06/06/2005

Marvin L. Wesely Distinguished Graduate Research Fellowship Awarded to University of California Graduate Student

Summary

Erika Marin-Spiotta, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of California, Berkeley, has been selected to receive the third Marvin L. Wesely Distinguished Graduate Research Environmental Fellowship (GREF) by the Office of Science s Global Change Education Program (GCEP). The award was established in honor of the late Dr. Marvin L. Wesely from Argonne National Laboratory. Dr. Wesely was a senior meteorologist and chief scientist of a former Atmospheric Chemistry Program funded by the Office of Science. The one-year Fellowship is awarded to a current GREF student conducting global change research who has made the best use of a mentor and facilities at a DOE laboratory to improve the quality of their research. Her graduate research involves the study of how past land-use activities lead to differences in carbon sequestration in terrestrial soils in formerly agricultural or pasture lands as the systems are allowed to return to a more natural, unmanaged condition. Erika’s mentor is Dr. Margaret Torn of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who is working in carbon cycling and carbon sequestration research.