Sophie Comer-Warner

Sophie Comer-Warner, a person with short, curly hair on one side and shaved hair on the other wears a patterned shirt with swirling blue, pink, and white designs, standing indoors against a softly blurred background

Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Geography & Environmental Systems
211-C Sondheim Hall

scomerwa@umbc.edu

Research Interests:

Aquatic Biogeochemistry (biogeochemical cycling and greenhouse gas fluxes), Rivers/Estuaries, Coastal Wetlands, Environmental Pollution (Legacy and Emerging Contaminants), Nutrient Pollution, Micro- and Nanoplastic Pollution, Global Environmental Change, Climate Change, Land Use and Land Cover Change

 

Key Themes:

  1. Unravelling drivers of microbial-biogeochemical cycling in coastal watersheds across land-use gradients and in response to global environmental change (Climate change and land use and land cover change)
  2. Understanding effects of global environmental change on coastal wetland biogeochemistry and ecosystem function
  3. Understanding the fate and transport of emerging contaminants in coastal watersheds and wetlands

 

Recent Research Activities:

The transport and fate of tire wear particles in watersheds and subsequent impacts on ecosystem function

Effects of land-use gradients on microbial-biogeochemical cycling in coastal watersheds

Effects of saltwater intrusion on belowground carbon storage and greenhouse gas fluxes in Peruvian mangrove forests

Diagnosing controls of pollution hot spots and hot moments and their impact on catchment water quality (SMARTWATER)

Is tropical deforestation contributing to the rise in atmospheric methane? (DefMet)

 

Selected Publications:

A full list of publications are available on google scholar (‪Sophie Comer-Warner – ‪Google Scholar)

Wu, W., Comer-Warner, S.A., Peacock, M., Xingxing, H., Li, S., Ju, X., Liu, C., Smith, P. and Yan, Z. (2024) IPCC Emission Factor Overestimates N2O Emissions from Agricultural Ditches. Environmental Science and Technology, 58(45), 20019-20029.

Comer-Warner, S. A., Ullah, S., Dey, A., Stagg, C. L., Elsey-Quirk, T., Swarzenski, C. M., Sgouridis, F., Krause, S. and Chmura, G. L. (2024) Elevated temperature and nutrients lead to increased N2O emissions from salt marsh soils from cold and warm climates. Biogeochemistry,167(1), 21-37.

Wu, W., Niu, X., Yan, Z., Li, S., Comer-Warner, S. A., Tian, H., Li, S., Zou, J., Yu, G. and Liu, C. (2023) Agricultural ditches are hotspots of greenhouse gas emissions controlled by nutrient input. Water Research, 242, 120271.

 

Comer-Warner, S. A., Ullah, S., Ampuero Reyes, W., Krause, S., and Chmura, G. (2022) Spartina alterniflora has the highest methane emissions in a St. Lawrence estuary salt marsh. Environmental Research: Ecology, 1(1), 011003. 

 

Comer-Warner, S. A., Nguyen, A. T. Q., Nguyen, M. N., Wang, M., Turner, A., Le, H., Sgouridis, F., Krause, S., Kettridge, N., Nguyen, N., Hamilton, R. L. and Ullah, S. (2022) Restoration impacts on rates of denitrification and greenhouse gas fluxes from tropical coastal wetlands. Science of the Total Environment, 803, 149577. 

 

Comer-Warner, S., Gooddy, D. C., Ullah, S., Glover, L., Kettridge, N., Wexler, S. K., Kaiser, J. and Krause, S. (2020) Seasonal variability of sediment controls of nitrogen cycling in an agricultural stream. Biogeochemistry, 148(1), 31-48. 

Comer-Warner, S., Gooddy, D. C., Ullah, S., Glover, L., Percival, A., Kettridge, N. and Krause, S. (2019) Seasonal variability of sediment controls of carbon cycling in an agricultural stream. Science of the Total Environment, 688, 732-741. 

 

Romeijn, P., Comer-Warner, S. A., Ullah, S., Hannah, D. M. and Krause, S. (2019) Streambed organic matter controls on carbon dioxide and methane emissions from streams. Environmental Science and Technology, 53(5), 2364-2374. 

 

Comer-Warner, S., Romeijn, P., Gooddy, D. C., Ullah, S., Kettridge, N., Marchant, B., Hannah, D. M. and Krause, S. (2018) Thermal sensitivity of CO2 and CH4 emissions varies with streambed sediment properties. Nature Communications, 9(1), 2803. 

 

Blaen, P., Brekenfeld, N., Comer-Warner, S. and Krause, S. (2017) Multitracer field fluorometry: Accounting for temperature and turbidity variability during stream tracer tests. Water Resources Research, 53(11), 9118-9126. 

 

Blaen, P., Khamis, K., Lloyd, C., Comer-Warner, S., Ciocca, F., Thomas, R. M., MacKenzie, A. R. and Krause, S. (2017) High-frequency monitoring of catchment nutrient exports reveals highly variable storm event responses and dynamic source zone activation. JGR: Biogeosciences, 122(9), 2265-2281.

Prospective Students

If you are interested in working with me (both prospective graduate students and undergraduate researchers), please reach out to me.