Dr. Danielle Ignace is our new associate professor of Tribal forest systems management, fire, and ecology as well as a research associate at Harvard Forest. She is an enrolled member of the Coeur d’Alene Tribe and an ecophysiologist studying the impacts of climate change, fire, and introduced species on forest ecosystem health and Indigenous communities in the United States and Canada. Dr. Ignace currently serves as Chair of the Traditional Ecological Knowledge Section of the Ecological Society of America (ESA), Chair of the Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee for the American Society of Plant Biologists, and Associate Editor for the journal Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene. Dr. Ignace was recently selected as an Excellence in Ecology Scholar by ESA and chapter lead for the first-ever U.S. National Nature Assessment. Fostering unique and transdisciplinary collaborations to understand and communicate pressing global change problems is the hallmark of her research and teaching.
Dr. Adriana Uscanga is our new assistant professor of forest systems social-ecological spatial analysis. Her research focuses on understanding how forest ecosystems and the human populations depending on them are affected by and respond to global change. She seeks to better understand the role of land use and management in shaping forest structure, composition, and function as well as the interactions between land-use or land-cover change and climate change. Dr. Uscanga uses an interdisciplinary approach to explore these social-ecological dynamics across scales through synthesizing field and remote sensing data with geographic information systems and ecological modeling. Besides doing research, she really enjoys teaching. As a mentor and teacher, she seeks to create a learning environment where participants feel free to be themselves and thrive on their academic journeys.
~ This article is part of the Fall 2024 Forest Scene newsletter (Issue 32). Access additional articles in the table of contents that follows the image description.
Image 1 description: A woman with light-brown skin, long dark hair, and black-rimmed glasses smiles in front of a gray background. She's wearing a maroon shirt.
Image 2 description: A young woman smiles in front of a some evergreen trees with a mountain in the background. She is light-skinned with long dark hair and is wearing casual hiking clothes and a lanyard with a badge around her neck.
The Forest Scene newsletter is published biannually in the spring and fall, featuring stories, research briefs, and updates from the Department of Forest Resources.
Click the following links to read articles from the Fall 2024 edition of Forest Scene (Issue 32):
- Department Message from Kristen C. Nelson
- Semester Highlight: "New geodetic markers honor GIS instructors"
- New Research: "Rising carbon dioxide and nitrogen pollution may jointly threaten biodiversity"
- New Research: "Are winter weather trends impacting northern Minnesota logging businesses?"
- "Teamwork": Support from student assistants is critical to conducting our research. It also bolsters the next generation of leaders.
- News Bites:
- "Danielle Ignace selected as a leader for the first National Nature Assessment"
- "SAF 2024"
- "Inspiring campus with tree cookies"
- "Continuing collaborations at the Cloquet Forestry Center"
- "Forestry Club participates in pile burning 'learn and burn' at the Cloquet Forestry Center"
- "UFOR and Extension collaborate to plant urban-tolerant, climate-ready trees"
- Field Questions: "Reducing vulnerability to wind damage in forest management planning"
- Alumnus Spotlight: Sawyer Scherer
- Faculty Retirement: Charlie Blinn
- Endnote