Speaker: Debra Willard
Bio: Debra Willard is a Research Geologist at the US Geological Survey in Reston, VA. She received her B.S. at Penn State and conducted her graduate research on palynological and paleobotanical records from Pennsylvanian-age peat swamps at the University of Illinois. After a postdoc at the Smithsonian Institution, she joined the USGS as a Research Geologist in 1991. Her research uses palynological evidence to document vegetational response to a range of environmental and climatic stressors in Paleogene, Neogene, and Holocene sediments. She served as the Coordinator for the USGS Climate Research & Development Program from 2010–2021 before resuming a research role, focusing on the response of wetland systems to changing climate and land cover since the Last Glacial Maximum.
Host: Ervan Garrison