YALE UNIVERSITY - Key Persons
Anna has worked in science management since she graduated with a MS in Geoecology from University of Potsdam in 2013. She has always been passionate about supporting science that aims at solving real world questions and in understanding how doing research and research results impact various communities and stakeholders. At YCNCC she oversees the day to day activities, serves as the main point of contact for inquiries from within the Yale community and beyond, and supports and implements the strategic planning for the Center.
Prior to joining Yale in 2001, Professor Bercovici earned a B.S. in physics from Harvey Mudd College, and both an M.S. and Ph.D. in geophysics and space physics from the University of California, Los Angeles. His research interests include geophysical and geological fluid dynamics, with applications to planetary interiors, volcanoes, and subsurface fluid migration and rock deformation. Bercovici is one of the senior editors for the Treatise on Geophysics, for two editions, and is the author of The Origins of Everything in 100 Pages More or Less (Yale University Press). He is the recipient of the James B. Macelwane Medal, and also Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, and is a member of both the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.
Job Titles:
- Expert
- Scientific Leadership Team
Dr. Paulo Brando is an expert on tropical ecology whose research is aimed at (1) identifying ecological thresholds beyond which global changes cause abrupt, prolonged degradation of terrestrial ecosystems by stressing, disturbing, and killing forests and (2) quantifying ecological & climatological boundaries for tropical agricultural expansion and intensification. His research combines field manipulation experiments, statistical and dynamic vegetation models, and remote sensing.
Job Titles:
- Scientific Leadership Team
Dr. Sparkle L. Malone joined the Yale School of the Environment in 2020. Her primary research focus is to improve our understanding of how climate and disturbance regimes influence spatial and temporal variability in ecosystem structure and function. Using remote sensing, eddy covariance, and spatial and temporal models she explores questions related to ecosystem condition, sustainability, and vulnerability to climate extremes.
Job Titles:
- Assistant Professor
- Scientific Leadership Team
Eric Slessarev is an Assistant Professor in the Yale Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. He studies soil and its role in terrestrial ecosystems. His research is guided by two major objectives: (1) understanding how soil properties develop in different ecological contexts, and how they are expressed at the global scale; and (2) understanding how the soil environment governs belowground ecology and influences carbon and nutrient cycling. Eric applies these research perspectives to evaluate soil-based climate change mitigation strategies in managed ecosystems.
Eric holds dual BS and BA degrees in Earth Systems and History from Stanford University, where he graduated in 2011. He completed a PhD in the department of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology at University of California, Santa Barbara in 2018. Eric then worked as a Postdoctoral Researcher and Staff Scientist in the Environmental isotope Systems Group at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory from 2019-2023.
Job Titles:
- Director of Finance and Administration
Job Titles:
- Scientific Leadership Team
Job Titles:
- Senior Administrative Assistant
Job Titles:
- Corporate Engagement Manager
- Outreach and Corporate Engagement Manager
Lauren is the Outreach and Corporate Engagement Manager in the Corporate Strategy and Engagement Office. She joined the team in late February 2022. Previously, she worked for three and a half years at the Yale School of Public Health as a Development Program Coordinator in the Office of Development and Alumni Affairs.
As Outreach and Corporate Engagement Manager, Lauren oversees corporate partnerships and engagement activities for the Yale Center for Natural Carbon Capture. Lauren's primary responsibilities include collaborating with center leadership and project managing deliverables to the Center's corporate partners, such as annual meetings, reports, and research briefs.
Lauren recently completed a three-year tenure as a co-chair of the Future Leaders of Yale Lean In Mentorship Committee, which provides nuanced professional development panel discussions to Yale's early career professionals. Lauren received her Master's of Public Administration and Bachelor's degree from UConn. She is still actively involved with her alma mater as a member of the Department of Public Policy Alumni Council and a Teaching Assistant in the department.
Professor Comita is a biologist, with expertise in tropical forest ecology. She joined Yale in 2014 after earning a B.A. in biology and an M.A. in conservation biology at the University of Pennsylvania, and a Ph.D. in plant biology from the University of Georgia. Her research uses extensive field studies to uncover novel insights about how tropical forests regenerate and to determine the processes that shape these diverse and carbon-rich ecosystems. She was the recipient of the 2017 British Ecological Society Founders' Prize and was selected as an Early Career Fellow of the Ecological Society of America. She also received the Yale Postdoctoral Mentoring Prize for her mentoring in the Women in Science at Yale program.
Job Titles:
- Professor of Soils and Ecosystem Ecology at the Yale School
- Scientific Leadership Team
Mark A. Bradford is Professor of Soils and Ecosystem Ecology at the Yale School of the Environment and The Yale Forest School. His group's research investigates how soil microbes and their interactions with plants govern carbon cycle responses to global change and ecosystem management. Their current work spans questions that address uncertainties in Earth system feedbacks to quantifying soil and forest health. He is particularly interested in how organisms and their interactions affect decomposition processes and soil carbon. He is author of over 190 academic papers and is an ISI highly-cited author in the field of Environment and Ecology.
Bradford connects to policy and practice through collaborations with NGOs and other agencies to produce and synthesize evidence that helps inform the management of soils to restore and protect soil carbon and hence soil and food security; and to inform the management of forests for native species and greenhouse gas mitigation. He teaches soil science and ecosystem science, with application to developing and managing ecosystem budgets. He holds a BSc and PhD in Biological Sciences from Exeter University (UK), did his graduate work at the then UK government Institute of Terrestrial Ecology, postdoctoral research at Imperial College, London and Duke University, and joined the faculty at the University of Georgia, Athens in 2005. He moved to Yale in 2009.
