influences the expression of floral-initiation genes in Arabidopsis thaliana. New Phytologist 178: 243-255

Marchin RM, EL Sage, JK Ward. 2008. Population-level variation of Fraxinus americana L. (white ash) is influenced by precipitation differences across the native range. Tree Physiology 28: 151-159

Springer CJ, JK Ward. 2007. Flowering time and elevated CO2. Tansley Review. New Phytologist 176: 243-255

Ward JK, JM Harris, TE Cerling, A Wiedenhoeft, MJ Lott, M-D Dearing, JB Coltrain, JR Ehleringer. 2005. Carbon starvation in glacial trees recovered from the La Brea tar pits. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 102: 690-694 (described in the New York Times)

Ward JK. 2005. Evolution and growth of plants in a low CO₂ world. In: A History of Atmospheric CO₂ and Its Effects on Plants, Animals, and Ecosystems, eds: Ehleringer J, T Cerling and D Dearing. Springer-Verlag, pp. 232-257.

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Current Postdoctoral Fellows

Juliana Meideros —IRACDA Fellow
Katie Becklin

Current Graduate Students

Laci Gerhart — Ph.D., SELF Fellow, IGERT Fellow
Charley Lewis —NIH PREP student
Michael Walkery — Ph.D. student