Aisha Rashid is a recent University of Washington graduate with dual degrees in marine biology and oceanography. During her time at UW, Rashid received a Husky 100 nod in 2024, served as captain of the equestrian team, and helped lead the College of the Environment’s student advisory council as co-chair.

In this episode of FieldSound, Rashid shares audio from her experience aboard the research vessel Thomas G. Thompson as part of her senior thesis project in American Samoa, highlighting the transformative impact of hands-on research in marine geology and geophysics, particularly underwater volcanism. Rashid illustrates the powerful role of ocean technology in understanding our planet's most critical ecosystems.

She also shares about her current work with Wild Orca, a research nonprofit under Dr. Deborah Giles, and contributes to crucial research on Southern Resident killer whales using a non-invasive research technique - a scent detection dog trained to sniff out killer whale feces. With a commitment to impactful climate solutions, she plans to pursue further studies after a gap year dedicated to research and community engagement. 

Rashid embodies the spirit of innovation and collaboration, ready to tackle the challenges of climate change and research ocean solutions. Join us as we dive into her inspiring journey!

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast

In this episode of FieldSound, we meet two students who found their own paths at the University of Washington, blending their interests in science communication and public safety with research, classes and discovery — all the while laying the groundwork for their future careers.

From an early age, Samantha Lynn-Martinez, a recent graduate of the UW with a dual degree in biology and marine biology, was drawn to the natural environment and wanted to get involved but didn’t know where to start. Then she heard about high school volunteer programs at local organizations, including Seattle Aquarium.

Martinez enjoyed working with Seattle Aquarium visitors — showing them how to touch a sea urchin or how to be a good steward of nature — and she began doing social media engagement for the aquarium. That work introduced her to video-making.

By combining that curiosity for the natural world with her passion for storytelling, Martinez now uses filmmaking and photography as powerful tools for science communication. Through the lens of a camera, she aims to make complex scientific ideas accessible and engaging. And she’s inspiring others to see the world through a new lens.

“If I can introduce people to a topic they’ve never considered before on my Instagram, and then they do their own Google deep dive after, I think that’s a job well done,” Martinez said.

All of the research she’s done has integrated some form of science communication. Martinez sees the value of this work and advocates for it with her supervisors and PIs.

Recently, Martinez worked with NOAA in the Aleutian Islands studying steller sea lion ecology. She gained valuable field experiences working with sea lions, doing drone and photography surveys, photo identification and more.

What began as an interest in marine life as a high school volunteer at the Seattle Aquarium has evolved into a remarkable journey for Martinez, who was named a Husky 100 in 2024. And she’s just getting started.

“I just want to capture that curiosity. Curiosity is really what drives everything I do,” Martinez said. “Stuff that I’m currently doing with my own projects and through the UW have been really helpful in terms of building that portfolio, building those skills.”

Trent Vonich is a Ph.D. student in atmospheric and climate science who studies the predictability of extreme weather. He’s passionate about unlocking the secrets of the world’s most powerful storms by exploring the potential of machine learning to transform meteorological forecasting.

Vonich is not only a full-time student, he’s also an active-duty officer in the United States Air Force. He balances an exhilarating, fast-paced military career as a pararescueman with his studies and scientific research, all while looking ahead toward his future ambitions — NASA’s astronaut program.

Vonich has always been interested in severe weather, but decided to focus on hurricanes after seeing a number of U.S. Navy and Air Force bases sustain damage by severe storms.

When a weather forecast is wrong, that’s when Vonich steps in. His research examines why weather forecasts sometimes fail. Historically, scientists have looked at physics-based weather models to find answers, but machine learning may offer a much simpler way.

“I think the most compelling part of machine learning impacting weather modeling is the speed at which you can now do forecasts. It’s a totally different approach,” he said. It takes a long time to build machine learning models and train them, but once trained, they work quickly.

Now, tech companies have entered the field of weather modeling. For example,

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast

In this episode of FieldSound, we meet two researchers who work in vastly different systems, but whose paths cross in the interdisciplinary field of astrobiology.

Jodi Young is an assistant professor and biological oceanographer at the University of Washington who studies tiny, yet mighty, marine microalgae that play a crucial role in our planet's ecosystems. She’s fascinated by how these algae manage to survive and even flourish in the harsh, icy and briny waters of the polar regions — still somewhat of a mystery.

As a member of the UW Future of Ice Initiative and Associate Director of the UW Astrobiology Program, Jodi Young’s research bridges the gap between Earth’s most remote locations and the potential for life in other worlds. Scientists like Young studying the extreme environments here on Earth can help the groundwork for understanding distant moons and exoplanets, like Ganymede, Mars and Enceladus.

