Vulnerability

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Melanie
Colavito
Photo of Melanie Colavito
Degree Program: 
phd
Primary Department/Unit: 
Other Departments or Unit Affiliations: 

My research dissertation research focuses on collaborative and participatory applications of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and Remote Sensing (R/S) technologies to improve communication and use of scientific knowledge for wildfire planning and management.  I am also a research associate for the Regional Center for Sustainable Economic Development through Arizona Cooperative Extension, where I conduct research to help identify the most sustainable areas for renewable energy development throughout the state using GIS modeling. And I love bicycles

Topic or title of your dissertation/thesis: 

Fire Futures In The Southwest: Using Geospatial Technologies to Bridge The Gap Between Science and Decision-Making [working title]

Advisor(s): 
Expected Graduation Date: 
December, 2012

Karletta Chief

Karletta
Chief
Title: 
Assistant Professor, Department of Soil, Water, and Environmental Sciences
Additional Titles and Departments: 
Affiliate Faculty, Institute of the Environment
Related Departments, Schools or Colleges and/or Program(s): 
Education: 
PhD, Hydrology & Water Resources, University of Arizona, 2007.
Phone: 
(520) 626-5598
Photo of Karletta Chief

Dr. Karletta Chief is an Assistant Professor and Assistant Specialist in the Department of Soil, Water, and Environmental Sciences at the University of Arizona in Tucson, AZ. As an assistant professor, the goal of her research is to improve our understanding, tools, and predictions of watershed hydrology, unsaturated flow in arid environments, and how natural and human disturbances affect soil hydrology through the use of physically based methods. Dr. Chief research also focuses on how indigenous communities will be affected by climate change and collaborated in an interdisciplinary group of scientists including hydrologists, system dynamic modelers, and social scientists to determine how hydrological models can be improved to identify and mitigate risks to these vulnerable populations. As an extension specialist, she works to bring relevant science to Native American communities in a culturally sensitive manner by providing hydrology expertise, transferring knowledge, assessing information needs, and developing applied science projects.

Environmental Themes: 

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Katrina
Running
Photo of
Degree Program: 
phd
Primary Department/Unit: 

Katrina completed an M.A. in Political Science in 2007 and an M.A. in Sociology in 2008 from the University of Arizona in Tucson.  She is currently a Ph.D student in the Sociology Department at the University of Arizona.  Katrina's dissertation research examines the role of economic inequality and vulnerability on international environmental attitudes and behavior, particularly related to climate change.  Her additional academic interests include theories of global ecological citizenship, the intersection between environmental concerns and economic development, and gender inequality.

Topic or title of your dissertation/thesis: 

Towards International Action on Climate: Examining Concern for the Environment in Developed, Transitioning and Developing Countries.

Expected Graduation Date: 
May, 2013

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Lily
A
House-Peters
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Degree Program: 
phd
Primary Department/Unit: 
Other Departments or Unit Affiliations: 

My research interests focus on the complex interactions and feedbacks between social, technological, and ecological systems, which effectively influence water supply, demand, wastewater disposal and reuse, and inequities in the distribution of water resources. I am interested in better understanding how human decision-making, across and between multiple social, political, economic, and legal hierarchies, directly and indirectly affects the urban hydrological cycle at differing temporal scales.

Topic or title of your dissertation/thesis: 

My dissertation research examines the impact of large-scale, centralized water infrastructure investments on water security, adaptive management capacity, and vulnerability to climate variability, including drought and flood, in urban Australia.

Advisor(s): 
Expected Graduation Date: 
May, 2014

Miranda Loh

Miranda
Loh
Title: 
Assistant Professor, College of Public Health
Additional Titles and Departments: 
Affiliate Faculty, Institute of the Environment
Related Departments, Schools or Colleges and/or Program(s): 
Education: 
ScD, Environmental Health Sciences, Harvard School of Public Health, 2006
Phone: 
(520) 626-4942
Photo of Miranda Loh

Miranda Loh joined the University of Arizona as an assistant professor in the Division of Community, Environment, and Policy at the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health in 2010. Her research interests include the influence of the urban environment on exposures, particularly indoors, where people spend the majority of their time. Her research explores the impact of personal behaviors such as time-activity patterns and microenvironment factors such as building ventilation on exposure and the differences in such exposure factors between population groups. She is also interested in the effect of climate change and climate-related policies on health and welfare.

Environmental Themes: 

Danny Shahar

Danny
Shahar
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Degree Program: 
phd
Primary Department/Unit: 
Other Departments or Unit Affiliations: 
Minor Program: 

I came to the University of Arizona in the Fall of 2009.  I have a BA in philosophy from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where I wrote my senior honors thesis under Harry Brighouse on the implications of global climate change for individual rights.  I have also worked as a researcher for Iridian Asset Management, LLC., focusing in part on emerging technologies in the energy industry. 

I currently work in environmental philosophy, with a strong inclination towards interdisciplinary research.  My research interests involve on a number of different subjects:

  • The psychological mechanisms underlying environmental concern, the evolutionary functions of those mechanisms, and the potential challenges for environmental ethics in the exaptation of these mechanisms for their new roles in our moral psychology.
  • The roles of romantic, not-all-things-considered viewpoints in our moral psychology and in our all-things-considered ethical positions.
  • The relationship between Hayekian market liberalism and environmentalist arguments for protecting or preserving natural systems due to their instrumental importance and complexity.
  • The history of thought regarding natural resource scarcity, fragility, and complexity.
  • Virtue-ethical approaches to thinking about collective responsibility

As one might expect, I am not nearly an expert on all of these areas.  But if you are interested in thinking about some of these issues (or don't know what they mean), I would love to hear from you!

