Welcome to the Mississippi River Delta Transition Initiative (MissDelta)
The Mississippi Birdsfoot Delta is the most threatened coastal region in the Gulf of Mexico, and it is among the most at-risk regions globally. The Mississippi River Delta Transition Initiative (MissDelta) was developed by the Gulf Research Program of National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to address the following issues and chart a future course for the Mississippi delta region.
Future Projection Development
Management Evaluation
Socioeconomic Resilience
Workforce Diversity
The MissDelta Team
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Monica Humphrey Burr
Assistant Professor of Environmental Science | Alcorn State University
mnburr@alcorn.edu
Bottomland hardwood reforestation, wetland reforestation, and wetland ecology. Undergraduate research and mentoring.
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Robert A. Collins
Professor of Urban Studies and Public Policy | Dillard University
rcollins@dillard.edu
Correlations between urban planning and health measures using census data. Analyzing census data and census tract maps.
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Paul Kim
Associate Profssor | Grambling State University
kimp@gram.edi
Biomedical sciences, inflammatory diseases, and metagenomics. Undergraduate research and mentoring.
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Sadik Khan
Associate Professor | Jackson State University
sadik.khan@jsums.edu
FEM modeling of the geo-infastructure, slope stability analysis, and remedial measure of failed slopes.
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Brent Thoma
Assistant Professor of Biology and Director of Marine Science | Jackson State University
brent.p.thoma@jsums.edu
Phylogenetic systematics, taxonomy, and natural history of marine malacostracan crustaceans. Population connectivity and dispersal is marine crustaceans, particularly in groups lacking clear dispersal mechanisms.
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Sam Bentley
Professor and Harrison Chair in Sedimentary Geology | Louisiana State University
sjb@lsu.edu
Coastal and marine sedimentology, sediment radiochemistry, fine sediment dynamics on continental shelves, bioturbation, predictive modeling of sedimentary fabric and structures.
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Traci Birch
Assistant Professor, School of Architecture | Associate Director, Coastal Ecosystem Design Studio | Louisiana State University
tbirch@lsu.edu
Coastal planning, methods for community risk reduction, community resiliance, and ecosystem management.
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Dominique Garello
Instructor or Record | Louisiana State University
dgarello1@lsu.edu
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Matthew Hiatt
Assistant Professor | Louisiana State University
mhiatt1@lsu.edu
Coastal hydrology, environmental fluid dynamics, harmful algal blooms, water transport timescales in deltas and wetlands, hydrological connectivity in coastal environments, network analysis, nearshore waves.
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Navid Jafari
Associate Professor | Louisiana State University
njafari@lsu.edu
Civil and environmental engineering.
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Giulio Mariotti
Associate Professor | Louisiana State University
gmariotti@lsu.edu
Ecogeomorphology, bioecology, and processes that shape costal environments.
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Paul Miller
Assistant Professor | Louisiana State University
pmiller1@lsu.edu
Coastal meteorology and hydroclimatology.
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Tracy Quirk
Associate Professor | Louisiana State University
tquirk@lsu.edu
Wetland ecology and restoration including plant and microbial processes, nutrient and carbon cycling and accretion dynamics, human impact on wetland ecosystems, and organic matter and nutrient linkages between coastal wetlands and rivers, estuaries, and submerged aquatic ecosystems.
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Tyrslai Menyaee’ Williams-Carter
Assistant Dean and Assistant Professor of Mentorship, Education, and Research | Louisiana State University
twil161@lsu.edu
STEM projects and development for historically uderrepresented groups. Outreach for K-12, undergraduate, and graduate students.
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Carol Wilson
Associate Professor | Louisiana State University
carolw@lsu.edu
Quantifying ecophysical processes that shape deltaic and coastal wetlands, specifically how biology, geology, and water interact to create and maintain functioning landscapes.
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New List Item
Professor | Louisiana State University
kxu@lsu.edu
Coastal restoration; sediment diversion; sediment dredging and management, geological oceanography, coastal morphodynamics, observation and numerical modeling of sediment transport, sedimentary geology, coastal processes.
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Z. George Xue
Professor | Louisiana State University
zxue@lsu.edu
Oceanography
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Jennifer "Murt" Conover
Associate Director of Education and Outreach | LUMCON
mconover@lumcon.edu
Marine educator at LUMCON since 2002. Coordinator of Costal Waters Consortium's education outreach. Commissioner for Louisiana Environmental Education Commission.
