Benjamin Houlton
Ronald P. Lynch Dean, Office of the Dean
Professor, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Professor, Department of Global Development

Benjamin Z. Houlton is the Ronald P. Lynch Dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and a Cornell University professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology as well as Global Development. Houlton began his term on Oct. 1, 2020, as the 12th Cornell CALS dean. He serves as co-chair of Cornell’s 2030 Project: A Climate Initiative, mobilizing practical solutions that mitigate the impacts of climate change.
As a premier institution of scientific learning and discovery, Cornell CALS is a world leader in tackling the complex challenges of our time with a culture of interdisciplinary understanding and collaboration. It is home to Cornell University’s second largest total college population, with 3,600 undergraduate students, 1,020 affiliated graduate students, 350 faculty and 1,000 staff. The college offers 20+ majors and 40+ minors, managed by 16 academic departments and two schools. In fiscal year 2021, CALS led Cornell’s Ithaca campus with a total of $238 million in research expenditures.
Ben has published more than 130 works including peer-reviewed scientific articles, book chapters and published abstracts. An accomplished international scientist, his research interests include global ecosystem processes, climate change solutions, and agricultural sustainability. Ben’s work has been published in leading scientific journals such as Nature, Science, Nature Climate Change, and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and has been covered by news media including the New York Times, Scientific American, NPR, The Christian Science Monitor, Discovery News, MSNBC/Today and the BBC. As part of his mission to connect scientific discovery with the public, he is also a frequent guest on regional and national news programs.
Ben is co-founder of The N3gative Company, which is empowering farmers and land managers with the tools to create, verify, and exchange permanent carbon dioxide removal in soil. The company’s approach will scale up permanent carbon dioxide removal in soils around the world to remove millions to billions of tons of carbon dioxide each year while also improving agricultural productivity. He is also founding principal investigator for the Working Lands Innovation Center, where he directs approximately 100 acres of farmland carbon sequestration projects to improve crop yields and create new financial markets for farmers and ranchers. He is a member of the Boyce Thompson Institute’s Board of Directors, serves on the eCornell and External Education Advisory Board and on the SUNY Cannabis Taskforce, and is a Cornell-appointed director for the Friends of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Ben is also the editor of Global Biogeochemical Cycles published by the American Geophysical Union, the world's largest society promoting geophysical endeavors of Earth and space scientists. As dean, he shares responsibility for leadership of Cornell Cooperative Extension throughout New York state with the College of Human Ecology.
Prior to joining Cornell, Ben served on the UC Davis faculty since 2007, teaching global environmental studies with a co-appointment in the UC Agriculture Experiment Station. He also led their John Muir Institute of the Environment, bringing together more than 300 faculty affiliates, 350 postdoctoral researchers, staff, and students from across the university with the goal of devising innovative solutions to the environmental sustainability challenges of the 21st century. As part of the institute, he led the new OneClimate “Big Idea,” an inter-disciplinary, team-based approach to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and help people, ecosystems, and agriculture adapt to an uncertain climate future. Ben served as faculty director of two diversity, equity and inclusion programs at UC Davis – EnvironMentors and SEEDS – and supported the launch of GOALS (Girls’ Outdoor Adventure in Leadership and Science) at the Muir Institute. He also worked with California tribes to empower the application of indigenous knowledge in agricultural and environmental sustainability. He has served as a scientific advisor to a Rockefeller Foundation and World Wildlife Fund project on sustainable agriculture, human nutrition, and climate solutions.
Ben received his B.S. from the University of Wisconsin – Stevens Point in Water Chemistry, an M.S. from Syracuse University in Environmental Engineering Science, and a Ph.D. from Princeton University in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. He spent two years working as a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford University and the Carnegie Institution for Science at Stanford before joining the UC Davis faculty. Ben is the recipient of the Gene E. Likens Award from the Ecological Society of America, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Young Investigator Award, and the NSF-CAREER award.
