A session entitled 'Ecology in the Critical Zone" will take place at the Ecological Society of America (ESA) 2015 Meeting held  from August 9 to 14, 2015 in Baltimore, Maryland.  The session is scheduled for Tuesday, August 11, 2015 from 1:30PM to 5:00PM. The session, organized by Kathleen Lohse and Whendee Silver, will feature a number of CZO speakers.  

The critical zone is the Earth's heterogeneous thin outer veneer extending from the top of the canopy to the base of weathered bedrock and sustains life through its provision of critical zone services such as climate regulation and water purification. Ecological processes are integral to critical zone processes, yet little integration of the field of ecology has taken place in critical zone science and observatories. The goal of this symposium is to bridge the gap between critical zone science and ecology and attract more ecologists to the critical zone observatories and critical zone science by highlighting key insights provided by ecologists in the critical zone and gaps in critical zone science that could be filled by ecologists-- thus the need for them in this frontier.