Eight new faculty members joined the Nicholas School over the past academic year, bringing extensive expertise and fresh perspectives in areas such as water and coastal change, geochemistry, natural resources finance, and environmental justice. We are excited to see their passion and in-depth knowledge continue to advance teaching and research at the Nicholas School. Learn more about our new faculty below.
Sarah Cooley was appointed as an assistant professor of planetary health effective July 1, 2024. Her research interests include global variations in surface water storage, as well as Arctic coastal change and its impact on communities.
Previously she was assistant professor in the University of Oregon’s geography department. She received her bachelor’s degree in geological sciences from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, her Master of Philosophy in polar studies from the University of Cambridge, and her doctorate in Earth, environmental and planetary sciences from Brown University.
Michael Kipp, a young geochemist who’s already turning heads for his ambitious, transdisciplinary studies in “paleo-bio-geo-chemistry,” joined the faculty as an assistant professor of earth, water, and air systems starting Jan. 1, 2024.
He comes to the Nicholas School from the California Institute of Technology, where he had been a postdoctoral scholar in the Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences since 2019. HE earned his PhD in earth and space sciences and astrobiology from the University of Washington in 2019, and, as part of his doctoral studies, spent 2018 as a visiting researcher at the Australian National University’s Research School of Earth Sciences.
Yan Lin was promoted to assistant research professor effective July 1, 2024. He had served as a postdoctoral associate since 2019, where his research areas included the health effects of air pollution and climate change, molecular mechanisms linking environmental pollution and disease, and early prevention of chronic disease caused by environmental pollution.
He earned his Ph.D. in environmental health sciences from University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA) with a dissertation on the ecological impacts of industrial pollutants. His research has been published in leading peer-reviewed journals, including Environmental Science & Technology.
Richard Mei joined the faculty on July 1, 2024. He leads the school’s Natural Resources Finance Initiative (NRFI), which was launched in 2018 to train professional master’s students in a broad array of financial skills critical to natural resource management and conservation today. He has authored or co-authored more than 70 peer-reviewed articles, conference papers or book chapters, and is co-lead author of the book, “Forestland Investment: Valuation and Analysis.”
Mei has more than 15 years of experience as a sustainable forestry and forestland investment consultant and co-founded Floria Consulting LLC in 2009. He was formerly on the faculty at the University of Georgia, where he earned his Ph.D. in forest economics in 2010. He earned a Master of Science in natural resource economics from Mississippi State University in 2007, a Master of Science in management science and engineering from Beijing Forestry University in 2005, and a Bachelor of Science in economics from Beijing Forestry University in 2002.
Tong Qiu joined the Nicholas School as assistant professor of ecology on July 1, 2024. Qiu earned his Ph.D. in geography from the University of North Carolina, where he studied the impact of urbanization and climate change on land surface phenology (the timing of seasonal changes in vegetation and land surfaces).
Qiu’s recent publications have covered issues such as the use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle images to estimate tree height, as well as how cities change over time and what that means for planning in megacities. Previously Qiu served as assistant professor at Penn State University and a postdoctoral associate at Duke University.
Anaís Roque was appointed John Hope Franklin Assistant Professor of Environmental Justice effective July 1, 2024. With a rich track record of experience, research, advocacy and education, Roque brings valuable insights and a commitment to environmental justice.
Roque holds a master’s degree and Ph.D. in environmental social science from Arizona State University, where her doctoral dissertation focused on the intersection of community resilience and water insecurity. She has also collaborated with international organizations to develop strategies for sustainable development that prioritize social equity.
Roque’s position was jointly funded by an anonymous donor and the Duke University endowment.
Jonathan “Johnny” Ryan joined the Nicholas School as assistant professor of ice and climate, starting on July 1, 2024. Ryan’s research focuses on Arctic environmental change, employing satellite and remote sensing to study global impacts of cryospheric (frozen water) processes.
Ryan received his Ph.D. in geography from Aberystwyth University in the UK, and spent more than two years as an assistant professor of geography at the University of Oregon. As a postdoctoral researcher at Brown University, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) funded Ryan’s research on the impact of winter snow accumulation, and melting, on the Greenland Ice Sheet, a continuous expanse of ice that covers roughly 660,000 square miles of Greenland.
Juliet Wong joined the faculty as assistant professor of coastal and marine climate change effective July 1, 2023. Her research focuses on how impacts from climate change, such as ocean acidification and warming, affect marine invertebrates.
A prolific researcher, she already has 13 peer-reviewed papers, 14 conference presentations and two research grants to her credit. Wong came to the Nicholas School from Florida International University, where she was a National Science Foundation (NSF) Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Biology since 2021 and was a Distinguished Postdoctoral Scholar in Biology for two years prior to that. She earned her Ph.D. in ecology, evolution, and marine biology in 2019 from the University of California Santa Barbara and a Bachelor of Science from the University of Miami.