Advisor(s): 
Expected Graduation Date: 
January, 2014

Daniel Ferguson

Daniel
Ferguson
Title: 
Program Director, Institute of the Environment
Education: 
MA, American Indian Studies, University of Arizona, 1997
Phone: 
(520) 622-8918
Photo of Dan Ferguson

Daniel Ferguson is the program director for the Climate Assessment of the Southwest (CLIMAS) housed in The University of Arizona's Institute of the Environment. CLIMAS, one of NOAA's Regional Integrated Sciences and Assessments (RISA) programs, has an explicit mission to connect climate science to decision making in the Southwest. Dan directs the day-to-day operations of the CLIMAS program, including outreach and assessment efforts with stakeholders throughout the region. In addition to his management responsibilities, Dan's research focuses on three related areas: communication of science for decision making; methods and processes for building partnerships to address climate-related issues in society; and climate impacts and adaptation strategies in Indian Country. Prior to his research appointment at the University of Arizona in 2005, Dan spent several years in Fairbanks, Alaska, managing the science management offices for the National Science Foundation's Arctic System Science program and the affiliated Human Dimensions of the Arctic System program.

Environmental Themes: 

Zack S Guido

Zack
S
Guido
Photo of Zack Guido
Degree Program: 
phd
Other Departments or Unit Affiliations: 

Zack is an associate staff scientist at the Climate Assessment for the Southwest at the University of Arizona. At CLIMAS, Zack helps improve the use of and access to climate information for decision makers in the Southwest by leading the monthly publication of the Southwest Climate Outlook, an e-publication that highlights climate information important to people in the Southwest. Zack also helps CLIMAS respond to quick-turnaround, stakeholder-driven projects that include investigating climate and groundwater connections and assessing the regional needs for climate training.

Zack’s professional and academic  interests focus on effectively communicating science and helping impoverished communities in developing countries become less vulnerable to climate change. To accomplish this, Zack draws on his Masters degree in Geology from the University of Colorado and his professional consulting background in hydrogeology and water resource planning. Zack also has worked for more than eight years in rural water development in Bolivia, South America, and he co-founded a non-profit organization that helps rural communities in the Bolivian Andes obtain clean water and be resilient to climate-driven changes in water supplies.

Topic or title of your dissertation/thesis: 

Climate Change Impacts on Water Supplies and Viable Adaptation Strategies for Rural and Empoverished Communities in the Andes Mountains, South America

Advisor(s): 

Alan Weisman

Alan
Weisman
Title: 
Professor, School of Journalism
Additional Titles and Departments: 
Professor, Center for Latin American Studies
Affiliate Faculty, Institute of the Environment
Education: 
MS, Journalism, Northwestern University, 1971
Phone: 
(520) 626-6407
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Alan Weisman teaches international journalism at the University of Arizona. Much of his writing is about how the environment, economics, international relations, and human society and culture intersect. He is the author of An Echo In My Blood, Gaviotas: A Village to Reinvent the World, La Frontera: The United States Border With Mexico, and We, Immortals. His reports, set in the United States, Mexico, Canada, Central and South America, the Caribbean, Antarctica, Europe, the former Soviet Union, and the Middle and Far East, have appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine, The Los Angeles Times Magazine, Audubon, Mother Jones, Discover, Condé Nast Traveler, and in several anthologies. They have also aired on National Public Radio and Public Radio International. He is a senior producer for Homelands Productions. His current projects include research on the future of energy, and his forthcoming book The World Without Us, which discusses what the Earth would be like without human beings.

Jake F Weltzin

Jake
F
Weltzin
Title: 
Executive Director, USA National Phenology Network
Additional Titles and Departments: 
Ecologist, US Geological Survey
Adjunct Associate Professor, School of Natural Resources and the Environment
Education: 
Ph.D., Renewable Natural Resource Studies, University of Arizona, 1998.
Phone: 
(520) 626-3821
Photo of Jake Weltzen

Jake Weltzin assumed his position as Executive Director of the USA-NPN in August, 2007. Jake’s interest in natural history developed as he grew up in Alaska and as an exchange student in the Australian outback. He obtained his B.S. from Colorado State University, M.S. from Texas A&M University, and Ph.D. from the University of Arizona. Following a post-doctoral fellowship at University of Notre Dame, Jake went to the University of Tennessee, where he served as Assistant and then Associate Professor.

Jake’s interests encompass how the structure and function of plant communities and ecosystems might respond to global environmental change, including atmospheric chemistry, climate change, and biological invasions. His research spans temperate and tropical grasslands and savannas, temperate woodlands, deciduous forest, and sub-boreal peatlands. His recent experience as a science administrator at the National Science Foundation underscored the need to foster large-scale science initiatives such as USA-NPN. As it's first Executive Director, Jake’s vision for USA-NPN is “to develop a continental-scale instrument for integrative assessment of global change that simultaneously serves as an outreach and educational platform for citizens and educators.”

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