DRI’s STEM Education Program has received a grant from the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Environmental Management to support Nevada’s clean energy workforce pipeline. The nearly $2 million in funding will be used to prepare the next generation with the knowledge and technical skills needed for employment in fields such as clean energy, waste management, and environmental remediation.
DRI is pleased to announce that the 26th annual Peter B. Wagner Memorial Award for Women in Atmospheric Sciences has been awarded to Catherine (Casey) Ivanovich of Columbia University. The Peter B. Wagner Memorial Award for Women in Atmospheric Sciences is an annual competition recognizing the published works of women pursuing a master’s or Ph.D. in the atmospheric sciences.
David Almanza, Ph.D., joined DRI this summer as a postdoctoral researcher in urban climate adaptation. He is working with Ariel Choinard in the Southern Nevada Heat Resilience Lab to examine how heat is impacting communities in and around Las Vegas. Born in Bogota, Colombia, Almanza grew up in Las Vegas and completed his Ph.D. at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, in 2023. In this interview, Almanza discusses his social science training, what it means to center research on your own community, and his love for Las Vegas eateries.
A few miles south of Yosemite’s famed Glacier Point, ringed by striking granite domes, lies the Illilouette Basin. This small stretch of the Sierra Nevada Mountains has become a sort of fire laboratory, a place where natural wildfires have been allowed to burn since 1972. In contrast with the long-supported program of fire suppression that has dominated American forests since the late 19th century, resulting in dense and unhealthy forests, the Illilouette Basin’s story is about the benefits that natural fire can bring to the landscape.
In an effort to better understand urban heat islands and their impacts on our region, a group of organizations, led by the Nevada State Climate Office, is seeking volunteers to track heat on August 10 for the Reno-Sparks Heat Mapping Project. Volunteers will set out in pairs to drive or navigate a predetermined route, equipped with a GPS-equipped temperature and humidity sensor that can be affixed to a volunteer’s car. The original project date was postponed due to unusually cool weather.
The $100,000 grant will fund the production of additional educational kits known as Greenboxes that raise awareness and understanding of the prevalence and role of microplastics in the environment. In addition to the Greenboxes, the grant will also support community partnerships with The Nature Conservancy, the Walker Basin Conservancy, Get Outdoors Nevada, Sierra Nevada Journeys, and Envirolution.
New research identifies ecosystems around the world that could be threatened by declining groundwater levels. The research, published July 17 in Nature, is the first time that groundwater-dependent ecosystems have been mapped on a global scale. Led by scientists from The Nature Conservancy and DRI, the global effort brought researchers together from universities, non-profit organizations, and institutions from seven countries.
A new study finds evidence to support that Mars had a cold and icy past by identifying similarities between soils found on Mars and those of Canada’s Newfoundland, a cold subarctic climate. The study, published July 7th in Communications Earth and Environment, looked for soils on Earth with comparable materials to Mars’ Gale Crater.
Scientists from the Desert Research Institute (DRI) and the University of Nevada, Reno are recruiting volunteers to conduct a one-day campaign to map extreme heat across Washoe County on July 27. community volunteers will fan out across the county to collect thousands of temperature and humidity measurements from early morning through evening, taken over 3 one-hour periods.
New research explores the microbial communities that live on plastic waste and how they impact the 2nd most biodiverse river in the world. DRI researchers Monica Arienzo and Rachel Kozloski are co-authors on this new study that examines the ecological impacts of plastic waste in Cambodia’s Mekong River.