http://www.dri.edu
	Summer 2006

DRI brings more terrific talent onboard

Philip A. McDonald

McDonald obtained his undergraduate degree in forestry from University of California, Berkeley. After a stint in the U.S. Army and a few jobs, he returned to school and earned his master’s of science degree in environmental design and meteorology from the University of Oklahoma. At the time he obtained his degrees, computer visualization of data was virtually an untapped field.

“We had to figure out how to make those ones and zeros that were in the computer into some sort of picture,” McDonald said.

As the field grew and expanded, McDonald continued to develop programs for visualizing weather, including working on visual effects we now take for granted—such as Doppler radar—that he helped develop for the National Weather Service NEXRAD program. Other projects McDonald has worked on include collaborative projects to display real-time 3D lightning data with Launch Weather officers at Cape Canaveral and creating programs for use in the Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System, used by the National Weather Service. In addition, McDonald has helped to create visualizations of Earth science data suitable for display on the World Wide Web. He truly enjoys interdisciplinary work, and believes DRI “to be a good fit” for his style of working.

Dr. Kumud Acharya

Dr. Kumud Acharya recently joined DRI’s Division of Hydrological Sciences after completing postdoctoral studies at Arizona State University and the University of Louisville. Truly an interdisciplinary scientist, Acharya plans to pursue several avenues of research at DRI, including human impacts on aquatic resources, maintenance of biodiversity, and the maintenance and/or restoration of water quality.

Acharya’s research finds him collaborating with scientists in other divisions in DRI as well as colleagues from a number of other institutions. These broad-ranging collaborations are not surprising because Acharya has been all over the world to earn his degrees. He earned his Ph.D. in biology and environmental science from Saitama University, Japan, his M.S. in environmental engineering from Bradley University in the U.S., and a B.E. in civil engineering from Nagpur University, India.

“DRI provides a platform for basic science as well as applied research,” Acharya said. “I thought this was a unique opportunity to find solutions to environmental problems based on fundamentals of science.”

Acharya is particularly interested in studying the structure of the aquatic invertebrate community—including plankton (zooplankton, algae etc.)—in watersheds that are affected by human activity. Because human impacts in watersheds can include abruptly changing water levels and the addition of pollutants and nutrients into water bodies, aquatic invertebrate communities can be affected greatly by human impacts. Acharya uses a number of techniques in his research, from field observations and experiments, to growing organisms in the lab, to examining the organization of these communities and how they are affected by changing environmental conditions.

Other research interests of Acharya’s include biogeochemical cycling, wastewater treatment systems and groundwater management. All of Acharya’s avenues of research will help maintain and improve water quality for humans, as well as aquatic life.

Renee Kolvet

Renee Corona Kolvet has joined DRI as a faculty member in the Division of Earth and Ecosystems Sciences at the Las Vegas campus. Specializing in archaeology, she is familiar with Nevada archaeology, partly through her master’s work at the University of Nevada, Reno, where she studied Great Basin anthropology and archaeology. She also plans to pursue a Ph.D. research degree at the University of Leicester in England and hopes to start the program this fall.

Part of Kolvet’s work at DRI involves surveying and assessing archaeological sites to comply with Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act. Kolvet is working with DRI’s Dr. David Rhode assessing several projects for the Department of Energy in Nevada. This involves surveying a proposed project area and recording areas of archaeological interest, evaluating the significance of each site and deciding the impact that the proposed project may have.

Kolvet said, “We try to protect and learn from the sites we find and suggest ways to avoid sites if they are in the way of a project.”

She has many diverse interests in the fields of archaeology and anthropology. Her research includes deducing changes in both paleoclimate and women’s and childrens’ social status using archaeological and anthropological records of plant processing, such as grinding stones.

A more historically recent area of Kolvet’s research is describing Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps projects found in Nevada. She has written a book, with oral histories by Victoria Ford, about the subject that will be available in August through the University of Nevada Press. She is currently researching New Deal programs on Indian reservations in Nevada and also is assisting the Fort Mojave Tribe with a study of a civil war-era fort and late nineteenth century American Indian school on its land.

Prior to coming to DRI, Kolvet worked for the Bureau of Reclamation in Boulder City and has lived in both Reno and Las Vegas. She said she appreciates both the unique qualities and beauty of the southern Nevada desert as well as the northern Nevada climate and, she admits, the wonderful Great Basin archaeological sites that make her work so enjoyable.

Kathy Badgett

The phrase “all things happen for a reason” may well describe Kathy Badgett’s return to her higher education roots by joining DRI. After several years working in higher education, first as a controller for Montana State University in Billings, then as a finance director for the University of Wyoming and finally as the chief financial officer at Washington State University-Tri-Cities, she moved into the corporate sector working for IBM. As a consultant for IBM, she traveled all over the United States for seven years doing software implementation and business transformation, working with the likes of Universal Studios and Pitney Bowes. Although she says she enjoyed the cultural diversity and working with the complex systems of IBM, she found she had more of a permanent connection with people working in higher education.

Badgett’s first introduction to DRI was through a project for IBM that led her to work on a human resources and payroll contract for the Nevada System of Higher Education. Little did she know that her brief encounter working with DRI Human Resources Manager Patricia Hughes for the IBM project wouldn’t be her last.

Badgett saw the opportunity at DRI as a chance to return to her love of working in higher education, and she has now settled into her role as DRI’s new assistant vice president and controller.

“It’s exciting and there’s a lot of diversity with this job. I know I’ll never get bored!” Badgett commented about her responsibilities of being DRI’s financial administrator and the treasurer for DRI’s Foundation Board.

Her duties include overseeing all activities of the Controller’s Office, Budget Office and the Office of Sponsored Research. With Badgett’s extensive background, DRI is in good hands when it comes to money matters.