Daniel Trugman

Dr. Trugman’s research focuses on developing and applying new techniques to analyze large datasets of seismic waveforms in order to better understand earthquake rupture processes and their relation to seismic hazards. His research team at the University is broadly interested in leveraging concepts from big data and scientific machine learning alongside high-fidelity physical modeling in order to advance earthquake science.

Topics of particular interest include to Dr. Trugman’s research team include:
– Nevada seismicity, tectonics, and earthquake sequences
– Earthquake source properties (magnitude, stress drop, and radiated energy estimates)
– Earthquake nucleation and rupture dynamics
– Stress transfer and earthquake triggering
– Earthquake early warning systems
– Ground motion prediction and hazard analysis
– Forensic seismology and nuclear monitoring

Merryn Cole

Dr. Cole’s research interests focus on the relationship between spatial thinking and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) content as well as the ways in which teachers understand and implement project-based instruction and the impact of implementation on students’ understanding of STEM content. Other research interests include the content understanding and self-efficacy of practitioners of science communication and/or science outreach and the impacts on their audiences.

Ana de Bettencourt-Dias

Ana de Bettencourt-Dias received her ‘licenciatura’ (M.S. equivalent) in Technological Chemistry from the University of Lisbon in 1993, and her ‘Dr. rer. nat.’ (Ph.D. equivalent) in Inorganic Chemistry from the University of Cologne in 1997 with Prof. Thomas Kruck. In her graduate work, she isolated new titanium complexes as single source precursors for the chemical vapor deposition of TiN thin layers. She joined the group of Prof. Alan Balch at UC Davis in 1998 as a Gulbenkian postdoctoral fellow, where she studied the electrochemistry and structure of fullerenes and endohedral fullerenes.

In 2001 she joined the faculty at Syracuse University and started her work on luminescent lanthanide ion complexes. She moved to the University of Nevada, Reno as associate professor in 2007 and was promoted to professor in 2013. Her research centers on light-emitting compounds and coordination chemistry of the f block of the periodic table. She has published over 80 peer-reviewed manuscripts, several book chapters and invited editorials and edited two books in lanthanide photophysics. Her work has been funded by the Department of Energy, the National Science Foundation, the Petroleum Research Fund, the Department of Agriculture, the Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technologic Development, and the Research Foundation of the State of São Paulo.

She served on the editorial advisory board for Inorganic Chemistry from 2013 to 2015, has been on the editorial advisory board for Comments on Inorganic Chemistry since 2016, is a managing member of the editorial board of the Journal of Rare Earths since 2014 and an associate editor for Inorganics since 2022. She has given over 200 oral presentations and was plenary or keynote speaker at several international conferences. She was program chair of the 2011 and conference chair of the 2014 Rare Earth Research Conference, organized the lanthanides and actinides symposia at the national meetings of the American Chemical Society, was the 2019 Chair of the Division of Inorganic Chemistry of the American Chemical Society and is co-program chair for the Division since 2022. She served as the Associate Vice President for Research at the University from 2015 to 2019. She returned to being a full-time faculty in July 2019, and is now the Susan Magee & Gary Clemons Professor of Chemistry. She received the 2006 Science & Technology Award of the Technology Alliance of Central New York, is a 2021 Fellow of the American Chemical Society and a 2022 Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She has also been named a Foundation Professor and received the 2023 Outstanding Researcher Award from the University.

Li Li

Dr. Li’s research is focused on developing and applying computational models to assess how human-made chemical substances reside, travel, and change in the human socioeconomic system, the environment, and food webs, and how they enter our bodies and cause potential environmental and health concerns. These chemicals include notorious examples like flame retardants, plasticizers, pesticides, personal care products, and disinfectants, which are frequently detected in homes, food items, and tap water across the U.S. and other countries.

Sarah VanderMeer

My research focus involves mapping surficial geology, which includes collecting traditional field data (e.g. sediment samples) as well as any pertinent geophysical data (e.g. passive seismic) and/or lab analyses (e.g. grain size analysis). I also use GIS mapping software to produce final map products. I use maps with other important data to help interpret how various landscapes developed into the patterns we see today.

Lazaro Perez

My work seeks to identify and understand the coupling between physical heterogeneity and biochemical processes that control environmental biogeochemical reactions, energy, and mass transfer processes in the environment. We design and implement multiscale laboratory experiments visualization and numerical modeling.
My research is highly collaborative and multidisciplinary that provides domain expertise in scale biogeochemistry, reactive transport processes, multiphase flow systems, lab-to-field-scale hydrogeology, and computational geochemistry.

Carrie Tyler

Global climate change and human activities continue to create an urgent need for effective conservation and management strategies, which require a thorough understanding of how and why ecosystems respond to extreme structural changes. My research on marine invertebrate communities, therefore, includes two main themes: (1)investigations assessing the quality and biases of the fossil record and identifying the limits of its applicability to paleoecology and conservation, and (2) understanding processes driving ecosystem structure and functioning, and community response to past disturbances.

Joshua Island

I lead the Nanoscale Physics Group in the Physics Dept. at UNLV. We are focused on studying low dimensional materials in electronic devices. We use a combination of low temperature and high frequency probes to study these devices and discern exotic phenomena that arise as a result of confinement and interactions. We are principally interested in how low temperature phases evolve under dimensionality reduction and when subjected to high magnetic fields and strong external electromagnetic drives.