Where and how are vegetation-type transitions occurring? (Fig. 1, Line 1)

Using historical vegetation data, modern forest inventories, and environmental data to characterize climate-induced range shifts. I primarily study vegetation-climate mismatch in the Sierra Nevada (i.e. “zombie forests”), with parallel work on urban refugia and the conservation value of urban biodiversity.

What are the impacts of these transitions? (Lines 2–3)

Investigating consequences for fire regimes, carbon storage, biodiversity, and the human communities embedded in these landscapes. Recent work includes wildfire behavior in zombie forests and co-authorship of the Nature and Climate Change chapter of The Nature Record.

How do we manage these transitions ethically and effectively? (Lines 4–9)

Developing ethical frameworks, community science platforms, and co-created management strategies that strengthen the reciprocal relationships between scientists, decision-makers, and local communities. This includes work to reframe nativeness as a gradient to better manage ecosystems in transition, a suite of tools to make biodiversity data more legible to the community scientists that collect it and the decision-makers that act on it, and community science campaigns that ground this work in local communities.