Since our inaugural 2019 USFS-NASA Applications Workshop held in Salt Lake City, Utah, all our collaborative efforts have been led by a diverse group of people with different skillsets from NASA, USFS, the broader resource management community, academia and Distributed Active Archive Centers (DAACs). Each year we gather as a committee to design activities that will strengthen our partnerships and advance our framework for collaboration.
2021 COMMITTEE
Sabrina Delgado Arias
Sabrina Delgado Arias, applications coordinator for the NASA Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2) mission, studied agriculture and resource economics and science & technology policy. Before coming to NASA, she worked on model development focusing on agricultural production and land use change. At Goddard, she engages with user communities interested in exploring the utility and societal value of ICESat-2 data. Learning about the innovative ways in which scientists and data users propose to use ICESat-2 observations strengthens her passion to explore and improve our understanding of scientific knowledge flows. Connect with Sabrina at sabrina.delgadoarias@nasa.gov
Amanda Armstrong
Amanda Armstrong is a Senior Research Scientist for Universities Space Research Association (USRA), working in Goddard’s Earth Science Technology and Research (GESTAR) Program since 2015. Prior to her position with USRA-GESTAR, she was a postdoctoral research fellow in the Biospheric Sciences Lab at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) with the NASA Postdoctoral Program. Dr Armstrong received her doctorate in Environmental Sciences from the University of Virginia with a focus on forest ecology and high-resolution forest modeling. The aim of Dr. Armstrong’s recent work within NASA’s Arctic-Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE) Program is to understand the rates and drivers of tundra-taiga ecotone shift. Her other areas of research interest include: the application and fusion of high-resolution forest models with remote sensing data products to improve estimates of vegetation structure, carbon stocks and land cover change at multi-temporal and multi-spatial scales; and the development and use of high-resolution remote sensing data products toward the improvement of metrics and understanding of forest structure and biodiversity.
Edil Sepúlveda Carlo
Edil Sepúlveda Carlo is a staff research scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, MD, where he works as the Applications Coordinator for NASA’s Carbon Monitoring System Initiative. He has been working in the environmental and climate science policy sector for over 10 years. He engages stakeholders from all sectors – federal, state and local agencies, non-governmental organizations, academia, and the private sector – with NASA-funded carbon scientists to ensure that data products developed are used in diverse applications and decision-making contexts. Edil has also been part of NASA's Black Marble Science Team, which was awarded the Agency's Group Achievement Medal for their efforts to support Puerto Rico’s recovery in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. The team developed the first ever near-real timemonitoring of power outage-affected areas in Puerto Rico at neighborhood scales using the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) “day-night band” on board the Suomi NPP satellite. He also provides support to the applications efforts of other NASA’s Earth Science Division missions, such as Ice, Cloud, and land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2); the Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE); and the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission. Edil also contributes to the NASA in Spanish Program and is a frequent speaker on climate science topics for major Spanish language networks in the United States like Telemundo and Univision, and other media in Latin America and Spain. Before working at NASA, Edil was a consultant in climate change and environmental legal issues for the Government of Puerto Rico. He holds a B.S. in Geology from the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez, a Juris Doctor from the University of Puerto Rico School of Law, and a master’s degree in Climate & Society with an Energy & Environmental Policy Concentration from Columbia University in the City of New York.
Stephanie Connolly
Stephanie Connolly is the Field Liaison for the Office of Sustainability and Climate. Her portfolio includes acting as a connection between the US Forest Service regional offices and the Washington Office for topics related to climate science. She is also leading the agency in developing a strategy for developing a framework for forest soil moisture monitoring networks. Stephanie Connolly has served USDA for more than two decades as a soil scientist. She holds degrees from West Virginia University (B.S. in Agronomy – 1995) and Colorado State University (M.S. in Agronomy w/emphasis in Soil Chemistry – 1998). She initially began her federal career as a journey level soil scientist with the Natural Resource Conservation Service in Preston, Idaho. During that time, she mapped the Bear Lake Wildlife Refuge for the USFWS and then moved on to western North Carolina in 1999 to work on the Smoky Mountain National Park Soil Survey and USFS soil survey contracts on the Nantahala National Forest. From 2001 to 2020, Stephanie served as the Forest Soil Scientist on the Monongahela National Forest (Elkins, WV). Her area of expertise includes soil carbon management, the effects of atmospheric deposition on soils, and landscape level restoration strategies. Connect with Stephanie at Stephanie.connolly@usda.gov.
Stephanie Granger
Stephanie leads the Applied Science System Engineering Group at NASA-JPL/Caltech, and is the Program Strategist for NASA’s Western Water Applications Office (WWAO). In her twenty-five years at JPL, she’s worked in Earth science remote sensing research activities, and science software development. In 2012, she served as a NASA special advisor to the Office of Science and Technology at the United States Agency for International Development in Washington DC. While at USAID, she was on the team that organized a “data jam” for agriculture held at the White House in 2013. More recently, she led NASA two research projects that developed a remote sensing-based modeling framework and built capacity in the use satellite geospatial data for monitoring drought and agricultural yield in Africa and Southeast Asia. Stephanie continues to work with a broad set of non-traditional remote sensing data users to understand their needs and expand the benefit and value of NASA’s geospatial data. She holds a Bachelor of Science Degree from the University of Redlands, CA, and a Master of Science Degree from the Claremont Graduate University.
