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Professor of Environmental Science Richard Bowden presented a poster, “Temperate Forest Soils Sequester as much Carbon as Trees in Response to Nitrogen Deposition,” at the National Science Foundation Long-Term Ecological Research Program All-Scientists Meeting in Estes Park, Colorado.  This 20-year project at the Harvard Forest Long-Term Ecological Research Site—which includes colleagues from the University of New Hampshire, the University of Michigan, Boston University, the University of Hawaii, Michigan Tech, the University of Massachusetts, Oregon State, the University of California-Santa Cruz, and Cornell—indicates that in temperate forests, nitrogen deposition from acid rain can increase storage of soil organic matter by decreasing rates of decomposition, thus influencing the chemistry of the atmosphere.  However, reductions in rates of organic matter decomposition may ultimately reduce forest productivity.