Two talks on Monday October 5th at 12pm:

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1. "Scenarios for climate change experiments on mountain landscapes"

Sisi Duchicela

Assistant Professor, CU Boulder, INSTAAR and Geography

Summary - Changes in plant community composition of mountain ecosystems (i.e., biodiversity or functional diversity) due to global environmental change may alter ecosystem functioning in ways we don’t fully understand yet. Using an experimental approach could help develop predictions on how ecosystems will change under these future climatic conditions. In this talk, I will introduce scenarios in which our lab is developing this experimental approach in the Andes and in the Colorado Rockies.

Bio - Sisi got her master’s at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor on Conservation Ecology, where she focused on Natural Resources Management. she did her PhD at UT Austin in Geography and the Environment and focused on Ecological Restoration. She comes from a biology background and loves doing fieldwork. Between her years studying, she worked with NGOs and the Ministry of the Environment in Ecuador. She got to INSTAAR in Jan. 2025. Here she has been working on new projects in Colorado at Niwot Ridge, and being involved with the Niwot LTER and the MRS. She values doing research that can provide recommendations towards creating well-developed land management, conservation or restoration programs

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2. "Two strings, one bow: Water filters as tools for both public health and environmental surveillance"

Riley Mulhern

Assistant Professor, CU Boulder, INSTAAR and Environmental Studies

Summary - In this talk, Mulhern will provide a brief introduction to his early-stage work assessing the effectiveness of point-of-use water filters for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).  He is exploring how consumer water filters can serve as tools for both public health protection in PFAS-contaminated sites and as passive samplers for PFAS surveillance in backcountry and alpine environments using participatory research methods.

Bio - Riley Mulhern is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Environmental Studies and Faculty Fellow of INSTAAR. His passion for alpine regions comes from having hiked and climbed all of Colorado's 14ers with his dad as a kid, and from living high in the Andes where he worked on issues of mining contamination and environmental justice for two years before his doctoral work. He completed his PhD in Environmental Sciences & Engineering from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and MS in Environmental Engineering from CU Boulder. 

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INSTAAR Seminar Series

All seminars are hybrid events, in person and via Zoom.

Audience: All are welcome

Location: Online and in SEEC S228. 4001 Discovery Drive, Boulder, CO.