Background
2004 Research Associate: ARC Discovery Grant - Mechanisms linking site water status and NPP of Australian woody ecosystems.
2004 Awarded PhD (Botany) at The University of Western Australia.
2002 Associate Lecturer: Coordination of peer assisted study sessions (PASS) for undergraduate students of biology at UWA (Biology 101).
1999 Research Fellow: Design and supervision of undergraduate laboratory classes in plant physiology at UWA (Botany 205).
1998 Awarded BSc with Honours (Natural Resource Management) at The University of Western Australia.
Research Interests
- Estimation of leaf area index and foliage clumping in forest canopies.
- Xylem hydraulic conductance and gas-exchange in trees.
- Estimation of net primary productivity in eucalypt woodland and forest.
Current project
Impact of alternative respiratory pathways on plant growth efficiency
Funding: UWA Research Grants Scheme ($17,000).
We recently implemented a stable oxygen isotope technique for estimating the contribution of the alternative oxidase respiratory pathway to total respiration in plant tissues. This pathway is less efficient than the cytochrome pathway at regenerating ATP. I will further develop this technique to enable the simultaneous estimation of growth efficiency from measurements of respiratory quotients. From these simultaneous measurements I will be able to quantify the contribution of inefficient respiration to inefficient growth and to test the hypothesis that changes in alternative oxidase activity underlie variation in growth efficiency with temperature in plants that are adapted to different growth temperatures.
Selected publications
Macfarlane C, Grigg A and Evangelista C (2007) Estimating forest leaf area using cover and fullframe fisheye photography: thinking inside the circle. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology. submitted October 2006
Macfarlane C, Hoffman M, Eamus D, Kerp N, Adams M A, Higginson S, McMurtrie R (2007) Estimation of leaf area index in eucalypt forest using digital photography. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology. accepted October 2006.
Adams M A, Bencini R and Macfarlane C (2006) Climate in Ecology: an Australian Persepctive. 2nd Revised Edition, (Eds Attiwill P and Wilson B), Oxford University Press, Oxford. ISBN: 0195550420
Criddle R S, Hansen L D, Smith B N, Macfarlane C, Church J N, Thygerson T, Jovanovic T and Booth T (2005) A thermodynamic law of adaptation of plants to environmental temperatures. Pure and Applied Chemistry, 77, 1425-1444.
Macfarlane C, Hansen L D, Edwards J, Adams M A and White D A (2005) Relation of relative growth rate to growth efficiency in growing shoots and roots of Eucalyptus globulus Labill. deprived of nitrogen or treated with salt. Tree Physiology, 25, 571-582.
Cullen, L E and Macfarlane C (2005) Comparison of cellulose extraction methods for analysis of stable-isotope ratios of carbon and oxygen in plant material. Tree Physiology, 25, 619-625.
Macfarlane C, Adams M A and White D A (2004) Productivity, carbon isotope discrimination and leaf traits of trees of Eucalyptus globulus Labill. are related to stand water balance. Plant, Cell and Environment, 27:1515-1524.
Macfarlane C, White D A and Adams M A (2004) The apparent feedforward response of stomata to vapour pressure deficit in droughted, field grown Eucalyptus globulus Labill. Plant, Cell and Environment, 27:1268-1280.
Hansen L D, Macfarlane C, McKinnon N, Smith B N and Criddle R S (2004) Use of calorespirometric ratios, heat per CO2 and heat per O2, to quantify metabolic paths and energetics of growing cells. Thermochimica Acta, 422:55-61.
White D A, Battaglia M, Macfarlane C, Mummery D, McGrath J F and Beadle C L. (2003) Selecting species for recharge management in Mediterranean south western Australia - some ecophysiological considerations. Plant and Soil, 257:283-293.
Adams M A, Macfarlane C and Bencini R (2003) Climate In Ecology: An Australian Perspective (P. M. Attiwill and B. Wilson (Eds.)), Oxford University Press, South Melbourne, pp. 36-53.
Macfarlane C, Adams M A and Hansen L D (2002) Application of an enthalpy balance model of the relation between growth and respiration to temperature acclimation of Eucalyptus globulus seedlings. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B, 269:1499-1507.
Hansen L D, Criddle R S, Smith B N and Macfarlane C (2002) A thermodynamic perspective on the relation between plant respiration and growth. Crop Science, 42:659.
Cherry M, Macfarlane C, Smethurst P and Beadle C (2001) Visual Guide to LAI of Eucalypt Plantations. Cooperative Research Centre for Sustainable Production Forestry, Hobart. 24 pp. ISBN 0 643 06797 3.
Macfarlane C, Coote M, White D A and Adams M A (2000) Photographic exposure affects indirect estimation of leaf area in plantations of Eucalyptus globulus Labill. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 100:155-168.
Macfarlane C, Warren C M, White D A and Adams M A (1999) Rapid and simple method for processing wood to crude cellulose for analysis of carbon isotope discrimination in tree rings. Tree Physiology, 19:831-836.
Macfarlane C and Adams M A (1998) delta13C of wood in growth-rings indicates cambial activity in drought- stressed trees of Eucalyptus globulus. Functional Ecology, 12:655-664. |