Fabian Klenner is a postdoctoral researcher at UW who focuses on geochemistry, planetary and space sciences and astrobiology. Klenner's work is part of NASA’s Europa Clipper mission, launched on October 14, 2024, with potential discoveries that could change our understanding of life in the universe, and the future of science.

Klenner’s path led him from the quiet countryside to the cutting edge of planetary science, astrobiology and the search for life beyond Earth. Klenner combines laboratory experiments with advanced modeling to understand the chemical and physical processes happening in the oceans of icy moons like Enceladus and Europa, as well as groundbreaking experiments to detect potential biosignatures — clues that life might exist — on distant moons.

Astrobiology is the multidisciplinary science of exploring life beyond our planet — a field that bridges biology, chemistry, astronomy, geology and more to understand the potential that exists in our universe. 

Related links:

https://www.washington.edu/news/2024/03/22/signs-of-life-detectable-in-single-ice-grain-emitted-from-extraterrestrial-moons/

https://www.washington.edu/news/2023/06/14/phosphate-a-key-building-block-of-life-found-on-saturns-moon-enceladus/

https://www.washington.edu/news/2023/09/15/polar-experiments-reveal-seasonal-cycle-in-antarctic-sea-ice-algae/

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast

In this episode of FieldSound, we meet Eli Wheat, an assistant teaching professor in the University of Washington’s Program on the Environment, an environmental studies program housed within the College of the Environment. Wheat is passionate about sustainable farming, and our relationship as humans with the land and food we consume.

Wheat, who is also a core faculty member in the UW School of Public Health’s Food Systems, Nutrition, and Health program, brings a unique perspective as both a farmer and a scholar. He is helping to bridge the gap between academia and agriculture, inspiring the next generation to care for our planet.

Wheat’s teaching laboratory is UW Farm, which began as a student organization in the early 2000s and has grown to encompass three locations across the Seattle campus. Students from many UW departments and majors are able to get out and experience food production in an urban setting.

Beyond the campus, Wheat owns and operates SkyRoot Farm, a 20-acre certified organic animal and vegetable farm on Whidbey Island. SkyRoot’s farming practices are based on an ecosystem approach to land management in agriculture, and they grow mostly vegetables — plus keep a small herd of goats.

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast

In this episode of FieldSound, we hear from Michael Buck, an enrolled member of the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation and a graduate of the UW School of Marine and Environmental Affairs. 

Buck’s path in science has been guided by the traditions, stories, practices and knowledge of his community. His research is not just academic; it’s a living practice, deeply rooted in the concept of relationality and “research as ceremony,” where self-reflection, ceremony and reciprocity form a foundation for his work.

Buck is passionate about passing on Indigenous Ways of Knowing to future generations, and infusing oral histories of the Pacific Northwest together with documented histories — offering a fuller, more nuanced understanding of our region’s unique ecology.

Related links:

https://smea.uw.edu/currents/the-lost-fish-indigenous-traditional-ecological-knowledge-and-translocation-for-the-ancient-pacific-lamprey/ 

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast

For the final episode of FieldSound Season 2, we’re revisiting an episode from season one with Laura Prugh, wildlife ecologist and associate professor at the UW School of Environmental and Forest Sciences.

Prugh is also part of the Washington Predator-Prey Project, which studies the potential ecological impact of recolonizing wolves in Washington state.

Wolf numbers in Washington have been steadily growing, raising questions about what the return of this large predator species means for ecosystems, deer populations and people alike.

A recent paper reported that human activities are likely limiting the impact of wolves on one of their primary food sources – white-tailed deer.

You can read about the Washington Predator-Prey Project and their findings over at our website at www.environment.uw.edu.

Enjoy this conversation with Laura Prugh and stay tuned for FieldSound Season 3 coming September 2024.

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast

In this episode of FieldSound, we hear from Ryan Kelly, professor in the School of Marine and Environmental Affairs. Trained as both an ecologist and a lawyer, Kelly brings a unique perspective to his research at the boundaries of marine science and real-world environmental law and policy. He works closely with federal agencies and currently serves on a national task force that aims to move science into practice at a federal level.

A major focus of Kelly's research involves environmental DNA, or eDNA, which is genetic material shed by organisms that is released into the environment. It can be collected from a variety of environmental samples, such as soil or seawater, with the idea that as organisms interact in the environment, their DNA will accumulate in their surroundings. Kelly explains that now we can take a cup of seawater, for example, sequence the DNA out of it, and see what lives nearby — we can see hundreds of thousands of species, all at once.

