Portrait of Rebecca Fritz at a creek with a dog.

Rebecca Fritz

Fritz’s graduate work will involve sequencing microbial communities in freshwater systems and incorporating microbes in freshwater aquatic ecosystems! Before coming to NAU, Fritz worked as a fisheries technician on the Idaho Steelhead Monitoring and Evaluation Studies project with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game. She has also worked with Read more…

Kathleen Balazs

Kathleen is interested in understanding how plant traits influence species response to environmental conditions and how functional diversity affects ecosystem properties in the applied context of ecological restoration. Her work includes synthesis of long-term regional restoration outcomes data for the Colorado Plateau as well as restoration experiments across the Southwestern Read more…
Portrait of graduate student Brian Howard with snow-covered mountains in the background.

Brian Howard

Brian Howard is working to understand what trees grow back, and why, after a large wildfire in the Alaskan tundra. Brian is a second year PhD student in the Plant and Ecosystem Ecology Research (PEER) Lab at Ecoss. His research takes him to Denali National Park in Alaska where the Read more…
lindsey jacobs inside a cave with headlamp

Lindsey Jacobs

Lindy Jacobs has already explored the microbiome of the California condor and is now turning to the microbiomes of soils around the world, testing their responses to warming. Lindy is a first-year PhD student in the Hungate Lab at Ecoss. She grew up in Los Alamos, New Mexico, and it Read more…

Michele James

James’ focus has recently changed from aquatic ecology, grant writing and Fossil Creek monitoring to graphic design, website design, and innovative communication of scientific information at Ecoss. James is passionate about communicating scientific information to the public in visually effective and exciting means in order to increase understanding of the importance Read more…

Keanan Allen

Keanan is interested in soil carbon cycling and ecosystem modeling within changing environments. He is working on how microbial functions change under rising temperatures and how they impact soil carbon dynamics. This research aims to broaden our understanding of microbial functions within soil carbon models. Full Curriculum Vitae

Austin Rueda

Austin is interested in understanding the effects of precipitation variation on grassland communities, through the scope of plant physiology. Austin’s research combines effects of soil moisture, precipitation, and elevational gradients to understand how plant communities may shift in response to changing climates.