UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES
DEPARTMENT OF GEOGRAPHY
Dennis Lettenmaier (co-PI, Project Lead)
DISTINGUISHED PROFESSOR |
Professor Lettenmaier’s group at UCLA provides expertise in hydrological and land surface modeling and prediction at scales from local to regional. This includes, for instance, drought monitoring and prediction, near-real time soil moisture estimation as well as historical reconstructions, and estimation (based on modeling and remote sensing) of surface water ponding, and other interaction pathways between land surface physical characteristics and public health outcomes. In addition, Professor Lettenmaier is the project PI, and as such his group interacts with all other members of the project team and assists in synthesizing project outcomes.
Gregory Okin (co-I)PROFESSOR |
Professor Okin (Ph.D., California Institute of Technology, 2001) (Vice Chair) has research interests in geomorphology, plant-soil interactions, arid environments, nutrient cycling, spatial modeling, and remote sensing. He teaches courses in Physical Geography and Soils.
Abi is Assistant Professor at CSU East Bay. For the MRPI project, his work focuses on studying the role of climate and vegetation in Valley Fever incidence. Abi received his BS in Watershed Science from Utah State University in 2006 and MS in Environmental Science from Indiana University in 2008 and PhD in Environmental Science from the University of Virginia in 2013. In his dissertation, he studied the effects of land degradation in the Southern Kalahari.
Solomon VinalRESEARCH ASSOCIATE |
Solomon is interested in hydrology, climate impacts in water resources, GIS, and hydroinformatics. Before joining UCLA in 2017, Solomon worked in Risk Management Solutions, Inc. for a year. In 2015 he graduated from a European Joint-Master's program in Flood Risk Management for which he spent a semester each in Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Slovenia, followed by a thesis period in the United States at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and the U.S. National Water Center.
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY
SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH
Justin Remais (co-PI, Site Lead)PROFESSOR
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Prof. Remais’ research group at UC Berkeley develops and applies methods for estimating the distribution and spread of infectious diseases in environments experiencing significant changes, such as those caused by urbanization, industrialization, changes in water resources, and a changing and increasingly variable climate. His team is investigating the dynamics of waterborne and vector-borne infections—including diarrheal diseases, malaria, dengue, Japanese encephalitis and schistosomiasis—as significant societal and environmental changes unfold, including in China, Ecuador, Senegal and California.
Karina's expertise in environmental engineering and statistical hydrology informs her research on waterborne and vector-borne diseases, drawing on her advanced training in physically-based hydrological modeling and spatiotemporal statistics. Karina received her PhD in Environmental Engineering from UC Berkeley and completed her undergraduate and graduate degrees in Environmental Engineering at the École polytechnique and Ecole des Mines in Paris, France.
Christopher HooverPH.D. STUDENT
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Chris Hoover, doctoral student in EHS, uses geospatial methods, statistical analysis, and mathematical modeling to understand the dynamics of infectious disease transmission driven by environmental change. Prior to joining EHS at Berkeley, he conducted research on the influence of avian community ecology on West Nile virus transmission. His current research examines the impact of agrochemical use on schistosomiasis transmission in West Africa using mathematical and statistical modeling to analyze and compare the range of human health, economic, and environmental consequences of coincident biological and chemical contamination of water.
Nicholas SkaffPOSTDOCTORAL SCHOLAR |
Nick's expertise spans the ecology and epidemiology of vector-borne diseases. He leverages large spatio-temporal datasets to identify the environmental conditions that facilitate or limit the transmission of these pathogens. Nick received his PhD from Michigan State University in Ecology, Evolutionary Biology & Behavior, and prior to that he earned a bachelor’s degree from Tufts University in Biology and Environmental Studies.
Jennifer is a first-year PhD student in Berkeley's graduate program in Epidemiology. Her background is in Chemical Engineering and Environmental Health Science. Prior to coming to Berkeley, she worked at CDC in a Global Health branch where she was responsible for initiating temporary hospital-based surveillance systems in Kazakhstan for encephalitis and ICU-attended severe acute respiratory infections. Jennifer also led a serosurvey of sheep, cattle, humans, and ticks on Crimean Congo Hemorrhagic Fever in Kazakhstan and was the data manager for a serosurvey of Zika virus in wild and domestic animals and mosquito populations. Her experience includes serving as the lead nutrition survey consultant at Save the Children, and as a consultant for the Rabies Branch at CDC on simulations used for risk assessments of oral animal vaccination.
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO
SCRIPPS INSTITUTE OF OCEANOGRAPHY
Alexander "Sasha" Gershunov (co-PI, Site Lead)RESEARCH METEROLOGIST |
Sasha’s research focuses on interrelated aspects of weather, climate and society. His professional interests include understanding the links between regional weather extremes and large-scale climate variability and change, long-range climate prediction, the atmospheric water cycle, precipitation and drought, heat waves, cold snaps, marine layer clouds, atmospheric rivers, Santa Ana winds, extreme weather and climate impacts on wildfire, energy, ecosystems, water resources and public health, climate influence on society and human influence on climate.
Tarik Benmarhnia (co-I)ASSISTANT PROFESSOR |
Dr. Benmarhnia finished his PhD jointly from The University of Montreal and Paris Sud and finished two Master’s degrees, one in Environmental Health Sciences Engineering from the French School of Higher Education in Public Health and another in Pharmacy and Ecotoxicology from Montpellier University in France. He completed his BA in Environmental Sciences from Montpellier University. He has therefore developed a very rich and diverse educational profile that gave him the ability to explore cross-disciplinary fields of public health and other disciplines. To further his training, he was an environmental scientist on contaminated soil with the French Railway Company, followed by a Health Scientist position with the French National Institute of Health Education and Prevention, and most recently was a post-doc at McGill University with the Institute for Health and Social Policy.
Janin Guzman MoralesGRADUATE STUDENT |
Morgan LevyPOSTDOCTORAL SCHOLAR |
Morgan holds a PhD (2016) and M.S. (2012) in Energy and Resources, and a M.A. in Statistics (2013), from UC Berkeley. Morgan’s research focuses on physical hydrology and water resources, including hydrological and environmental determinants of waterborne disease; land use and climate impacts to water systems; human-environmental dynamics; GIS and environmental data science.
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, MERCED
LeRoy Westerling (co-PI, Site Lead)ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR |
Kurt Schnier (co-I)PROFESSOR |
Kurt Schnier is a professor of economics at the University of California, Merced, and a senior research fellow at PERC. Schnier received a B.S. in management sciences from the University of California at San Diego, an M.A. in environmental studies from the University of Pennsylvania, and his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Arizona. His research focuses on conducting policy analysis in the fields of health and resource economics. His health care research has focused on the response of physicians and hospitals to current and impeding regulations that impact the provision of health care. His resource economics research focuses on facilitating the development of efficient marine resource policy and determining how fishermen respond to current and prospective fisheries policy. More specifically, his research has focused on hospital discharge decisions, efficient utilization of organs for transplantation, utilizing property rights in fisheries, estimation of capacity in fisheries and investigating heterogeneous preferences. He was a 2007 and 2009 Lone Mountain Fellow at PERC.