Month: January 2021

Categories
Faculty Spotlight News

The GCC welcomes four new faculty affiliates in January 2021

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Meet our newest faculty affiliates:

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Dr. Wendy Parker

Professor, Philosophy

Dr. Parker’s research focuses on topics in general philosophy of science and philosophy of climate science/meteorology. She is interested in how scientists have developed evidence that global climate change is occurring and is anthropogenic and, especially, in the role of computational modeling in this regard. She is a contributing author for Working Group I’s contribution to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 6th Assessment Report and a member of the US CLIVAR Ocean Uncertainty Quantification Working Group.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_separator][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/3″][vc_single_image image=”54208″ img_size=”250×250″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_shadow_3d”][/vc_column][vc_column width=”2/3″][vc_column_text]

Dr. Manoochehr Shirzaei

Professor, Geosciences

Dr. Shirzaei is a geodesist/geophysicist specializing in satellite geodesy, inverse theory, signal processing, modeling techniques, and crustal deformation physics. His research effort aims to advance Earth-observing techniques, in particular RADAR remote sensing, and improve understanding of the underlying mechanism associated with seismic and aseismic faulting processes, the evolution of crustal stresses, and seismic hazard due to fluid extraction and disposal, change in groundwater and surface water resources, and impacts of relative sea-level rise on coastal areas.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_separator][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/3″][vc_single_image image=”54291″ img_size=”250×250″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_shadow_3d”][/vc_column][vc_column width=”2/3″][vc_column_text]

Dr. Susanna Werth

Associate Research Professor, Geosciences

Dr. Werth is a geodesist/engineer specialized in satellite gravimetry, large-scale hydrology and water resource management. Her research interests are the time-dependent Earth and planetary gravity field, hydrology, terrestrial water cycle and resources management, interaction of the water, climate, environmental and human societies as well as signal processing. A main focus of her research is on monitoring, modeling and forecasting the Earth’s water mass budget variations using remote sensing data.

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Dr. Kang Xia

Professor, School of Plant and Environmental Sciences

Dr. Xia is a professor of environmental chemistry. The foundation of her research program has been to understand negative human impact on water and soil quality and strategies to remediate the negative impact. She has collaborated with GCC affiliates on several federally-funded projects focused on the environmental occurrence, fate, and impact of emerging contaminants, as well as understanding issues related to antibiotic resistance and substance use disorders in Appalachia and beyond by monitoring environmental water samples.

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Categories
Accolades Interfaces of Global Change IGEP News Student Spotlight

Disciplinary diversity shines bright among new cohort of IGC fellows in spring 2021

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 January 22, 2021

The Interfaces of Global Change IGEP welcomes 12 new Ph.D. fellows in Spring 2021. The incoming cohort holds the most diverse disciplinary representation to date for an IGC admissions cycle, representing 10 different departments and 5 colleges across the VT campus!

Meet our newest fellows:

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Abigail Belvin
Entomology

Working with Dr. Sally Entrekin

Research interests: Interactions between riparian habitats and freshwater ecosystems; the impacts of land use change on aquatic environments with a focus on macroinvertebrates.

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Namrata Shanmukh Panji
Civil and Environmental Engineering

Working with Dr. Gabriel Isaacman-VanWertz

Research interests: Atmospheric chemistry, air quality, and atmospheric measurement techniques

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Jordan Coscia
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences

Working with Dr. Leighton Reid

Research interests: Grassland ecology, community ecology, ecological restoration, botany

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Paul Risteca
Biological Sciences

Working with Dr. Jeb Barrett

Research interests: Microbial and ecosystem ecology; effects of climate change on polar soil microbial communities and nutrient cycling

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Stephanie Duston
Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation

Working with Drs. Brian Strahm and Brian Badgley

Research interests: Soil biogeochemistry; soil organic matter and microbe dynamics; distribution and partitioning of soil organic matter through plant and microbial function

