Ghassan J. Alaka, Jr.

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2012-2013 Graduate Research Assistant, Department of Atmospheric Science Research Summary: My research matters because Atlantic hurricanes are destructive forces that are not well-predicted. I tackle this issue by improving our understanding of pre-hurricane weather systems over Africa. Although these weather systems regularly move from Africa into the East Atlantic in the summer, […]

August 29, 2018

Suzan Hassan AlDoubi

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2013-2014 Ph.D. Candidate, School of Education Research Summary: Playing different roles in my life as a mother, wife, daughter, sister, student, and educator, allowed me to be a leader for a long time. Walking through the professional leadership road, I discovered that it is not an easy path for women. Although women […]

September 14, 2018

Charlotte Alster

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2015-2016 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Biology Research Summary: My research aims to understand how microbial communities in soil vary in their response to changes in temperature and what impact this has on global carbon modeling. Soil microorganisms play a critical role in ecosystems, breaking down leaf litter and converting nutrients into plant […]

September 25, 2018

Natalie Anderson

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2013-2014 Ph.D. Student, Department of Geosciences Research Summary: I explore rivers. I am a fluvial geomorphologist. I am a professional whitewater kayaker. My passion for rivers is deep and swift and I enjoy sharing my intellectual and physical journey down them with others. For my dissertation, “Wood Dynamics on the Mackenzie River […]

September 14, 2018

Mike Angstadt

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2015-2016 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Political Science Research Summary: My research examines the role that court structures play in shaping environmental outcomes. Specifically, I explore specialized environmental courts and tribunals (“ECTs”). ECTs are rapidly emerging in many developing countries on the premise that better environmental outcomes will result from judiciaries possessing procedures […]

September 25, 2018

Timothy J. Assal

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2013-2014 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Anthropology Research Summary: I am a Spatial Ecologist at Colorado State University and the U.S. Geological Survey. I study disturbance impacts on forests which can change how an ecosystem works for many years into the future. I combine field studies, satellite sensors and computer modeling to study […]

September 14, 2018

Daniel Auerbach

Sustainability Leadership Fellow Cohort: 2011-2012 Ph. D. Student, Graduate Degree Program in Ecology Research Summary: Humans need and love rivers, streams and lakes. Unfortunately, the combination of ineptitude, social inertia and ignorance have led to their ongoing degradation. If my children and yours are to know the joy of seeing a native fish flash away or […]

August 24, 2018

Bethany Avera

Sustainability Leadership Fellow Cohort: 2018-2019 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Soil and Crop Sciences Graduate Degree Program in Ecology Natural Resource Ecology Laboratory Research Summary: Disturbances and management in forest ecosystems can impact the amount of carbon stored in the forest system. I am studying how the outbreak of a native pine beetle and subsequent logging have […]

May 23, 2018

Wahid Awad

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2014-2015 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Soil and Crop Sciences Research Summary: Climate change and drought in particular decreases crops and wheat production worldwide. This leads to crop loss every year for millions of farmers around the world, which increases poverty, starvation, and endangers global food security. My contribution to solving this problem […]

September 25, 2018

Elizabeth Bach

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2016-2017 Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Biology Research Summary: She is a soil microbial ecologist interested in exploring how fungal and bacterial communities influence ecosystem functions, specifically carbon and nitrogen cycling.  She also investigates interactions between soil microbes and soil structure.  Her research focuses on restored grassland systems in central North America.  She […]

February 13, 2018

Theresa Barosh

Sustainability Leadership Fellow Cohort: 2018-2019 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Bioagricultural Sciences and Pest Management and Graduate Degree Program in Ecology Research Summary: As a PhD student in Dr. Paul Ode’s lab at CSU, I am studying the intersection of species biodiversity and environmental stewardship. Those that practice environmental stewardship often have interests in biodiversity and […]

May 23, 2018

Whitney Beck

Sustainability Leadership Fellow Cohort: 2018-2019 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Biology and Graduate Degree Program in Ecology Research Summary:Freshwater algae is an important food resource for aquatic insects and fish. However, when fertilizers and other nutrient sources are added to rivers and streams, large algal blooms can form that lower stream oxygen and degrade ecosystems. My […]

James Benedict

Sustainability Leadership Fellow Cohort: 2011-2012 Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Atmospherics Science Research Summary: Predicting future climate is tricky. There are many pieces to the climate puzzle, and computer models used to forecast the climate decades or centuries into the future must get most of these details right. The models must accurately capture the atmosphere‘s general […]

August 24, 2018

Katharine Benedict

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2011-2012 Ph. D. Student, Department of Atmospheric Science Research Summary: My research is focused on understanding the types of compounds in the atmosphere and their sources that contribute to ecosystem changes in our national parks. Specifically my research in Rocky Mountain National Park (RMNP) has measured atmospheric nitrogen containing species that get […]

Drew Bennett

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2016-2017 Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology Research Summary: Trained broadly as a geographer, I integrate insights from social and physical sciences to better understand the social and ecological outcomes of market-based approaches to environmental conservation. Currently I am researching ways to engage private landowners, such as farmer and […]

October 9, 2018

Hannah Berry

Sustainability Leadership Fellow Cohort: 2019-2020 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Bioagricultural Sciences and Pest Management & Department of Cell and Molecular Biology Research Summary: Defense responses to pathogens are energetically costly to plants. In many plant species, constitutive and systemic activation of defenses by chemical or genetic approaches leads to reduced losses to disease, but also […]

April 30, 2019

Kelsey Bilsback

Sustainability Leadership Fellow Cohort: 2019-2020 Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Atmospheric Science Research Summary: Nearly half the world’s population uses inefficient cookstoves that burn solid fuels (e.g., wood, charcoal, coal) to cook their meals and heat their homes. About 3 million people die prematurely every year from exposure to air pollution from cookstoves. I use a […]

May 2, 2019

Sarah Bisbing

Sustainability Research Fellowship Cohort: 2012-2013 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Ecosystem Science and Sustainability Research Summary: The landscape of North America was historically dominated by large, intact forest. Despite diminishing in size over the last century, these valuable ecosystems continue to provide crucial services to residents of both our wild lands and urban centers. Forest trees are […]

August 29, 2018

Brittany Bloodhart

Sustainability Leadership Fellowship Cohort: 2015-2016 Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Atmospheric Science Research Summary: I study the psychological processes of individuals when thinking about social and environmental injustice (What makes people deny climate change?  What makes people DO something about climate change?).  Most of my research looks at barriers to people getting involved in environmental issues, including […]

September 25, 2018

Andrea Borkenhagen

Sustainability Leadership Fellow Cohort: 2017-2018 Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Forest and Rangeland Stewardship North America’s largest oil deposit is in Alberta’s oil sands region where mining extraction operations remove vast areas of forest and peatland wetlands. Traditional reclamation ignored peatlands because they require precise hydrologic conditions, specific plant species, and take long time periods to […]

February 15, 2018