Department of Biology

Welcome to our newest faculty member

Posted on December 18, 2020

Jim Coleman, provost

Dr. Jim Coleman

Provost & Executive Vice Chancellor and Professor of Biology

Provost Coleman joined the UNCG Department of Biology in July 2020 while he simultaneously assumed the leadership position of Provost of UNC Greensboro. Jim has a strong research record in biology, and as we have come to know him, understand that he also has a fondness for his pet dogs. He is shown here with Annie.  Jim describes his vast research accomplishments as follows:

“I currently serve as the Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor at UNCG.  I am also a plant physiological ecologist. Most recently, my research focused on the effects of environmental change, particularly elevated CO2 and how elevated CO2 interacts with changes in temperature patterns, nutrients and water to affect plant physiology and performance, plant communities, ecosystem productivity, and carbon and nutrient flux.

I also

1.) investigated how plant anatomical and physiological development underlie the susceptibility of plants to abiotic and biotic stresses (e.g., vasculature connections can control induced responses of plants to herbivory or heat stress; demonstration of how leaf physiological development affects susceptibility of leaves to herbivores and pathogens; and demonstrating that the important role that leaf expansion plays in estimating ecosystem level herbivory);

2.) integrated whole plant developmental patterns (i.e., allometry) in understanding whether plants allocate resources to different  plant organs to optimize the capture of light, nutrients and water;

3) examined the physiological and evolutionary ecology of low molecular weight plant heat shock proteins (hsps), and, in doing so, our lab was the first lab to demonstrate a physiological function of these hsps in protecting photosystem II during heat stress; and

4.) used a sophisticated mass balance facility to understand the ecosystem level flux  of mercury.

I have been PI, Co-PI administrative PI, or co lead in the development of proposals that garnered over $250 million in grants and contracts for either my research or for institutional research infrastructure.  I am also a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.”