Everett Hinkley
As National Remote Sensing Program Manager for the Forest Service, Everett serves as the primary remote sensing liaison to other federal departments/agencies. In this capacity, he works with NASA, DHS, the BLM, the USGS, and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency to ensure that the Forest Service is utilizing the most up-to-date data sources, applications and best practices for data exploitation and use. This role promotes collaboration on remote sensing activities which helps to reduce redundant efforts within the federal government. Everett is also USDA’s representative to the Civilian Applications Committee (CAC). The CAC is an interagency committee that coordinates and oversees the Federal civil use of classified assets and provides Federal civil agencies access to National Systems data in support of mission responsibilities. In this role, Everett ensures that agency mission needs are met utilizing a broad range of environmental and remote sensing applications central to Forest Service agency missions such as detecting wildland fires, monitoring ecosystems, and mapping wetlands. As the co-chairman of the CAC - Thermal Working Group, Everett developed with the DoD and Intelligence Community, a fire detection and reporting capability which successfully leverages National Systems to improve wildfire detection and reporting nationwide. He recently served as the Acting Forest Service Geospatial Information Officer, and in early 2018, served for four months as the USDA Geospatial Information Officer. Connect with Everett at everett.hinkley@usda.gov
Erin Urquhart Jephson
Erin Urquhart is an applied environmental scientist who manages the NASA PACE Applications program. She works at the transdisciplinary boundary of earth science, social science, and public health employing Design Thinking principles and participatory research. Erin engages data users and stakeholders to identify their needs and science objectives while exploring innovative and practical uses of satellite Earth observation data products to benefit society. She has a proven track record in coastal and inland water quality research, empirical modeling, and satellite remote sensing with a MHS in Public Health and a MA/PhD in Earth & Planetary Sciences from Johns Hopkins University.
Erik Johnson
Erik serves as Program Analyst for the Office of Sustainability and Climate based out of Juneau, Alaska. He has a bachelor’s degree in Bio-Agricultural Science, an interdisciplinary certificate in Geospatial Sciences, and M.S. in Forest Sciences all from Colorado State University. Erik has been with the Forest Service since 1989 serving in various roles including Regional Geospatial Group Leader, Aerial Survey Program Manager, and Forest Technician.
Kim Locke
As Applied Sciences Specialist, Kim Locke supports the management of NASA Goddard’s Applied Sciences Team and synergistic activities with NASA’s Western Water Applications Office, focusing on promoting the use of Earth observations for more sustainable agriculture, water use and forest management. Under a USDA grant at Dartmouth, Kim studied integrated food and energy production systems, including policies affecting dairy farmers’ adoption of anaerobic digesters for electricity and nutrient reuse. Kim co-founded a company that designed “zero waste” greenhouse aquaponics systems powered by otherwise fugitive methane emissions from closed landfills, also using waste heat and CO2 emissions from the CHP plant to “feed” microalgae for biofuels production. For the Lake Champlain Basin Program, she coordinated the development of a bi-state, bi-national management plan for the Lake Champlain watershed and was an environment and energy outreach staffer for Senator Bernie Sanders. She received her MS in Hydrology and Watershed Management from the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies and a BA in Geology from Oberlin College.
Peggy E. O’Neill
Peggy E. O’Neill received her B.S. degree summa cum laude with University Honors in geography from Northern Illinois University in 1976, her M.A. degree in geography from the University of California at Santa Barbara in 1979, and has done post-graduate work in civil and environmental engineering through Cornell University. Since 1980 she has been employed as a Physical Scientist in the Hydrological Sciences Branch at NASA / Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, MD where she conducts research in soil moisture retrieval and land surface hydrology, primarily through microwave remote sensing techniques. She is currently the SMAP Deputy Project Scientist.
Batuhan Osmanoglu
Batuhan Osmanoglu, Research Physical Scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, holds a B.Sc. in telecommunications engineering and a Ph.D. in synthetic aperture radar (SAR) interferometry. He has been a part of Istanbul Technical University, University of Miami, University of Alaska Fairbanks developing his primary area of expertise in radar remote sensing, and he has worked on applications for observing surface deformation, measuring target velocities, and radar design. Since 2013 he has been working at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. He is working on instrument and algorithm development of P- , L-, X- and Ku-band SAR systems. He also serves as the deputy lead for Candidate Observing Systems Architecture phase for Surface Deformation and Change mission study, one of the NISAR Deputy Application Leads NASA, and one of the Disasters Program coordinators at Goddard. He is a member of the IEEE and American Geophysical Union. He also chairs the Microwave Remote Sensing workgroup under International Society for Photogrammetry and Remote-Sensing.
Birgit Peterson
Birgit Peterson is a Geographer with the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science Center in Sioux Falls, SD. Dr. Peterson received her PhD in Geography from the University of Maryland. She has been at USGS EROS for that last 10 plus years, supporting various fire science projects, including the LANDFIRE program. Her primary interest is in leverage remotely sensed data to assess vegetation structure, especially as it relates to wildland fire. Most recently, she has been focusing on the use of vegetation structure information to supplement spectral data for burn severity mapping in forested systems. She is anticipating using data from the new ICESat-2 and GEDI missions for national level vegetation structure assessments
Mahesh Pun
Mahesh Pun is a Senior Research Scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, where he works as the Applications Coordinator for NASA’s Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) project. He holds a B.Sc. in Environmental Science from St. Xavier’s College in Kathmandu, Nepal; MS in Environmental Engineering and Ph.D. in Civil Engineering (Water Resources) from University of Nebraska in Lincoln, Nebraska. Before coming to NASA, he worked as an Integrated Water Management Analyst at Nebraska Department of natural Resources. At Goddard, he engages with user communities interested in exploring the utility and societal value of ICESat-2 data. Connect with Mahesh at mahesh.pun@nasa.gov