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Brendan Shea
Fish and Wildlife Conservation

Working with Dr. Francesco Ferretti

Research interests: Marine ecology; predator-prey dynamics; ecological role of sharks and the ecosystem consequences of their removal

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Luke Goodman
Biological Systems Engineering

Working with Dr. Durelle Scott

Research interests: Watershed modeling focused on management and policy; climate change adaptation in the context of water resource management

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Charles W. Sterling III
Biological Systems Engineering

Working with Dr. Leigh-Anne Krometis

Research interests: Private well water quality; Environmental Justice

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Amanda Hensley
Translational Biology, Medicine, and Health

Working with Dr. Kathy Hosig

Research interests: Public health implementation science, immunology and infectious disease, health equity for diverse, under-engaged, and rural populations

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Irving Forde Upshur
Biochemistry

Working with Dr. Chloé Lahondère

Research interests: Mosquito-plant interactions, entomology, behavioral ecology, ecophysiology

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Bailey Howell
Biological Sciences

Working with Dr. Josef Uyeda

Research interests: Urban evolution, phylogenetic comparative methods, macroevolution, trait adaptation

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Tyler Weiglein
Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation

Working with Drs. Brian Strahm and Kevin McGuire

Research interests: Terrestrial biogeochemistry, hillslope/catchment hydrology

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Categories
Seminars, Workshops, Lectures Water

Human-Water Systems, a new monthly seminar in spring 2021

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This message is adapted from an announcement from Landon Marston (CEE), on behalf of the Human-Water Systems seminar series leadership committee.

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Faculty and students at VT are invited to join a new professional networking and research seminar series centered on human-water systems.

Meetings will be held the third Friday of each month from 1-2 pm EST, with the first meeting occurring on Friday, January 15th, 2021.

To participate – please complete this Google Form to be added you to the informational listserv. You will receive an email in early January with additional details and call-in information. Please share this message with any colleagues you think may be interested in participating.

Each meeting will start with two invited speakers, each giving a 15 minute talk followed by a short Q&A. As the seminar title suggests, all talks will be related to human-water systems. In the remaining twenty minutes, participants will breakout into smaller gatherings (4-10 people) to meet new people (and perhaps a few familiar faces) with a shared interest in human-water systems. There will be designated rooms for graduate students to gather and other rooms dedicated for postgraduate researchers (i.e., postdocs, junior and senior faculty, government scientists, etc.) to meet. The goal is to facilitate regular opportunities for you to make new connections that will hopefully lead to fruitful collaborations on papers and proposals.

Human-water systems are defined very broadly and people from all disciplinary backgrounds are strongly encouraged to attend ‘Human-Water Systems Monthly’. As human-water systems are highly complex, stretching across multiple disciplines, we’d like our audience to reflect this. Diverse participants will also increase the likelihood of collaborations forming that might not be possible in traditional conference settings that are well attended by one discipline but not others.

[/vc_column_text][vc_separator style=”dotted”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]The void of in-person workshops, conferences, and campus visits has limited opportunities to make new connections, form collaborations, and have serendipitous encounters with colleagues you may only see once a year. Early career researchers are particularly impacted by these lack of opportunities since this is a critical time in one’s career to develop a professional network. While several major conferences have made valiant efforts to mimic the in-person experience, the prolonged conference schedule, odd conference hours, and limited opportunities to make meaningful new contacts has left an opening for regular, focused meetings that provide researchers at all career stages a chance to ‘meet-and-greet’ and also allow early career researchers a stage to present their research.

For now, speakers have been schedule through the spring term (January-April). If interest remains high, the seminar will likely invite additional speakers for the summer and/or fall term. If you would be interested in giving an invited talk, please indicate this when you sign up. At least initially, preference will be given to early career faculty and scientists since these invited presentations are the most meaningful at this stage in their career.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_separator style=”shadow”][/vc_column][/vc_row]