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Brian Roberts
Executive Director and Chief Scientist | LUMCON
broberts@lumcon.edu
Human impacts to ecosystems and restoration efforts.
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Jacqueline McComb
Assistant Research Professor of Plant and Soil Science | Southern University
jacqueline.mccomb@sus.edu
Biogeochemistry and phytoremediation, coupled with agrotechnology to aid understanding the interrelationships between agricultural landscapes and ecosystems.
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Scott A. Hemmerling
Senior Research Scientist | The Water Institute of the Gulf
shemmerling@thewaterinstitute.org
Climate adaptation, community resilience, quantifying the social value of ecosystem restoration projects, cultural geography.
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Mead Allison
Professor and Chair of RCSE | Tulane University
meadallison@tulane.edu
Sediment dynamics of modern environments including lowland river, deltaic, wetland, estuarine, and continental shelf settings as well as examination of the late Holocene sediment record in coastal settings.
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Soenke Dangendorf
Assistant Professor | Tulane University
sdangendorf1@tulane.edu
Sea level change and variability, spatial and temporal sea level and climate reconstructions, sea-level budgets, extreme value statistics, time series modelling, design water levels, climate change, detection & attribution, proxy reconstructions.
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Emily Farrer
Associate Professor | Tulane University
efarrer@tulane.edu
Plant ecology, plant-microbe interactions, global change biology, invasive species, wetland ecology, population genetics, and botany.
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Kelin Hu
Research Assistant Professor | Tulane University
khu1@tulane.edu
Modeling of storm surge, hurricane waves, sediment transports and morphological developments in coastal and estuarine areas.
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Barbara A. Kleiss
Research Professor | Tulane University
bkleiss@tulane.edu
Water chemistry of aquatic systems, wetlands biogeochemistry, restoration of rivers and wetlands, and interdisciplinary studies of the Mississippi River and its floodplains.
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Joshua Lewis
Research Associate Professor | Tulane University
jlewis9@tulane.edu
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Ehab A. Meselhe
Professor | Tulane University
emeselhe@tulane.edu
Computer modeling of coastal wetland, estuarine, and riverine systems, particularly integrating physical, ecological and social processes for inland watersheds riverine, deltaic and coastal systems.
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Annalisa Molini
Associate Professor | Tulane University
amolini@tulane.edu
Hydroclimatology; Physically-based/stochastic models for ecohydrology, hydrometeorology, land/vegetation-atmosphere interactions; Plant hydraulics; Boundary layer meteorology; Modeling of extreme hydrological and environmental processes.
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Michelle Hewlett Sanchez
Senior Professor of Practice | Tulane University
sanchez@tulane.edu
Research interests include K-12 STEM Education.
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Simone Domingue
Research Associate Professor | Tulane ByWater Institute
sdomingue@tulane.edu
Environmental sociology and critical scholar of climate adaptation.
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Thomas Wahl
Associate Professor | The University of Central Florida
t.wahl@ucf.edu
Sustainability of human-natural systems in coastal zones, coastal engineering design concepts, extreme value analysis, climate adaptation and resilience, integrated coastal vulnerability and risk assessment.
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Robert Miller
Assistant Professor and Assistant Director | University of Louisiana at Lafayette
robert.miller@louisiana.edu
FEM modeling of the geo-infrastructure, slope stability analysis, and remedial measure of failed slopes.
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Mustafa Kemal Cambazoglu
Assistant Professor of Ocean Science and Engineering | The University of Southern Mississippi
kemal.cambazoglu@usm.edu
Coastal ocean modeling, coastal engineering, coastal sediment transport, and coastal oceanography.
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Kim de Mutsert
Associate Professor | The University of Southern Mississippi
kim.demutsert@usm.edu
Fisheries ecology, marine ecology, movement ecology, and parasitology.
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Jerry Wiggert
Professor of Marine Science | The University of Southern Mississippi
jerry.wiggert@usm.edu
Coastal ocean modeling, biophysical interactions, biogeochemical modeling, and coastal oceanography
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Courtney K. Harris
Professor and Department Chair | Virginia Institute of Marine Science, William and Mary
ckharris@vims.edu
Sediment transport on continental shelves. Numerical ocean models.
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Harish Ratnayaka
Associate Professor | Xavier University of Louisiana
hratnaya@xula.edu
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Arielle C. Filostrat
MissDelta Program Manager
asutt24@lsu.edu