Job Titles:
- Professor
- Scientific Leadership Team
Professor Ashton conducts research on the biological and physical processes governing the regeneration of natural forests and on the creation of their agroforestry analogs. In particular, he seeks a better understanding of regeneration establishment among assemblages of closely related trees. His long-term research concentrates on tropical and temperate forests of the Asian and American realms. The results of his research have been applied to the development and testing of silvicultural techniques for restoration of degraded lands and for the management of natural forests for a variety of timber and nontimber products and services. He is the author or editor of over twelve books, including the nations textbook on silviculture and applied forest ecology, and over 200 publications in applied forest ecology.
Job Titles:
- Scientific Leadership Team
Mary-Louise Timmermans is a physical oceanographer, with expertise in polar oceans.
Prior to joining Yale in 2009, she received a B.S. in Physics from the University of Victoria
Job Titles:
- Associate Professor
- Scientific Leadership Team
Matthew Eisaman is an Associate Professor at Yale University in the Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences and the Yale Center for Natural Carbon Capture (YCNCC). Prior to joining Yale in 2023, he served as an Associate Professor at Stony Brook University with a guest appointment at Brookhaven National Lab. In 2021, Matt co-founded Ebb Carbon, a startup based in San Carlos, CA that is commercializing ocean-based carbon dioxide removal (ocean CDR) and ocean acidification reversal using electrochemical ocean alkalinity enhancement. He currently advises Ebb Carbon as Chief Scientist. Prof. Eisaman served as a technical advisor to X, formerly known as Google[X], from 2014 - 2021, and in 2016 he led Project Foghorn at X, which aimed to create carbon-neutral liquid fuel from seawater. Prior to Stony Brook, Prof. Eisaman was a Physicist at Brookhaven National Lab from 2011-2014, an Applied Physicist in the Cleantech Innovation Program at Xerox PARC in Palo Alto, CA from 2008-2011, and an NRC Postdoc at NIST from 2006-2008. He received his Ph.D. in Physics from Harvard and A.B. in Physics from Princeton in 2006 and 2000, respectively. His research has covered a broad range of clean-energy technologies, including photovoltaics and CO 2 removal. Prof. Eisaman's current research is focused on ocean CDR, including: the optimization and commercialization of electrochemical ocean CDR; its effects on marine ecosystems; establishing and improving methods for measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV); and the potential for colocation and co-benefits of electrochemical ocean CDR with other carbon removal approaches.
Job Titles:
- Professor
- Scientific Leadership Team
Nilay Hazari is currently the John Randolph Huffman Professor of Chemistry at Yale University. He received a BSc (2002), majoring in chemistry, and a MSc (2003) in inorganic chemistry working with Professor Leslie D Field at the University of Sydney. He then completed a D. Phil in inorganic chemistry (2006) at the University of Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. His doctoral supervisor was Professor Jennifer C Green. He finished his formal education by working for three years (2006-2009) as a postdoctoral scholar under the supervision of Professor John E Bercaw and Dr. Jay A Labinger at the California Institute of Technology. In 2009, he started his independent career at Yale. His primary research focus is the mechanism-based design of homogeneous transition metal catalysts for the synthesis of fine and commodity chemicals and fuels. His approach to developing new catalysts involves detailed experimental and theoretical studies of reaction mechanisms. These studies provide guidance on how to modify current catalysts and design new catalysts, which are more active and selective for existing and novel transformations.
To date his group has developed state-of-the-art catalysts for the hydrogenation of carbon dioxide to formic acid and methanol, the dehydrogenation of formic acid and methanol to carbon dioxide and hydrogen, and palladium and nickel catalyzed cross-coupling. His group has developed more than 10 commercially available reagents for catalysis, and his precatalysts for palladium catalyzed cross-coupling are commercially available on a kilogram scale.
Professor Hazari has received a number of awards including the American Chemical Society Harry Gray Award for Creative Work in Inorganic Chemistry by a Young Investigator (2017), the Arthur Greer Memorial Prize for Outstanding Scholarship by Junior Faculty Members in the Social Sciences and Sciences at Yale University (2015), the Camille and Henry Dreyfus Teacher Scholar Award (2014), and the National Science Foundation Career Award (2012). In 2020, he was elected to the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering, in 2013 he was named an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, and in 2012 an Organometallics Fellow (from the American Chemical Society Journal Organometallics).
Job Titles:
- Scientific Leadership Team
Job Titles:
- Scientific Leadership Team
Job Titles:
- Director of Research for the Yale Applied Science Synthesis Program
Sara is an ecologist with expertise in conservation biology, invasion biology, plant ecology, community ecology, and ecosystem ecology. She conducts research on how humans can make informed decisions on how to best protect and conserve landscapes, ecosystems, and all the species that lives within them. Prior to joining Yale, she was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at the University of Pittsburgh where she ran an empirical research lab in plant ecology and invasion biology. Sara's research training includes postdoctoral positions with the Yale Institute for Biospheric Studies and the Smith Conservation Fellows Program, a PhD from the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Tennessee and a BS from the Department of Entomology & Wildlife Conservation at the University of Delaware
Sara Kuebbing
Director of Research for the Yale Applied Science Synthesis Program
sara.kuebbing@yale.edu
Ecosystem Capture