Now, the challenge is to make sense of all this data. Kelly also is the director of the eDNA Collaborative, which aims to move the use of eDNA out of the lab and into practice in real-world environmental management and conservation.

Some ways it's already being used: In Puget Sound, using eDNA to look at the impacts of urbanization on the nearshore environment; measuring the effects of culvert restoration for salmon in Washington state; and surveying the edges of the invasion of European green crab in Washington.

The Collaborative has awarded 130 "microgrants" to people in 40 different countries in its goal to make this technology and knowledge more accessible.

Kelly also discusses his recent co-authored work, "Between the Tides," which offers readers a comprehensive guide to the beaches and tidepools of Washington, Oregon and California, enriching our understanding of coastal marine ecology.

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast

In this episode of FieldSound, KOMO 4 Chief Meteorologist Shannon O'Donnell and University of Washington students speak about the formation of the UW Dawgcast, born out of ATM S 493: Media & Meteorology in the UW Department of Atmospheric Sciences.

ATM S 493, which launched in 2020, is the first broadcast meteorology class offered on the West Coast. With it, the UW joins Pennsylvania State University and Mississippi State University as schools that offer broadcast meteorology instruction. The course equips students to learn how to create forecasts, communicate the science of weather, and gain real-world broadcast experience using industry-standard equipment.

While the class takes place each winter quarter, students from all majors can participate in the UW Dawgcast club year-round.


Steve Pool Memorial Fund for Students in Atmospheric Sciences
Steve Pool was one the leading television weathercasters in Seattle for nearly 40 years, providing meteorological insights and weather education to millions of viewers across western Washington. A profoundly impactful UW alumnus, he was committed to the University of Washington and the Department of Atmospheric Sciences, establishing an internship program that provided dozens of UW students with experience in broadcast meteorology — with several going on to successful careers in TV weather (such as O’Donnell at KOMO 4).  

The Department of Atmospheric Sciences is honored to be undertaking an effort to create an endowed scholarship to support undergraduates in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences in honor of Steve Pool. Your support will provide financial assistance to promising atmospheric sciences students and foster training opportunities for the next generation of meteorologists and atmospheric scientists. Learn more about the campaign here.

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast

David Montgomery is a geomorphologist who looks at the processes shaping Earth’s surface and how they affect ecological systems — and human societies. He has studied everything from the ways that landslides and glaciers influence the height of mountain ranges to the way that soils have shaped human civilizations, both now and in the past. He has worked in mountain ranges throughout the world, from the Cascades in the Pacific Northwest to the Andes in South America and Tibet, and the Himalaya in Central Asia.

In addition to his academic work, Montgomery has written a number of popular science books, three of which won the Washington State Book Award. He is an elected fellow of the American Geophysical Union and has received many awards throughout his career, including a MacArthur Fellowship and the Vega Medal.

In this episode, Montgomery discusses his career trajectory, which began with a fascination for maps as a child and led him to become a geomorphologist studying Earth's surface features. He describes his transition from biology to geology during college.

Montgomery also shares insights from his research on soil erosion and its impact on civilizations, as well as his collaboration with his wife, Anne Biklé, on books about soil health and regenerative farming. Listen to learn more about the importance of soil microbiology for crop health and human nutrition. You can also catch some music by his band, Big Dirt.

Related: UW Magazine published this recent feature on Montgomery.

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast

In this episode of FieldSound, we take you to UW Friday Harbor Laboratories in the San Juan Islands, where marine researchers Joey Ullman and Olivia Graham prepare for a dive on a cold January morning. They scout sites for deploying juvenile sunflower stars, aiming to compare the survivability of lab-grown versus wild-caught specimens.

Fiona Curliss, another researcher, discusses the intricate process of raising these sea stars, from fertilization to adulthood, and the importance of their work in combating sea star wasting syndrome.

Learn about the interesting research that is being conducted at UW Friday Harbor Labs, which provides an ideal environment for studying marine biology. Faculty and researchers from the University of Washington and beyond gather at FHL to explore oceanography, chemistry, biology, ecology and other marine sciences. Students have the chance to engage deeply in research and coursework, linking classroom knowledge to the  ecosystems of the San Juan Archipelago.

Watch a video about FHL's sea star rearing efforts

The project recently was featured on NBC's 'Wild Kingdom' show

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast