The Nature Conservancy in New Mexico - New Mexico Welcomes Climate Scientist to Staff

New Mexico Welcomes Climate Scientist

The New Mexico program is pleased to announce that Carolyn Enquist is the program's new Climate Change Science Fellow -- the first of its kind in a Nature Conservancy state chapter .

Carolyn will be based in Tucson, AZ, but will travel frequently to New Mexico to work with staff and partner scientists and conservation practitioners. As Climate Change Science Fellow, her job will be to review, synthesize and interpret emerging climate change science for conservation practitioners and policy-makers in New Mexico and the greater Southwest USA, with special focus on New Mexico's most important natural landscapes, species and ecosystems.

Carolyn brings to this important position excellent qualifications including PhD-level research at the University of New Mexico on the spatial and temporal dynamics of tropical dry forests. She also spent four years as a conservation scientist with the Arizona Chapter and three years as a scientist in the USDA Forest Service (Southwestern Region) Remote Sensing Unit supporting forest plan revision and threatened and endangered species recovery. She has strong skills in ecological modeling, remote sensing interpretation, spatial analysis, and conservation planning.

Carolyn's publications include an article in the Journal of Biogeography on regional impacts of climate change on the geographic distribution and diversity of tropical forests. She has also co-authored a report on the impacts of climate change on the biological diversity of the Apache Highlands ecoregion (southwestern New Mexico and southeastern Arizona).

We welcome Carolyn to the New Mexico staff and are excited to understand and begin addressing the threat posed by climate change to the special places and vulnerable species of the Southwest.