Our team also includes two Faculty Advisors from the Bren School of Environmental
Science & Management and two External Advisors from the University of Hawai'i at Manoa and the Nature Conservancy Hawai'i program. |
Faculty Advisors
Sam Stevenson
Bren School of Environmental Science & Management
Bren School of Environmental Science & Management
Sam Stevenson is an Assistant Professor at the Bren School of Environmental Science & Management. Her work focuses on the coupled atmosphere/ocean dynamics of the tropical Pacific, its responses to past and future changes in climate, and the implications for drought in arid regions such as the American Southwest. She works extensively with climate model simulations; examples include diagnosing output from 21st century climate projections, creating large 'ensembles' of simulations covering the past millennium, and designing targeted sensitivity experiments to diagnose particular aspects of climate dynamics such as the response of El Nino events to volcanic eruptions. Other research interests include understanding ocean circulation in coral reef environments and its implications for understanding marine proxy records, and the interaction of climate variability and anthropogenic climate change in influencing the severity and persistence of drought events. For these projects, she uses a variety of tools including regional ocean model simulations and field experiments at tropical Pacific island locations.
[email protected] |
Kelly Caylor
Bren School of Environmental Science & Management
Bren School of Environmental Science & Management
Kelly Caylor is an Associate Professor at the Bren School of Environmental Science & Management and the Department of Geography at UCSB. In his research, Dr. Caylor seeks to develop improved insight into the way that land use and climate change interact to affect the dynamics and resilience of global drylands. His primary research sites are in sub-Saharan Africa, where he is focused on understanding the vulnerability of pastoral and subsistence agricultural communities to current and future changes in hydrological dynamics. Dr. Caylor conducts research at a number of spatial and temporal scales; from small-scale experiments during individual rainfall events all the way up to continental-scale analyses of climate trends. A major focus of his research is the development of new methods to improve the measurement and prediction of ecosystem water-use efficiency and novel observation networks for characterization of coupled natural-human system dynamics.
[email protected] |
External Advisors
Kirstin Oleson
University of Hawai'i at Manoa
University of Hawai'i at Manoa
Kirstin Oleson is an Associate Professor in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Management at the University of Hawai'i, Manoa. Dr. Oleson is an ecological economist, bringing together economics, ethics, social science, and environmental science and using the power of economics to help address environmental policy problems. Her past work includes quantifying environmental and social impacts of development projects at the World Bank, developing economic sustainability indicators which such as the Genuine Progress Indicator for the State of Hawaii, and studying fisheries management in Madagascar. Dr. Oleson's current research focuses on improving natural resource and environmental management by integrating methods, approaches, and tools from economics, geography, natural science, decision science, and political science.
[email protected] |
Kim Falinski
The Nature Conservancy
The Nature Conservancy
Kim Falinski is an environmental engineer advising conservation projects in Hawaii and Palmyra Atoll for The Nature Conservancy. She focuses on green infrastructure solutions to mitigating sediment, nutrients and pollutants from watersheds that affect coastal water quality. Recent projects include monitoring the effects of a native Hawaiian restoration for a 200-acre wetland in windward O'ahu, partnering with the USGS on erosion control management recommendations on Hawai'i island, and developing quality assurance documents for a large-scale citizen science water quality project in collaboration with the Department of Health. In her spare time, Dr. Falinski runs Nalo Meli Honey and keeps urban bee hives in Honolulu.
[email protected] |