
Meet the Team
Meet the California Collaborative for Natural Climate Change Solutions team.

Principal Investigator
Isabel P. Montañez
Isabel is the Director of the Institute of the Environment and Distinguished Professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at UC Davis. Her expertise is in carbon cycling and climate change.

Principal Investigator
Toby O'Geen
Toby is a professor in the Department of Land, Air and Water Resources at UC Davis and a professor and Cooperative Extension Soil Resource Specialist for UC ANR.

Program Scientist
Radomir Schmidt
Radomir is a program manager at UC Davis' Institute of the Environment. Radomir's research centers on sustainable agriculture and agroecology.

Computer Scientist
Mike Walkinshaw
Mapping professional providing GIS, web, and cartographic services including regional planning, transportation, natural resource management, and disaster response.

Postdoctoral Scholar
Michal Ben-Israel
Michal is working on developing and applying novel isotopic systems to track inorganic carbon from rock weathering through soils, investigating clay mineral formation, and advancing understanding of organic-inorganic carbon cycling in amended working lands.

Ph.D. Student
Jaeeun Sohng
Jaeeun's research focuses on leveraging natural processes (mineral weathering and microbial carbon pump) in soil management to enhance important ecosystem services.

Master's Student
Alyssa Flores
Alyssa's research focuses on soil health in rangelands. She is dedicated to understanding the critical role of soil health in maintaining productive and resilient rangeland ecosystems.

Junior Specialist
Seth Whiteaker
Seth supports field and lab trials as a junior specialist with the Institute of the Environment. He is also responsible for data management and analysis, with a focus on geospatial data and soil mapping.

Marketing & Communications Specialist
Elena Peters
Elena is the Strategic Communications Administrator for the UC Davis Institute of the Environment and the web development and marketing lead for the California Collaborative for Natural Climate Change Solutions.
Collaborators
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Terraforming Soil Energy Earthshot Research Center (Jennifer Pitt-Ridge & Noah Sokol, LLNL)
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Yale University, Center for Natural Carbon Capture, New Haven, CT (Noah Planavsky & Barbina Khordana-Arael
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Sierra Foothills Research and Extension Center
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Kearney Research and Extension Center
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Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley CA (Peter Nico)
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Carleton College, Northfield, MN (Dan Maxbauer)