Ben grew up in Wisconsin and Minnesota, solidifying his dedication to the environment at a young age while camping with his family throughout the Midwest and spending time on his great aunt and uncle’s dairy farm. His family legacy in agriculture spans the dairy, poultry, and grain commodities, and still includes one remaining family dairy farm in Kansas. He can often be found fly fishing, running, traveling internationally, and coaching his kids’ soccer teams in his spare time.
Education
- B.S., University of Wisconsin – Stevens Point, College of Natural Resources (Water Chemistry, Chemistry Minor)
- M.S., Syracuse University (Environmental Engineering Science)
- Ph.D., Princeton University (Ecology and Evolutionary Biology)
Interests
Global ecosystem processes
Climate change solutions
Agricultural sustainability
Awards & Honors
- NSF-CAREER Award Recipient (2012 – 2017) “…the most prestigious awards in support of junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholar through outstanding research, excellent teaching and the integration of education and research within the context of the mission of their organizations.”
- Gene E. Likens Award (ESA) for the most outstanding paper published in the Biogeosciences (for Houlton et al., PNAS, 2006) (2007)
Selected Publications
- Peng, J., Wang, Y. P., Houlton, B. Z., Dan, L., Pak, B., & Tang, X. Global carbon sequestration is highly sensitive to model-based formulations of nitrogen fixation. Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 34(1), e2019GB006296 (2020).
- Khalsa, S. D. S., Smart, D. R., Muhammad, S., Armstrong, C. M., Sanden, B. L., Houlton, B. Z., & Brown, P. H. Intensive fertilizer use increases orchard N cycling and lowers net global warming potential. Science of The Total Environment, 137889 (2020).
- Xu, P., Chen, A., Houlton, B. Z., Zeng, Z., Wei, S., Zhao, C., et al. Spatial variation of reactive nitrogen emissions from China's croplands codetermined by regional urbanization and its feedback to global climate change. Geophysical Research Letters, 47, e2019GL086551 (2020).
- Houlton, B. Z., Almaraz, M., Aneja, V.,Austin, A. T., Bai, E., Cassman, K. G.et al. A world of cobenefits: Solving the global nitrogen challenge. Earth's Future,7, 865-872 (2019).
- Houlton, B. Z., Morford, S. L., Dahlgren, R. A., Convergent evidence for widespread rock nitrogen sources in Earth’s surface environment. Science (Research Article) Vol. 360, Issue 6384, 58-62 (2018).
- Lennon, E., Houlton B. Z., Coupled molecular and isotopic evidence for denitrifier controls over terrestrial nitrogen availability. Nature-ISMEJ (2017).
- Houlton, B. Z., Marklein A. R., and Bai E. Representation of nitrogen in climate change forecasts Nature Climate Change 5 (5): 398-401 (2015).
- Morford, S, Houlton, B. Z., and Dahlgren, R. A., Increased forest nitrogen and carbon storage from nitrogen-rich bedrock. Nature 477, 78-81 (2011).
- Houlton, B. Z., and Bai, E., Imprint of denitrifying bacteria on the global terrestrial biosphere. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS) 106 (51): 21713 - 21716 (2009).
- Wang, Y. P., and Houlton, B. Z., Estimates of global nitrogen fixation: Implications for global climate change. Geophysical Research Letters 36: L24403 (2009).
- Houlton, B. Z., Wang, Y. P., Vitousek, P. M., and Field, C. B., A unifying framework for dinitrogen fixation in the terrestrial biosphere. Nature 454 (7202): 327-U34 (2008).
- Houlton, B. Z., Sigman, D. M., Schuur, E. A., and Hedin, L. O., A climate-driven switch in plant nitrogen acquisition within tropical forest communities. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS) 104 (21): 8902 - 8906 (2007).
- Houlton, B. Z., Sigman, D. M., and Hedin, L. O., Isotopic evidence for large gaseous nitrogen losses from tropical rainforests. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS) 103 (23): 8745-8750 (2006).
Contact Information
215 Garden Avenue
Roberts Hall Room 260
Ithaca, NY 14853
bzhoulton [at] cornell.edu
Additional links
Benjamin in the news

News
The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences welcomes its first artist-in-residence, Andrea Strongwater ’70, this winter. She will showcase her series, “The Lost Synagogues of Europe,” March 6 in Mann Library.
- Animals
- Entomology

News
This renewed funding will enable the Innovation Lab for Crop Improvement to strengthen its interdisciplinary efforts to support demand-driven, socially responsive crop improvement programs in key regions around the world.
- Nutritional Sciences
- School of Integrative Plant Science
- Plant Breeding and Genetics Section