People

Daniel Griffin, PhD      griffin9@umn.edu  |  ORCID | Google Scholar  |  Twitter  |  Instagram 

Dan is an Associate Professor of Geography at the University of Minnesota. He studies climate and ecosystem change — past and present — through data collected from tree rings. 

Griffin is affiliated with the AISOS Lab and the UMN Undergraduate Honors Program. He is a member of the graduate faculty in the UMN Department of Earth & Environmental Sciences. Dan teaches undergraduate courses on biogeography, climatology, and the geography of Minnesota, plus a graduate seminar on climate extremes and environmental change. Griffin's research has been consistently supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, the NOAA Climate and Global Change Program, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the University of Minnesota. 

Prospective students interested in joining the group are encouraged to reach out after reviewing information at the bottom of this page. I welcome the opportunity to discuss possibilities for postdoctoral research, including competitive funding available through the University of Minnesota.

Matthew Trumper     trump022@umn.edu

Trumper is a Staff Research Specialist with expertise in biogeography, dendroclimatology, hydrology, and multivariate numerical data analysis.  He is working on our new collaborative grant researching floodplain forest response to hydroclimate and climate change in the Upper Mississippi River Valley, through collaboration with Drs. Molly van Appledorn (USGS) and Windmueller-Campione (UMN), with USGS funding from the Midwest CASC. Trumper's previous environmental research with tree rings has been supported by NSF, NOAA, and the  UMN UROP programs. Matt holds BS and MS degrees in Geography from the University of Minnesota.

Jessica Thorne thorn573@umn.edu

Thorne is working towards a MS in Systems Engineering with emphasis in Data Analytics. In 2023, she earned a BS in Industrial and Systems Engineering. She's interested in curbing climate change from a big business standpoint. Since mid-Spring 2020, Thorne has worked as a member of the lab group, analyzing tree ring data and developing a number of user data acquisition tools for DendroElevator.  Her efforts have been supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program and the National Science Foundation.

Naomi Schulberg schu4841@umn.edu

Schulberg is a PhD student in Earth & Environmental Sciences, focusing on paleoclimate and dendrochronology. Naomi holds a BS in Earth Science from Cornell University, and was previously affiliated as a researcher with Columbia University's Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory and the Harvard Forest. Her work and studies are supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship.

Sandy Wong     wong0792@umn.edu

Wong is a MA student in Geography. She is interested in climate change, drought extremes, and related effects on tree growth in oak woodlands. Prior to joining the lab group, she obtained a BSc in Earth System Sciences and Geography from The University of Hong Kong. Sandy's undergraduate thesis focused on the relationship between drought and tree resilience in the Tibetan Plateau. 

Grace Aho

Aho is a University Honors Program student working toward a double major in Biology and Environmental Geography. She is interested in pursuing a career that combines her love of nature with her interest in science. Aho joined the lab as an undergraduate research assistant in the Spring 2023.

Leo Huppke

Huppke is a University Honors Program student working towards a B.S. in Environmental Science, Policy, and Management with minors in Spanish and Creative Writing. He is interested in pursuing a career that relates to ecological conservation and environmental literacy. Huppke joined the lab as a research assistant in the Fall 2023 semester.

Eleanor McKee

McKee is working towards a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering with a focus on environmental sustainability. She’s interested in a variety of career paths including clean energy and transportation as well as environmental conservation. McKee joined the lab as a research assistant in the 2023 spring semester.

Elizabeth Moline

Moline is working towards a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering. She joined the lab as a research assistant in the 2023 spring semester. In Fall 2023, she completed a UROP working with Colin McFadden and Dan Griffin on robotic photography tools for dendrochronology.

Amital Shaver 

Shaver is a University Honors Program student working towards a B.S. in Biochemistry with a minor in Dance and another in Creative Writing. Amital spent the summer of 2022 in Alaska working on a wildland fire and fuels reduction crew with the Alaska Female Fire Core in collaboration with the Student Conservation Association and the National Park Service. Amital started working with the lab group in Fall 2022.

