People
Josh Lawler
Josh is an assistant professor of landscape ecology and conservation in the College of Forest Resources at the University of Washington. His research addresses questions with direct impacts on the conservation and management of ecological systems at multiple scales. His current work focuses heavily on climate change, land-use change, and ecosystem services. He is particularly interested in how ecological systems respond to anthropogenic stresses and how policy, management, and human behavior can be used to modify those responses.
Post-doctoral Researchers
Julie Heinrichs
Julie is a post-doctoral researcher at the School of Forest Resources at the University of Washington. Her research questions address the relative influence of habitat configuration and composition, specifically habitat quality, on population dynamics and persistence in both theoretical and applied systems. As part of her Ph.D. research at the University of Calgary, Julie used habitat/population models to assess critical habitat for the endangered Ord’s kangaroo rat in Alberta, Canada and she continues to develop models for species at risk. In her post-doctoral position, she is exploring the drivers of source-sink dynamics and is using spatially explicit population models to identify the attributes of species, landscapes, and ecological systems that promote source-sink dynamics.
Theresa Nogeire
Theresa conducts research in landscape ecology and conservation biology, with a particular focus on conservation planning for wildlife. She is interested in how biodiversity hangs on in human-dominated landscapes, and especially how wide-ranging birds and mammalian carnivores use agricultural landscapes. She uses wildlife surveys, geographic information systems, and spatially explicit modeling to answer questions about animal movement and habitat selection to gain a better understanding of how private-lands management might advance conservation goals. Theresa received her Ph.D. in 2011 in Environmental Science and Management at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Chad Wilsey
Chad earned an M.S. in Conservation Biology and Sustainable Development at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2007 and a Ph.D. in Landscape Ecology at the University of Washington in 2011. He uses technology, such as remote sensing and computer modeling, to address ecological problems with broad spatial scales. For example, Chad is interested in the impacts of development and climate-change on wildlife populations. He is currently working with a team of researchers from several universities, government agencies, and non-profits to characterize the vulnerability of wildlife populations to climate change in the Pacific Northwest. Previously, Chad simulated the impacts of land-use, climate-change, and management on the endangered black-capped vireo. He also studied bird communities in shaded cacao and banana agroforests in Costa Rica.
Graduate Students
Michael Case
Having completed a tree growth and climate-focused Masters degree in Ecosystem Analysis at the College of Forest Resources (UW) in 2004, Michael worked as a Research Scientist for World Wildlife Fund's (WWF) International Climate Change Program for nearly 5 years. While working for WWF, Michael was responsible for ensuring that WWF's conservation work not only considered the impacts of climate change, but also include appropriate adaptation planning. Using these experiences, Michael will be focusing his research on a Pacific Northwest region-wide climate vulnerability assessment, working with federal, state and non-profit organizations. This work will combine climate science with appropriate communications and policy tools that will facilitate effective research on the vulnerability of key species in the Pacific Northwest and help managers better plan for the future.
Christie Galitsky
Christie earned a B.S.E. in Chemical Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania in 1996 and an M.S. in Chemical Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley in 1999. She worked as an engineer for 10 years, most recently in the International Energy Studies Group at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory where she focused on sustainable development projects in developing countries. There she helped to develop a fuel efficient cookstove program in Darfur, Sudan, and energy efficiency and benchmarking tools for China. She helped to identify and to assess opportunities for greenhouse gas emissions reductions in several industrial sectors around the world. Currently, Christie is shifting focus to ecology. As a master's student at the University of Washington, she is studying how landscape patterns and climate change affect biodiversity. Her research will focus on avian diversity as an indicator of ecosystem health in the Willamette Valley, Oregon.
Jesse Langdon
Jesse earned a B.A. in Geography from the University of Texas in Austin in 1999, and has worked as a GIS analyst for the City of Austin, City of Pflugerville, and the Texas Water Development Board. Previous to joining the Landscape Ecology and Conservation Lab, he worked as a GIS analyst for the Nature Conservancy's Washington program for 7 years. Jesse's research is associated with the Pacific Northwest Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment. Specifically, he is studying the potential impact of climate change and land use change on habitat suitability for approximately 200 terrestrial animal species.
Peter Singleton
In addition to being a PhD student in the Landscape Ecology Lab, Peter is an ecologist with the USDA Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station in Wenatchee, WA. Peter’s research interests are focused on the integration of landscape ecology, habitat ecology, and animal population dynamics. He is currently conducting research on interactions between barred owls and spotted owls in fire-prone forests of the eastern Cascades. Peter has also been involved in research on carnivore movement patterns, developing analysis techniques to assess habitat connectivity, and other topics. Peter holds an M.S. from the University of Montana, and a B.S. from The Evergreen State College.
Aimee Fullerton
Aimee is a PhD student interested in the spatial structure of aquatic populations (especially fishes) living in stream networks, relationships between spatio-temporal scale and ecological patterns and processes, anthropogenic influences on population structure, and ways that science can contribute to improved decision-making. Since 2002, Aimee has been a research fisheries biologist with NOAA's Northwest Fisheries Science Center . There, her research has centered on freshwater habitat conservation for ESA-listed Pacific salmonids. Prior to that, Aimee was a biologist with the state of North Carolina, where she worked on conservation of rare and nongame aquatic fauna (1998-2002). She holds a B.S. in Biology from the Ohio State University (1994) and an M.S. in Aquatic Ecology from the University of Notre Dame (1998).
Former Lab Members
John Withey
John received his M.S. (2002) and Ph.D. (2006) from the University of Washington's College of Forest Resources. His research interests include the ecological responses of vertebrates to land-use changes, in particular avian diversity and behavior across urban gradients, and integrating land-use and climate change predictions to better understand future impacts on biodiversity. His field experience includes observing banded crows in downtown Seattle, tracking spotted owls in the mountains of New Mexico, and surveying isolated forest patches near the Panama Canal for songbirds. His current postdoctoral position is part of an interdisciplinary project to predict and compare how alternative policy incentives and market forces affect land-use decisions, and how resulting land-use changes affect species conservation, carbon storage, and the value of commodity production. He will be joined the Department of Biological Sciences at Florida International University (in Miami) in January 2012.
Carrie Schloss
Carrie earned her Masters of Science from the School of Forest Resources in 2011. She focused on strategies for reserve selection to mitigate the effects of climate change on biodiversity.
Tristan Nuñez
Tristan graduated with an M.S. from the UW School of Forest Resources in 2011. His research focused on the ways habitat connectivity might influence how vertebrate distributions are shifted by climate change. He is currently working on his Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley.
Aaron Ruesch
Aaron graduated with an M.S. from the UW School of Forest Resources in 2011. Aaron's research focused on how changes in physical hydrological systems, depending on climate change and land-use change, affect the composition of the John Day River and how that will change the distribution of fishes. He currently works for The Nature Conservancy.
Jorge Ramos
Jorge graduate with an M.S. from the UW School of Forest Resources in 2011. As a masters student, Jorge studied how landscape patterns affect amphibian distributions in an urbanizing environment. He is currently working on his Ph.D. at Arizona State University.
Betsy Bancroft
Betsy was a post-doctoral researcher in the lab from 2007-2009. Betsy is currently an Assistant Professor of Biology at Southern Utah University.
Evan Girvetz
Evan was a post-doctoral researcher in the lab from 2007-2009. Evan is currently a scientist at The Nature Conservancy and an adjuct professor in the School of Forest Resources.
Lesley Jantarasami
Leslie completed her M.S. in 2009 and is currently working at the Washington DC as a Presidential Management Fellow at the EPA.
