I have research interests in two areas.  First, I am interested in how plasticity of photosynthetic and water use characters may affect the responses of tree species to environmental changes.  Second, I am interested in how terrestrial organic and biogenic materials can be used to reconstruct changes in past environments. Some of the techniques that I employ include analyses of isotope ratios of stable carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, and oxygen as well as instantaneous measures of gas exchange, fluorescence, and sapflow.  I analyze both plants and soils.

Terwilliger, V. J.  2007 (in press).  Review of Foundations of Biogeography: Classic Papers with Commentaries,  Mark Lomolino, Dov Sax, and James Brown, eds. Annals of the Association of American Geographers.

Terwilliger, V. J.  2003.  Influence of phenotypic plasticity in photosynthetic functions on the spatial distributions of tropical trees. Physical Geography  24:433-446.

Terwilliger, V. J., J. L. Betancourt, S. W. Leavitt, P. K. Van de Water.  2002. Leaf cellulose δD and δ18O trends with elevation differ in direction among co-occurring, semi-arid plant species. Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 66:3887-3900.

Terwilliger, V. J.  2002.  Comment on “A mechanistic model for interpretation of hydrogen and oxygen isotope ratios in tree-ring cellulose,” by J. S. Roden, G. Lin, and J. R. Ehleringer.  Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 66:729-731.

Terwilliger, V. J., K. Kitajima, D. J. Le Roux-Swarthout, S. Mulkey, and S. J. Wright.  2001.  Influences of heterotrophic and autotrophic resource use on carbon and hydrogen isotopic compositions of tropical tree leaves.  Isotopes in Environmental and Health Studies  37:133-160.

Terwilliger, V. J., K. Kitajima, D. J. Le Roux-Swarthout, S. S. Mulkey, and S. J. Wright. 2001. Intrinsic water-use efficiency and heterotrophic investment in tropical leaf growth of two Neotropical pioneer tree species as estimated from δ13C values. New Phytologist 152:267-281.

Le Roux-Swarthout, D. J., V. J. Terwilliger, and C. E. Martin. 2001. Deviation between δ13C and leaf intercellular CO2 in Salix interior cuttings developing under low light. International Journal of Plant Sciences 162:1017-1024.

Le Roux-Swarthout, D. J., V. J. Terwilliger, M. Christianson, C. E. Martin, and S. Madhavan.  2001.  Carbon isotopic ratios of atmospheric CO2 affect the δ13C values of heterotrophic growth in Nicotiana tabacum. Plant Science 160:563-570.