Dr. Walker’s research supports exposure assessment as a part of risk assessment associated with human health protection. I have conducted studies of exposure and potential for exposure to: Arsenic in private water supplies; E. coli, as an indicator of fecal contamination in water; Leptospira, as a result of changes in land use in Hawaii; and Cryptosporidium. His extension work provides technical support and information through: Water supply operators throughout Nevada; using an innovative partnership and distance learning technologies; Web sites that help interpret water quality and have served as models for at least two national efforts; Peer-reviewed fact sheets and special publications and newsletters; and small grants programs for Extension Educators.
Matthew Lachniet
Dr. Lachniet’s research focuses on understanding the controls on Earth’s climate on time scales ranging from seasonal to 100s of thousands years, with a particular focus on tropical and arctic past climates. These data inform understanding of modern and anthropogenic climate change. He is co-director of the Las Vegas Isotope Science (LVIS) Lab in the Science and Engineering Building. Dr. Lachniet has an active research program in which he uses light stable and radiogenic isotope geochemistry, hydrology, speleology, glacial geology, geomorphology, and the sedimentary record to answer questions of paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic change. His primary research areas are Costa Rica, Panama, Mexico, Alaska, and the Great Basin.
Matt Forister
The Forister lab works in the areas of specialization, diversification, and plant-insect ecology. Specific questions and topics include the evolution of diet breadth, evolutionary interactions across trophic levels, phenology and population regulation. We are also interested in the conservation and management of insect diversity. In the field, our research includes the Great Basin, the Sierra Nevada, and much of the western hemisphere including tropical sites. In the lab, we combine physiological and behavioral experiments with genomic sequencing of novel-model organisms.
Vaidyanathan (Ravi) Subramanian
Ravi Subramanian is currently an associate professor of chemical engineering. He is on the graduate faculty of the Electrical and Biomedical Engineering Department and an adjunct in the Chemistry Department. He is also the solar energy thrust area coordinator in the Renewable Energy Center at the University. His area of research focus is on nanostructured materials for solar energy utilization. He has expertise in the synthesis, characterization and application of photoactive materials in photovoltaics, clean fuel production and environmental remediation. In his 12 years of research he has developed inorganic materials including semiconductor-semiconductor and semiconductor-metal nanocomposites for applications related to solar energy utilization and fuel cells.
Materials discovery and devices development to harvest solar energy continues to be a challenge. Eco-friendly and earth abundant elements have a great potential to harvest solar energy. With solar energy: your future is bright!
Robert Futrell
Robert Futrell (Professor, Sociology) specializes in areas that include: social movements and social change, environmental sociology, urban sustainability, and science and technology. His environmental research focuses on sustainability, climate change, and urban life in the U.S. desert southwest. His current social movement scholarship focuses on the cultural and organizational dynamics of movement persistence. Dr. Futrell has also received several teaching awards including the UNLV Foundation Distinguished Teaching Award. Dr. Futrell joined the UNLV faculty in 1999.
Robert Sheridan
Our research revolves around highly reactive organic molecules. These unstable and elusive intermediates, such as carbenes, nitrenes, and biradicals, are especially important in photochemistry, but their chemistry and properties are poorly understood. Moreover, these molecules are related to searches for organic conducting and magnetic materials. Much of the organic synthesis that we carry out involves making previously unknown compounds, and we spend a considerable amount of our time developing new synthetic methods to tackle these challenging molecules. A specialized technique that we use to study reaction intermediates involves matrix isolation photochemistry. In this method, organic molecules are frozen into glasses of inert gas at extremely low temperatures (10 Kelvin). The samples are then irradiated with UV light to generate highly reactive intermediates. The low temperatures and high dilution in inert surroundings protect these otherwise unstable species from reaction. IR and UV spectra of the samples, acquired at low temperature, tell us a great deal about the bonding and structures of the products. Finally, we carry out a variety of ab initio and DFT electronic structure calculations to model the structures, spectra, and electronics of these novel molecules.
Scott Abella
Scott Abella is an assistant professor in restoration ecology with the School of Life Sciences at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. His areas of expertise include fire management, ecological restoration, plant ecology, and habitat-wildlife relationships. He also owns the consulting firm Natural Resource Conservation LLC.
Our lab group focuses on restoration ecology and applied conservation science. Restoration ecology is the science behind repairing ecosystems that are damaged or destroyed. This does not mean exactly replicating some type of past or current “undisturbed” ecosystem, which is rarely even possible. Rather, restoration seeks to favorably change sites so an ecosystem can support native species and recover functions, like providing wildlife habitat. Similarly, applied conservation science provides a foundation for sustaining native ecological diversity and desired natural resources.
To advance these areas, we also conduct supporting research in fire ecology, plant ecology, invasion biology and non-native species management, and landscape ecology.
Scott Bassett
Dr. Bassett is a conservation biologist and geographic information systems specialist with over 15 years experience in using computers to address environmental planning issues. He has extensive experience in spatial modeling, habitat modeling, landscape ecology, military installation encroachment issues, urban/natural environment boundary and in conservation reserve assessment and planning.
Sergiu Dascalu
Dascalu is an associate professor in the Computer Science and Engineering Department at the University of Nevada, Reno. He received a master’s degree in automated control and computers from the Polytechnic of Bucharest, Romania and his doctorate in computer science from Dalhousie University, Canada. Dascalu is the director of the Software Engineering Laboratory (SOELA) at UNR and has served as PI or co-PI on various projects funded by federal agencies such as NSF, NASA, and ONR, as well as by industry organizations. Dascalu has more than 120 peer-reviewed publications and has been involved in the organization of many international conferences and workshops, from which he received numerous recognitions. Dascalu’s main research interests are in software engineering and human-computer interaction, particularly in software specification and design, software tools for scientific research, simulation environments and user interface design.
Steve Rowland
Dr. Stephen Rowland is an Emeritus professor in the Department of Geology. He received his Ph.D. at the University of California, Santa Cruz, in 1978. Professor Rowland’s primary studies are in the areas of paleontology, paleoecology, stratigraphy, and the history of geology. My students and I study the history of life on Earth as recorded in the fossil record, especially the paleontology of Southern Nevada and adjacent regions. Our research ranges from the earliest (late pre-Cambrian) animal fossils, to Jurassic dinosaur tracks (and those of co-existing animals) in Red Rock Canyon and Valley of Fire State Park, to Ice-Age fossils of the Tule Springs area. My history of geology research focuses primarily on the 18th century, especially in Russia.