Andrew Toensing 

Toensing is a University Honors Program student working towards a B.S. in Chemistry. He is interested in fields relating to organic chemistry and biochemistry. Toensing joined the lab as a research assistant in the 2023 Spring semester as part of the Dean’s First-Year and Creative Scholar Program.

Ian Seremet Rogers 

Seremet is pursuing a major B.S. in Mechanical Engineering with a minor in Computer Science. He is interested in machine learning, and environmental sustainability. Previously, Seremet automated a method to improve sustainability of fisheries and piloted a composting program. He worked in the lab as a research assistant in the Spring 2023 semester.

2024 - Jack Rogers 

Rogers is a University Honors Program sophomore working toward a double major in Data Science and Environmental Geography. He is interested in quantitative analysis related to the environment and sports, and is interning with the Washington Nationals’ baseball research and development department in summer 2023. Previously Rogers worked in data analysis involving energy storage markets and technology. Jack worked in the lab as an undergraduate research assistant in the 2022–2023 academic year.

2023 - Rachel de Sobrino

de Sobrino was a University Honors Program student and earned a B.S. in Environmental Geography with a minor in Sustainability Studies. Rachel developed her senior honors thesis on climate change and old-growth forests at a site in Pennsylvania, where she conducted fieldwork as part of her 2022 summer internship with Dr. Neil Pederson of Harvard Forest. She has been a regular instructor at the Minnesota Debate Institute, engaged with the Women's Environmental Institute Farm in Minnesota, and Tamales y Bicicletas, a southside Minneapolis environmental justice organization. Rachel started working with the lab group in Spring 2020.

2023 - Grace Hansen

Hansen was a University Honors Program student working towards a B.S. in Industrial and Systems Engineering. Grace's efforts to develop image visualization and data I/O tools for DendroElevator were supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program. In the 2022–2023 year, Grace is spearheading a industrial systems analysis of tree-ring data processing workflow in the lab group. Grace is also involved with a number of extracurricular leadership and sports activities. She is Director of Programs for the UMN Student Robotics Group and currently serves as President for the Green Girls STEM Foundation, a nonprofit that serves STEM diversity through grants and scholarships fundraising for women from historically underrepresented groups. In 2021, Hansen was recipient of the UMN President’s Student Leadership & Service Award.

2021 - Daniel Crawford 

Crawford completed a MA in Geography in the summer of 2021 with the support of a Graduate Research Fellowship from the College of Liberal Arts and a grant to Griffin from the National Science Foundation. His thesis leveraged Quercus macrocarpa samples from the Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve to investigate questions of vessel area variability and tree hydraulic allometry. Previously, Crawford earned B.S. degrees in Environmental Science and Geography at the University of Minnesota. His work on climate, music, and science communication has been featured widely, including in this video by CLA. He now works as a research scientist in the Environment & Natural Resources Institute at the University of Alaska.

2020 - Siiri Bigalke

Bigalke completed a MA in Geography in the summer of 2020. Her thesis research focused on the emergence of a "new" winter season temperature regime in Minnesota. Her interests have grown to encompass climate system dynamics, human-environment interactions, and climate services with a stakeholder orientation. In Fall 2020, Siiri began a PhD program in climate science at Utah State University in the lab group led by Professor Simon Wang. Siiri earned a BA in Environmental Science & Policy from Smith College.

2020 - Jack Dougherty

Dougherty is a junior pursuing a B.S. in Economics and anticipates graduation in Spring 2021. His interests include energy and agriculture policy, international relations, and the politics surrounding climate change. In his free time he enjoys playing trombone in the University of Minnesota Marching Band. In the lab Jack assists with core mounting, surface preparation, and imaging. Dougherty began working in the lab in Summer 2018.

2020 - Elizabeth Spencer spenc644@umn.edu

Spencer is a sophomore pursuing a B.S. in Plant Science with minors in horticulture, genetics, and agronomy and is expected to graduate in the Fall of 2022. Elizabeth is interested in sustainable agriculture, air quality, and water pollution. In her free time she loves to cheer on Gopher Athletics, especially football, softball, and hockey.  In the lab, Elizabeth helped with tree ring data collection and polishing wood samples. 

