Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability
Showing 1-10 of 11 Results
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Elizabeth Hadly
Paul S. and Billie Achilles Professor of Environmental Biology and Professor of Earth System Science, Emerita
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsElizabeth Hadly and her lab probe how perturbations such as climatic change and human modification of the environment influence the evolution and ecology of animals.
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John A. Harrison
Visiting Professor, Earth System Science
BioDue largely to human activities associated with food and energy production, the world is experiencing an un-precedented mobilization of nutrients such as nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P). A substantial portion of this mobilized N and P flows into streams and rivers, and eventually down to coastal waters, where nutrient over-enrichment has been associated with a host of environmental impacts. En route to the ocean, these nutrients can alter ecosystem function as well as the balance of atmospheric greenhouse gases.
I use experimental and spatially explicit modeling approaches to elucidate processes governing the mobilization, transport, transformation, and ecosystem/biogeochemical impacts of land-based N, P, and other bio-active elements. For more information about me and my research group, please see my Washington State University research page: https://labs.wsu.edu/gcwblab/ -
Alex Hedgpeth
Postdoctoral Scholar, Earth System Science
BioAlexandra Hedgpeth is a biogeochemist whose research explores how soil carbon cycling in peatlands responds to environmental change. Her work focuses on understanding the mechanisms that regulate carbon storage and greenhouse gas production in both tropical and boreal wetlands, with a particular emphasis on the vulnerability of deep, ancient carbon to modern surface inputs and hydrologic shifts.
Through her Ph.D. research at the University of California, Los Angeles, Alex has developed and applied novel isotopic and geochemical approaches—including implementing radiocarbon dating, stable isotope analyses, and high-resolution molecular characterization—to trace the sources and fates of carbon in peat soils. Her fieldwork spans a range of ecosystems, from ombrotrophic bogs in the Arctic to saturated tropical peat domes in Central America. This comparative framework allows her to identify unifying controls on carbon preservation and loss across climate zones.
Alex's research integrates field measurements, laboratory experiments, and synthesis of global datasets. She is a key contributor to multi-institutional efforts to model peatland carbon cycling under climate change scenarios, including DOE- and NSF-supported initiatives. Her work helps clarify the role of peatlands as both long-term carbon sinks and potential sources of atmospheric CO₂ and CH₄ under future disturbance.
In addition to her scientific contributions, Alex is committed to collaborative, interdisciplinary research and has worked closely with partners at national laboratories, the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, and international data synthesis networks. She is especially interested in questions with high uncertainty and high relevance to climate feedbacks—such as thresholds in biogeochemical function and the persistence of deep soil carbon under hydrologic change. -
Sebastian Heilpern
Assistant Professor of Earth System Science
BioSebastian is an ecologist and sustainability scientist studying the causes of biodiversity change and its consequences for ecosystems and human well-being, with a particular emphasis on aquatic ecosystems. In linking causes to consequences, his research also seeks to identify opportunities to align biodiversity conservation with societal objectives around public health, food systems, and renewable energy. His research integrates field work, data science and synthesis, and spans scales from local and regional studies in tropical river basins such as the Amazon to global analyses. Prior to joining Stanford, he was an Eric & Wendy Schmidt AI in Science Postdoctoral Fellow at Cornell University.
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Natalie Herbert
Social Science Research Scholar
BioNATALIE HERBERT is a Research Scientist in the Department of Earth Systems Science at the Doerr School of Sustainability. Her research investigates decision-making in the face of environmental risk. She completed her Ph.D. in 2020 at the Annenberg School for Communication, where she researched health and science communication with a focus on communicating scientific uncertainty. Natalie was a Christine Mirzayan Science and Technology Policy Graduate Fellow at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
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Alexander Honeyman
Postdoctoral Scholar, Earth System Science
BioI work at the intersections of data science, field work, laboratory experimentation, biogeochemistry, and microbial ecology. I was exposed to the issue of wildland fire through 10 years of experience as a volunteer firefighter / EMT in Colorado (fire / rescue / EMS). My current work involves investigating the geochemical character of wildfire smoke by hybridizing analyses of physical samples with various geospatial datasets and atmospheric particle transport models. I love working in environmental systems because they are complex, and offer numerous opportunities to blend the physical and computational sciences.
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Alison Hoyt
Assistant Professor of Earth System Science and Center Fellow, by courtesy, at the Woods Institute for the Environment
BioAlison Hoyt is an Assistant Professor of Earth System Science at Stanford. Her work focuses on understanding how biogeochemical cycles respond to human impacts, with a particular focus on the most vulnerable and least understood carbon stocks in the tropics and the Arctic. For more information, please visit her group website here: https://carboncycle.stanford.edu/
