Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability


Showing 101-120 of 365 Results

  • Anton Ermakov

    Anton Ermakov

    Assistant Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics and, by courtesy, of Geophysics and of Earth and Planetary Sciences

    Current Research and Scholarly InterestsI am interested in the formation and evolution of the Solar System bodies and the ways we can constrain planetary interiors by geophysical measurements.

  • Stefano Ermon

    Stefano Ermon

    Associate Professor of Computer Science and Senior Fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment

    BioI am an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Stanford University, where I am affiliated with the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and a fellow of the Woods Institute for the Environment.

    My research is centered on techniques for scalable and accurate inference in graphical models, statistical modeling of data, large-scale combinatorial optimization, and robust decision making under uncertainty, and is motivated by a range of applications, in particular ones in the emerging field of computational sustainability.

  • W Gary Ernst

    W Gary Ernst

    The Benjamin M. Page Professor in Earth Sciences, Emeritus

    Current Research and Scholarly InterestsPetrology/geochemistry and plate tectonics of Circumpacific and Alpine mobile belts; ultrahigh-pressure metamorphism in Eurasia; geology of the California Coast Ranges, the cental Klamath Mountains, and White-Inyo Range; geobotany and remote sensing of the American Southwest; mineralogy and human health.

  • Walter Falcon

    Walter Falcon

    Senior Fellow, Emeritus, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment

    Current Research and Scholarly Interestsbiotechnology; food security; food and agricultural policy in developing countries

  • Jonathan Fan

    Jonathan Fan

    Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering and Senior Fellow at the Precourt Institute for Energy

    Current Research and Scholarly InterestsOptical engineering plays a major role in imaging, communications, energy harvesting, and quantum technologies. We are exploring the next frontier of optical engineering on three fronts. The first is new materials development in the growth of crystalline plasmonic materials and assembly of nanomaterials. The second is novel methods for nanofabrication. The third is new inverse design concepts based on optimization and machine learning.

  • Shanhui Fan

    Shanhui Fan

    Joseph and Hon Mai Goodman Professor of the School of Engineering, Senior Fellow at the Precourt Institute for Energy and Professor, by courtesy, of Applied Physics

    BioFan's research interests are in fundamental studies of nanophotonic structures, especially photonic crystals and meta-materials, and applications of these structures in energy and information technology applications

  • Marcus Feldman

    Marcus Feldman

    Burnet C. and Mildred Finley Wohlford Professor

    Current Research and Scholarly InterestsHuman genetic and cultural evolution, mathematical biology, demography of China

  • Stephen Felt, DVM, MPH

    Stephen Felt, DVM, MPH

    Professor of Comparative Medicine

    Current Research and Scholarly InterestsHis research interests include infectious diseases, particularly zoonoses, and exploring techniques which promote the health and welfare of laboratory animals.

  • Chris Field

    Chris Field

    Melvin and Joan Lane Professor of Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies, Director, Woods Institute for the Environment & Professor of Earth System Science, of Biology and Senior Fellow at the Woods Institute and at the Precourt Institute

    Current Research and Scholarly InterestsResearch
    My field is climate-change science, and my research emphasizes human-ecological interactions across many disciplines. Most studies include aspects of ecology, but also aspects of law, sociology, medicine, or engineering.

  • Martin Fischer

    Martin Fischer

    Kumagai Professor in the School of Engineering and Senior Fellow at the Precourt Institute for Energy

    BioProfessor Fischer's research goals are to improve the productivity of project teams involved in designing, building, and operating facilities and to enhance the sustainability of the built environment. His work develops the theoretical foundations and applications for virtual design and construction (VDC). VDC methods support the design of a facility and its delivery process and help reduce the costs and maximize the value over its lifecycle. His research has been used by many small and large industrial government organizations around the world.

  • Sarah Fletcher

    Sarah Fletcher

    Assistant Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Center Fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment

    Current Research and Scholarly InterestsThe Fletcher Lab aims to advance water resources management to promote resilient and equitable responses to a changing world.

  • Christopher Francis

    Christopher Francis

    Professor of Earth System Science, of Oceans and Senior Fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment

    Current Research and Scholarly InterestsMicrobial cycling of carbon, nitrogen, and metals in the environment; molecular geomicrobiology; marine microbiology; microbial diversity; meta-omics

  • Nicole Franz

    Nicole Franz

    Social Science Research Scholar, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment

    BioNicole Franz (she/her) is an expert in the political economy of sustainable development. She has over two decades of experience working in intergovernmental organizations, namely the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development in Rome as well as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris.

    As leader of the equitable livelihoods team in FAO’s Fisheries and Aquaculture Division, Nicole focused on advancing global sustainability policy, making policy processes more inclusive, and empowering stakeholders.

    Her role and leadership in the development and implementation of the Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries in the Context of Food Security and Poverty Eradication cemented her dedication to bringing together responsible natural resource use with social development. She spearheaded efforts to embed these guidelines into national, regional, and global policy processes and initiatives relating to fisheries, food security, climate change, and biodiversity.

    Also during her tenure at FAO, Nicole kickstarted the Illuminating Hidden Harvests initiative to generate and disseminate new evidence about the benefits, interactions, and impacts of small-scale fisheries to inform policy and practice.

    Beyond her policy and research contributions, Nicole is a deeply committed mentor and capacity-builder. Over the past decade, she has supervised and mentored approximately 20 early-career scientists, interns, and young professionals and served as a guest lecturer.

  • Kelsey Freeman

    Kelsey Freeman

    Social Science Research Scholar, Precourt Institute for Energy

    BioKelsey is an award-winning writer, policy researcher, and advocate focused on rural community development, Indigenous rights, migration and climate change.