2019 - Tanner Johnson      joh12499@umn.edu 

Johnson completed a B.S. in Environmental and Ecological Engineering in May 2020. His research interests include forests, remote sensing, and natural resources management.  In summer 2018, Tanner worked at the University of Georgia in Athens with support from the NASA DEVELOP program. Tanner worked in the lab from Fall 2016 through Spring 2019.

2019 - Daniel Ackerman 

Ackerman completed a PhD in Ecology, Evolution & Behavior in 2019. His dissertation research focused on climate change and vegetation in arctic tundra, in addition to modeling the volume and effects of nitrogen deposition for watersheds at the global scale. Dan's work was supported by a NSF GRFP and in summer 2018, he worked with Scientific American as a AAAS Mass Media Science Fellow. Dan is an active science journalist and you can check out a bunch of his writing here. Dan earned a BA in Environmental Studies  from Carleton College.

2018 - Kate Carlson

Carlson is a University Honors Program alumnus who completed a B.S. in Geography in Fall 2018. She is focusing on Geographic Information Science, database management, and web development. Her work to develop a web GIS for the Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve has been supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program. Kate began working in the lab in Fall 2016 and went on to pursue graduate studies in Geography at the University of Colorado Boulder. 

2018 - Malik Nusseihbeh

Nusseihbeh completed a B.S. in Computer Science in Fall 2018. Malik is interested in advanced computing technologies and development. He has been key for our group's project to bring high-resolution image analysis to the web, and his work was supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program. Malik began working in the lab in Summer 2017.

2018 - Erin Jones graduated with honors and a B.A. in Geography and another B.A. in English. With her focus in human geography, her senior thesis was supervised by Kate Derickson, and was focused around land tenure, environmental policy, and political ecology in coastal Florida. Erin worked in the lab from Fall 2015 through Spring 2018, with a focus on wood anatomy, microtome specimen preparation, and she was a longstanding participant in Ackerman's dissertation project on shrub dendroecology. She was supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program. 

2018 - Madison Sherwood graduated with honors and a B.S. in Geography and went onto a job working in GIS with the City of Minneapolis.  Her Senior Thesis was on time series analysis of historical aerial imagery for Cedar Creek, and she has been utilizing the Minnesota Historical Aerial Photography Online resource. Madison worked in the lab from summer 2016 through spring 2018 and was supported the UMN Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program. 

2018 – Jacob Arndt graduated from the MGIS program in 2018, and went on to a job at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. In summer 2017, Jake worked at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory with support from the NASA DEVELOP program. Jake's research interests include climate, ecology, land cover change, and computer science. He specializes in remote sensing, development, GIScience, and climatology. Jake is also a phenomenal dendrochronologist, and worked in the lab group from Summer 2016 through Spring 2018.

2017 – Whitney DeLong  graduated from our MGIS program in 2019. She is an expert with advanced geospatial technologies, including terrestrial laser scanning, point cloud processing, and GIScience. She worked in the lab as a graduate RA during Fall 2017, and was supported by funding from the University of Minnesota OVPR

2017 – Kelly Popham completed her B.S. in Biology with highest honors in Spring 2017.  She worked in the lab from Spring 2015–Spring 2017, and was supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program.

2016 – Talia Anderson completed her B.S. in Geography and B.A. in Spanish Studies with highest honors in Spring 2016. She worked in our lab from Fall 2014–Spring 2016, and was supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program and a Talle Family Scholarship. She was profiled by the UMN in this video. She went on to work for the USFS in Puerto Rico. In 2018, Talia participated in research with Duncan Christie and his collaborators in Chile with support from the Fulbright Foundation. She is now a Ph.D. student with Kevin Anchukaitis in the School of Geography at the University of Arizona, where she earned a master's degree in May 2020. 

2016 – Danny Schwalen is completing his Management Information Systems degree in the Carlson School. He worked in the lab from Spring 2015–Spring 2016 and his work was supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Scholarship program.

2016 – Ethan Van Offlen completed his B.S. in Geography in Spring 2017. He worked in the lab in Fall 2017 and his work was supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program.

2016 – Lucas Veitch completed his B.S. in Economics in Spring 2016 and is now enrolled in a graduate program at Harvard. He worked in the lab from Spring 2015–Spring 2016 and his work was supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program.