Sherry Schiff

• Cycling of key elements in lakes, rivers, forests and agricultural watersheds
• Impacts of climate change and agriculture on aquatic ecosystems
• Development and use of novel tracers, such as stable isotopes and artificial sweeteners, for following impacts on surface water and groundwater
• Indicators of climate change in high arctic and subarctic systems

Professor Schiff's research interest lies in the field of watershed biogeochemistry.

Current projects focus on environmental problems including the impact of nutrients and climate change on aquatic ecosystems. She also studies the effects of agricultural and other anthropogenic inputs on the combined biogeochemical cycles of oxygen, nitrogen, iron, sulfur and phosphorus in eutrophic ecosystems; carbon dioxide and methane cycling in both natural and modified boreal lakes and wetlands and climate change in subarctic and high arctic systems

These projects most often require a multi-disciplinary approach combining the talents of team specialists in biogeochemistry, hydrology, and ecology.

Special interests include the development and use of isotopic tools (stable and radioactive) and other tracers to supplement the more traditional geochemical techniques utilized in watershed studies.

For graduate student and researcher opportunities, please visit the Environmental Geochemistry website.

Professor Schiff's course offerings have included:

• EARTH 221: Introduction to Geochemistry

• EARTH 436/499: Honours BSc thesis/project

• EARTH 622: Isotope Hydrology and Geochemistry

• EARTH 642: Geolimnology

Selected publications in the past five years include:

• Venkiteswaran JJ, Schiff SL, Taylor WD. 2015. Separating urban and agricultural impacts on aquatic metabolism along the 300 km Grand River, Canada. Freshwater Science, FSW-S-13-00130 

• Snider DM, JJ Venkiteswaran, SL Schiff, J Spoelstra. 2015. From the Ground Up:  Nitrous Oxide Sources are Constrained by Stable Isotope Values. PLoS ONE.

• Venkiteswaran JJ, Schiff SL and MB Wallin, 2014.  Large Carbon Dioxide Fluxes from Headwater Boreal and Sub-Boreal Streams. PloS ONE 9(7).

• Spoelstra J, SL Schiff and SJ Brown. 2013. Artificial sweeteners in a large Canadian river reflect human consumption in the watershed. PLoS ONE 8(12).

• Rosamond MS, Thuss SJ and SL Schiff.  2012. Heavily impacted temperate rivers are overestimated in the global N2O budget.  Nature Geoscience. 5 715-718.

​Please see Sherry Schiff's Google Scholar profile for a current list of her peer-reviewed articles.

• 2007-2014 University Research Chair in Watershed Biogeochemistry, University of Waterloo
• 1992 Lindeman Award for Outstanding Paper by Young Scientist:  American Society of Limnology & Oceanography

• Member, The Water Institute
• Member, Interdisciplinary Centre on Climate Change
• Member, Cold Regions Research Centre (Wilfrid Laurier University)
• Cross-appointed to the Department of Biology
• Waterloo Centre for Microbial Research (member)

The following news stories have featured Professor Schiff's research:

• October 21, 2015 Earth and Environmental Sciences’ graduate student wins President’s Outstanding Scholar-Athlete Award

• December 18, 2013 University of Waterloo scientists find artificial sweeteners in Grand River

1987 PhD Geological Sciences, Columbia University, New York, NY

1984 MPhil Geological Sciences, Columbia University, New York, NY

1981 MA Geological Sciences, Columbia University, New York, NY

1978 BSc Hons, Chemistry, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada