Chelsea Andreozzi is an ecologist with a strong interest in how science can inform policy and conservation planning. She has focused her PhD career on studying bats in California’s coast redwood forests in relation to climate and forest management. Her journey to become a field ecologist has led her to unexpected situations, from spending nights standing in chilly streams and catching bats to climbing to the top of redwood trees. By understanding the seasonal ecology and habitat needs of bats, Chelsea hopes to support efforts to protect elusive species threatened by global change. Chelsea currently works as a postdoctoral scholar at University of California, Davis, where she supports the California Wildfire and Forest Resilience Task Force’s Science Advisory Panel.

Phoebe Parker-Shames is an interdisciplinary researcher working to engage stakeholders in conservation solutions that intersect policy, management, and the environment. Phoebe grew up in Southern Oregon, where she based the bulk of her dissertation research, combining skills from wildlife conservation, community ecology, landscape ecology, and social science to address questions relating to wildlife in working landscapes and the dynamics of social-ecological systems.

Sebastián Rubiano-Galvis is a Ph.D. candidate at UC Berkeley’s Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management. He holds a JD degree and an MSc in Geography, both from the Universidad de Los Andes (Colombia). His interests lie at the intersection of science and technology studies, global environmental politics, and political ecology. Broadly, he is interested in the relationships between power, knowledge, and the environment in Latin America.

Wenjing Xu is a wildlife ecologist specializing in spatial ecology. Her research draws on movement and landscape ecology and applies geospatial tools to understand the impacts of our increasingly fragmented world. She is motivated to better understand social-ecological dynamics in landscapes shared by humans and wildlife. Her dissertation focuses on a ubiquitous, yet largely understudied linear infrastructure, fences, and their impacts on ungulate movement and space use. Wenjing obtained a BS degree in natural resources at the China University of Geosciences, and an MS degree in geography with a geospatial science certificate at the University of Georgia. Aside from research, she is interested in multimedia science communication, filmmaking, and gardening.

Catch Wenjing’s finishing talk as the ESPM Distinguished Graduate Student Lecture, May 3rd, 4-5 pm at 132 Mulford & Zoom (link here)

Paige’s research works at the intersection of soil biogeochemistry, rangeland ecology, and rancher sociology to understand how grazing management can be used to sequester soil carbon in rangeland ecosystems to help mitigate climate change. She works to understand the mechanisms, drivers, and persistence of soil C sequestration from grazing management as well as how ranchers’ decision processes underlying their management. Her dissertation work has been interdisciplinary from beginning to end, and includes an analytical study of soil carbon measurement to optimize sampling schemes, a study of adaptive-multi paddock grazing and soil carbon sequestration on California rangelands, and a socio-ecological study on rancher motivations and barriers to adaptive grazing management. She’s collaborated with groups including the Union of Concerned Scientists and the United States Forest Service, but core to her work is centering ranchers to ensure her research contributes to solving their on-the-ground challenges related to soil C and management shifts. Paige was a 2020 Western SARE recipient, recently accepted a post-doctoral fellowship at Colorado State University. 

Katie Low is a graduating Master of Forestry Student interested in assessing the impacts of fuel reduction and forest restoration treatments on California’s Sierra Nevada mixed-conifer forests. Katie was awarded a CALFIRE Forest Health Research Grant for her master’s project evaluating the ability for shaded fuel breaks to reduce fire risk, preserve forest resilience, and sequester carbon in a post-wildfire environment. In addition to her research, Katie is committed to working with forestry professionals to build and sustain a diverse workforce of forest practitioners. During graduate school, she founded the Forestry and Natural Resources Career Mentorship Program to support historically underrepresented students studying forestry and resource management. Upon graduation, she is excited to join UC Agriculture and Natural Resources as a Fire Coordinator where she will help accelerate the implementation of wildfire adaptation and resilience programs across California. 

Katie will be giving her finishing talk on Tuesday, May 3 at 9:00-10:00 AM PST
103 Mulford Hall
Zoom Link: upon request

Brian Whyte is a Behavioral Ecologist who studied ants and trematodes in the Tsutsui Lab. His research focuses on social animals that use group recognition to decide which individuals are accepted or rejected from social groups. In ants, the chemical cues they use to identify members of their colony are well known, so his research on ants involves chemical extractions and analysis paired with behavioral assays. In trematodes (i.e. flatworms), their social behaviors have only recently been discovered, so his research on trematodes involves investigative behavior experiments, trying to observe behaviors for the first time and compare and contrast them to other social animals.