Welcome to Anna Michalak!

Posted 6/9/11

On June 1, Dr. Anna Michalak became the fifth faculty member in the Department of Global Ecology. Anna's expertise is in statistical and geostatistical analysis of complex environmental phenomena, with a focus on techniques for extracting the maximum possible information from limited data sets. She has worked on a wide range of specific problems. Current projects involve water quality monitoring, characterizing the Earth system with remote sensing, and estimating sources and sinks of atmospheric greenhouse gases. Prior to joining Carnegie, Anna was the Frank and Brooke Transue faculty scholar and an associate professor at the University of Michigan, with appointments in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and the Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Space Sciences. Her academic background includes an undergraduate degree from the University of Guelph in Canada, masters and PhD degrees from Stanford, and a post-doc at the NOAA Climate Monitoring and Diagnostics Laboratory. Among her many awards, Anna has been recognized with a 2007 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, a 2010 ASP Faculty Fellowship from NCAR, and an NSF CAREER award. Her interest in environmental issues extends to questions of environmental policy and the legal and economic impacts of environmental research.

Anna grew up in Montreal, and speaks four languages. She is an avid outdoorsperson, and loves climbing, mountain biking, and tele skiing – All of which should benefit from the move to California! Two of her more notable adventures were taking an 18-day self-guided rafting trip down the Grand Canyon, and recently joining her brother for a portion of his bike trek across Mongolia.

Anna's lab at Carnegie is getting off to a quick start, with several students and post-docs shifting from Michigan to Carnegie. At Carnegie, Anna’s group will maintain its current projects while looking for new opportunities to collaborate and new ways to take advantage of Carnegie’s unique mix of people and expertise. More information on Anna, her research, and her group is available at http://www-personal.umich.edu/~amichala/ (soon to be updated for Carnegie!)