UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Summer 2022 has seen record droughts in the western United States, Europe and China, and extreme flooding in Pakistan. Transitioning to a more sustainable society in the face of uncertain climatic futures requires a holistic approach that incorporates several research disciplines. The emerging field of MultiSector Dynamics (MSD) and the multi-disciplinary collective of natural and social scientists, engineers, economists and other researchers that make up the MSD Community of Practice aim to help with that transition.
Antonia Hadjimichael, assistant professor of geosciences at Penn State, will discuss the research vision of the MSD Community of Practice as well as planned activities and ways for researchers to interact with the community at a talk at 3:30 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 16. The talk will take place in 112 Walker Building and on Zoom.
The MSD Community of Practice is comprised of researchers at universities and national laboratories across the United States. Its mission is “to improve our understanding of the co-evolution of human and natural systems over time and build the next generation of tools that bridge across sectors (energy, water, land, economy) and scales (spatial, temporal), and offer a holistic view of systems-of-systems.”
Hadjimichael is an interdisciplinary scientist studying complex human-Earth systems, specifically in the domain of water and planning under uncertainty. Her research sheds light on how human and Earth systems interact across scales, especially how their interactions shape human impacts. She holds a bachelor of science in mathematics from the University of Leicester, U.K.; a master of science in environmental modeling from University College London (UCL), U.K., and a doctorate in water science and technology from the University of Girona, Spain. She serves as chair of communications for the Society for Decision Making under Deep Uncertainty and on the facilitation team for the MSD Community of Practice. She also has recently been elected to Penn State’s Water Council.
Hadjimichael’s talk is part of the fall 2022 Coffee Hour seminar series hosted by Penn State’s Department of Geography.