Why I Went into Sustainability Science

On May 4, Caltech will break ground on the Resnick Sustainability Center, a new hub on campus that will reflect and amplify the Institute’s innovative approach to education and research in environmental issues. Here, some of Caltech’s Resnick Scholars explain why this work means so much to them and to the world.

Max A. Saccone, Graduate student in chemical engineering

Anthropogenic climate change is one of the most significant and existential problems that humanity faces. Climate change co-evolved with human technological advances, many of which have significantly increased our quality of life. But now, we need to learn how to live in harmony with the earth and take a more holistic and sustainable approach to industrial processes. I am drawn to engineering as a vocation to solve these real-world problems for the benefit of humanity, and to help others to reach their potential to participate in the same journey.

My research focuses on additive manufacturing (also known as 3D printing) of functional materials, which allows us to fabricate complex, computer-designed objects layer-by-layer. Often, additive manufacturing allows us to create materials more quickly and with less waste than subtractive methods. We’ve developed a 3D printing method that can form conductive metals such as copper with feature sizes of 40 micrometers, or millions of a meter, much smaller than previously possible. We also learned how to fabricate other materials, from battery materials to multicomponent alloys, using the same process. We hope to use these materials to solve societal problems by making more robust batteries or lighter structural materials. We also hope that other researchers will use the tools we developed to 3D-print new materials and follow their own paths of discovery and innovation.

Brooke Versaw, Graduate research assistant in chemistry & chemical engineering.

In the last several decades, the field of polymer chemistry has excelled at creating plastics with excellent durability. While valuable during a material’s useful life, this longevity also poses a substantial challenge for plastic waste management. Sustainability science enables me to address the challenge of creating materials that are robust when required and recyclable on demand. My research focuses on the development of new thermally triggered platforms for chemical recycling of polymeric materials.

Lilian Dove, Graduate student in environmental science & engineering

I grew up in Florida and was intrigued by hurricanes: how they formed, traveled across the ocean, and ultimately impacted my hometown. I became fascinated by the power and physics of the atmosphere and ocean, and I am thrilled my job is to discover new things about Earth's climate and carbon system.

I am now working to expand our understanding of the role of the ocean in the global carbon cycle. I am interested in how ocean physics affect the efficiency with which carbon dioxide can be transferred from the atmosphere to the deep ocean. This multifaceted and interdisciplinary research has results that impacts communities worldwide.

Sara Beery, Graduate student in computer vision, sustainability, and conservation

Our generation has actively seen the effects of climate change on our local and global ecosystems; I think many of us are passionate about doing what we can to build a sustainable future. For me, that meant studying computer vision and machine learning to bring these powerful new tools to bear on global-scale environmental challenges.

Advancements in computer vision have the potential to play a fundamental role in sustainability and conservation. We are currently witnessing an unprecedented loss of biodiversity, yet biodiversity is vital to sustainable development, public health, and mitigating climate change. Earth observation, the gathering of information about the biological, physical, and chemical systems of the planet, is necessary for conservation and sustainability. Computer vision, along with machine learning and data science, will prove crucial to extracting scientific insights from quickly-growing repositories of natural world data.

Hannah Dion-Kirschner, Graduate student in geobiology

Since I learned about the climate crisis as an adolescent, I have felt the urgency to help contribute toward a more sustainable future. I also love how Earth science offers a window into the countless ways that biology shapes the surface of our planet.

Almost every soil on Earth hosts microorganisms that can consume methane from the atmosphere. I am working to characterize how these microorganisms will respond to changes in climate and land use. My coauthors and I hope that our work will enhance the understanding of how land management decisions may affect future methane levels in Earth's atmosphere.

Madison M. Douglas, Graduate student in geological and planetary sciences

My research focuses on how river systems in permafrost impact, and are impacted by, human activity and climate change. I get to work across disciplines, from carbon chemistry and microbiology to fluid dynamics and sediment transport, to understand how rivers and their floodplains may change as the Arctic warms.

I developed a mathematical theory for permafrost bank erosion, and am currently testing it using frozen flume experiments in the Earth Surface Dynamics Lab. This summer, I will travel to Alaska as part of a team to work with communities threatened by riverbank erosion and permafrost thaw, where we will measure bank erosion rates and develop hazard assessments and mitigation plans.

Ignacio Lopez Gomez, Graduate student in environmental science & engineering

With the atmospheric CO2 concentration already 50 percent above preindustrial levels, two of the most pressing problems humanity faces are climate change mitigation and adaptation. I believe advances in sustainability and climate science will have an outsized effect on human societies and biodiversity for centuries to come. The potential to contribute to these advances is why I decided to pursue a career in climate science.

To implement effective strategies, we need access to accurate projections of the climate response to a wide variety of greenhouse gas emission scenarios. Most uncertainty and biases in current climate projections can be traced back to the representation of clouds in the climate models used to generate these projections. The focus of my research, then, is on improving the representation of clouds in climate models, leveraging physics and machine learning to reduce uncertainty.