People

Potkay, Aaron

Rutgers University, NJ, Ph.D. Candidate in Earth & Planetary Sciences, expected 2021
University of Texas at Austin, TX, M.S. in Geotechnical Engineering, 2017
- Masters Thesis: "Flow Processes in Unsaturated, Expansive Soils"
Virginia Tech, VA, B.S. in Civil & Environmental Engineering, 2015

Richard K. Olsson Award for Excellence in Research from Rutgers’ Geoscience, 2020
Rutgers Graduate Program in Geological Science Excellence Fellowship: Fall 2017 - Spring 2019
CUASHI 2018 Pathfinder Fellowship
- Project: "Developing a Whole-Plant Hydraulics Model along Soil-Root-Stem-Leaf-Atmosphere Continuum"

Vegetation and groundwater: How do soil- and ground-water dynamics drive changes in transpiration, carbon storage, growth, and allocation? What are the physiological limits and environmental drivers of rooting depth and distribution?
Plant physiological traits: How do plants optimize their efficiencies within the limits of genotypic variation and environmental constraints? How will their strategies adapt to a changing environment? How do (or should) plant traits scale with size? How does plant vasculature (both xylem and phloem, which transport water and sugars, respectively) fit into optimality theories?
Water-stress and forest mortality: How do forests respond to meteorological and hydrological droughts? What are the limits to tree size? How does a tree's access to water and its water-use (through both xylem and phloem pathways) control its productivity, size, and vulnerability to mortality?

Potkay, A., Trugman, A., Wang, Y., Venturas, M.D., Anderegg, W.R.L., Mattos, C.R., Fan, Y. 2021. Coupled whole-tree optimality and xylem-hydraulics explain dynamic biomass partitioning. New Phytologist.
Potkay, A., ten Veldhuis, M.C., Fan, Y., Mattos, C.R.C., Ananyev, G., Dismukes, G.C. 2019. Water and Vapor Transport in Algal‐Fungal Lichen: Modeling constrained by Laboratory Experiments, an application for Flavoparmelia caperata. Plant, Cell & Environment.
Potkay, A. 2017. One-dimensional seepage in unsaturated, expansive soils. Vadose Zone J.
16(11).
Zornberg, J.G., Armstrong, C.P., Potkay, A. 2017. Implementation of centrifuge testing of
expansive soils for pavement design. FHWA/TX-17/5-6048-03-1. Center for Transportation
Research, UT Austin.

Potkay, A., Trugman, A.T., Yang, Y., Venturas, M., Anderegg, W., Mattos, C.R.C., Fan, Y. 2020. "Coupled whole-tree optimality and xylem-hydraulics explain carbon allocation under drought" - Fall 2020 AGU Meeting
Mattos, C.R.C., Mazzochini, G.G., Hirota, M., Oliveira, R.S., Potkay, A., Miguez-Macho, G., Fan, Y. 2020. "Assessing belowground hydrologic controls on vegetation activity across Amazônia" - Fall 2020 AGU Meeting
Swenson, S.C., Potkay, A., Fan, Y., Clark, M.P., Lawrence, D.M. 2019. "Implementing Hillslope-scale Hydrology in the Community Terrestrial Systems Model: Do hillslope-scale hydrologic processes affect predictions of global environmental change?" - San Francisco, CA, Fall 2019 AGU Meeting
Potkay, A., ten Veldhuis, M.C., Fan, Y., Ananyev, G., Dismukes, G. 2018. "Understanding Water and Gas Transport in Algal-Fungal Symbionts: Integrating Laboratory Experiments and Numerical Modeling of Lichens" - Washington D.C., Fall 2018 AGU Meeting