Dr. Walter Zachritz                 Dr Roger Jacobson

Zachritz Tackles Desert Dilemmas as DRI's Newest Center Director

Dr. Walter Zachritz examines the channel of the Las Vegas Wash, which he hopes will be a major subject of CALEM's future research programs.

Dr. Walter Zachritz is the new head of CALEM, which was established to create integrated, innovative approaches to environmental management issues affecting global desert ecosystems. Zachritz is up to the challenge.

No stranger to arid environments, he has spent the past 11 years with New Mexico State University, most recently as Assistant Director of the Southwest Technology Development Institute. There, he tackled domestic and internationalland management issues such as wastewater reuse, aquaculture engineering, and hazardous waste treatment.

"When the DRI position came up, I saw it as a chance to continue work that was similar in scope," he recalls, "but on a bigger scale, and with a broader base of expertise. It seemed like a really interesting opportunity."

Much of the initial focus of CALEM's work will be in the American Southwest, particularly around Zachritz's DRI headquarters in Las Vegas, where many of the challenges of arid land management are particularly evident. Zachritz notes of his new home turf, "Las Vegas is a prime example of an interface between arid land and urban use, and there are a lot of opportunities to look at some of the problems that can create-dust, encroachment, wastewater disposal."

While an ideal arid setting is close to home, Zachritz will also be taking his expertise on the road. He continues work on a project begun at New Mexico State using wastewater to grow trees in Egypt. Reclaiming wastewater that would otherwise be dumped into the Nile and using it to grow trees the country urgently needs for fuel and building solves two environmental problems at once. It's the kind of system that could potentially be applied to any arid region, and, Zachritz says, that's the whole idea behind CALEM. "We want to come up with specific concepts and strategies for an area and eventually apply them broadly to other arid regions with similar problems."
Jackie Allen

Knock, Knock: Opportunities Abound in Dr. Roger Jacobson's Latest Role

Ask someone what DRI is all about, and you might hear something along the lines of "science," "environment," or "research." But, ask long-time DRI researcher, administrator, and professor Dr. Roger Jacobson, and he's likely to say, "Opportunity. It's all about opportunity."

Roger Jacobson with DRI graduate research assistants Jason Kuchnicki and Katrina Smolen.

"When I joined DRI 25 years ago," remembers Jacobson, "I was really excited about the opportunity to not only conduct research, but also to be a part of the graduate hydrology program at the University of Nevada, Reno. I was excited by the opportunity to work with students, and to develop and teach courses that hadn't been taught before." Today, as DRI's interim Vice President for Academic Affairs (VPAA), that enthusiasm for linking DRI's research faculty with UNR and UNLV students has not flagged. That's fitting, since as VPAA Jacobson promotes interactions between the university and DRI that give environmental sciences graduate students opportunities for involvement in current research projects and to learn from working researchers.

It is a relationship Jacobson understands well. During his 25 years with DRI, he has headed numerous research projects, taught a variety of graduate-level courses, and advised numerous graduate students as they pursued their degrees. Today, DRI researchers teach over a dozen courses each year on Nevada campuses, and DRI employs about 50 graduate students annually on funded research projects.

"We teach virtually all the courses in the Atmospheric Sciences Program at UNR and many of the courses in UNR's Hydrologic Sciences Program. We also have some people teaching geology courses and, periodically, anthropology and archaeology." Jacobson sees research and learning as inextricably linked, and is working to expand DRI's involvement still further with courses like environmental remediation and aquatic ecology and biology.

Jacobson is clearly proud of DRI's role employing, as well as creating, top quality scientists. "The truth is, together with the campuses, we have turned out some terrific graduates who are doing great work all over the world. They're giving Nevada an excellent reputation, and that's giving us the opportunity to make these programs even stronger."

Jackie Allen

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