    She is currently a Social Science Research Scholar at Stanford University's Precourt Energy Institute, where her work focuses on supporting Native American tribes in their clean energy goals. Through this role, she is also seconded to the Tribal Affairs program at the California Energy Commission (CEC), where she is helping launch a landmark policy-making process in collaboration with California tribes to ensure they can participate in and benefit from the clean energy transition.

    Kelsey draws on 10 years focused on tribal sovereignty and has a strong track record of building programming to support tribes. She previously worked at Central Oregon Community College, where she collaborated with tribes across Oregon to start a college-readiness program for Native American high school students. She also facilitated workshops on equity, advised the college’s Dreamers’ Club, and served on the City of Bend Accessibility Advisory Committee.

    Her debut book No Option but North (IG Publishing) was published in 2020 and is based on her year on a Fulbright Fellowship in Mexico interviewing Central American migrants. It interweaves their stories with research into the policies that reveal the fundamental tensions involved in contemporary migration. It won the 2021 Colorado Book Award in creative nonfiction and was a finalist for the Oregon Book Award. It also received acclaim in Publisher’s Weekly, The New York Journal of Books, Choice Reviews of the Association of College and Research Libraries, and many others. She has since spoken and interviewed across the U.S. on immigration policy. Kelsey has written for Stanford International Policy Review, UCLA’s Journal of Law and Environmental Policy, The Mantle, Complex(ion) Magazine, and is the recipient of a Steinberg Reporting Award.

    From 2022-2025, Kelsey was a Knight Hennessy Scholar at Stanford studying international policy and environment and resources. During this time, she worked with Nevada’s green bank to help develop their tribal clean energy program, conducted research on international climate displacement and organized a course and conference on climate migration. She is the author of the report "Understanding Federal Indian Law for Renewable Energy," published by Stanford Law School.

    Kelsey holds an MA in international policy and an MS in environment and resources from Stanford University and a BA in government and legal studies from Bowdoin College.

  • Oliver Fringer

    Oliver Fringer

    Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and of Oceans

    BioFringer's research focuses on the development and application of numerical models and high-performance computational techniques to the study of fundamental processes that influence the dynamics of the coastal ocean, rivers, lakes, and estuaries.

  • Tadashi Fukami

    Tadashi Fukami

    Professor of Biology and of Earth System Science

    Current Research and Scholarly InterestsEcological and evolutionary community assembly, with emphasis on understanding historical contingency in community structure, ecosystem functioning, biological invasion and ecological restoration, using experimental, theoretical, and comparative methods involving bacteria, protists, fungi, plants, and animals.

  • Angela Garcia

    Angela Garcia

    Roger and Cynthia Lang Professor

    BioProfessor Garcia’s work engages historical and institutional processes through which violence and suffering are produced and lived. A central theme is the disproportionate burden of addiction, depression and incarceration among poor families and communities. Her research is oriented toward understanding how attachments, affect, and practices of intimacy are important registers of politics and economy.

    Garcia’s most recent book is The Way That Leads Among the Lost: Life, Death, and Hope in Mexico City's Anexos (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2024). Set in Mexico City, it examines how violence precedes and functions in the ways families seek to care for and protect each other. Central to this work are anexos (annexes), informal and coercive rehabilitation clinics for the treatment of drug addiction that are run and utilized by the working poor, and which incorporate violence into their therapeutic practices. Anexos are widespread across Mexico (and increasingly in the United States) and are widely condemned as abusive, illegal, ineffective, and unethical. By situating anexos within a larger social and historical frame, and closely attending to life within and beyond these spaces, Garcia shows that anexos provide refuge from the catastrophic and everyday violence associated with the drug war. The book also demonstrates that anexos are the leading resource for the treatment of drug addiction among Mexico’s poor, and are an essential space of protection for individuals at risk of the intensifying violence in Mexico.

    Garcia's first book, The Pastoral Clinic: Addiction and Dispossession Along The Rio Grande (University of California Press, 2010) received awards in anthropology and writing. The Pastoral Clinic explores the relationship between intergenerational heroin use, poverty and colonial history in northern New Mexico. It argues that heroin addiction among Hispanos is a contemporary expression of an enduring history of dispossession, social and intimate fragmentation, and the existential desire for a release from these. Ongoing work in the U.S. explores processes of legal “re-entry” and intimate repair that incarcerated and paroled drug users undertake, particularly within kin networks.

    Currently, Garcia is studying the environmental, social, and bodily effects resulting from Mexico City’s ongoing desagüe, the massive drainage project initiated by Spanish colonists in the seventeenth century in the Valley of Mexico. Mexico City’s desagüe speaks to some of the most pressing concerns of our time: water scarcity, humans’ relationship to changing ecologies, and chronic disease. This project examines how the desagüe remakes bodies, neighborhoods, and social worlds.

    A second research project concerns the growth and destruction of a New Mexican mining community. Its focus is Santa Rita del Cobre, near Silver City, New Mexico, an area scarred by Conquest, capitalism, and ecological destruction. Using ethnographic and historical methods, this project examines the labors and losses of those who lived in Santa Rita del Cobre. It moves from present to past, from surface to subsurface, unearthing new ways of thinking about environmental and social history. It also reveals the difficult necessity of maintaining our capacities to be resilient when faced with environmental and existential catastrophe.

  • Christopher Gardner

    Christopher Gardner

    Rehnborg Farquhar Professor

    Current Research and Scholarly InterestsThe role of nutrition in individual and societal health, with particular interests in: plant-based diets, differential response to low-carb vs. low-fat weight loss diets by insulin resistance status, chronic disease prevention, randomized controlled trials, human nutrition, community based studies, Community Based Participatory Research, sustainable food movement (animal rights and welfare, global warming, human labor practices), stealth health, nutrition policy, nutrition guidelines