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Speakers

Dr. Changwoo Ahn

Professor

Dr. Changwoo Ahn’s general research interests and experiences include ecological functions of created wetlands, wetland system ecology, water quality, wetland creation and restoration, nutrient dynamics (N, P), and ecological modeling. Currently his Wetland Ecosystem Laboratory at GMU has three main topics of study: wetland creation/restoration techniques (i.e., microtopography relations), ecological monitoring of mitigation wetlands, and microbial community patterns along biogeochemical gradients in constructed wetlands.

Through his postdoctoral work at the Illinois Water Resources Center of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Dr. Ahn focused on developing a dynamic model to predict vegetation responses to many different scenarios of river hydrology being manipulated for the restoration of Illinois floodplain-river ecosystem. Through this project, Dr. Ahn worked with a number of stakeholders, including The Nature Conservancy and National Science Foundation.

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Junior Faculty Advisor Staff

Freya Patel

Junior Faculty Advisor

Freya Patel is a rising sophomore majoring in Biology and Psychology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In her free time, Freya enjoys reading fiction novels and she aspires to one day become a zoologist and work in the field of animal conservation. During high school, Freya was dual enrolled at Central Piedmont Community College and graduated in 2017 with an Associates in Biological Sciences. Freya attended WYSE as a delegate in 2016 and as an intern in 2017. She is excited to return as a Junior Faculty Advisor for WYSE 2018 and looks forward to meeting the new delegates.

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Speakers

Alonso Aguirre, PhD, DMV

Associate Professor

Dr. Alonso Aguirre heads a program of collaborative research that focuses on the ecology of wildlife disease and the links to human health and conservation of biodiversity. His research has been instrumental in revealing the impact of emerging diseases of marine wildlife populations. Dr. Aguirre’s international experience brings applied solutions to ecological health issues accomplished through trans-disciplinary teams, innovative research, scientific excellence, and long-term monitoring of sentinel species. Dr. Aguirre served as the Executive Director of the Smithsonian-Mason School of Conservation and Director of the Mason Center for Conservation Studies.

He has authored three books, published over 160 professional papers, monographs and scientific reports, and advised government agency and NGO leaders of several countries in the Americas, Southeast Asia and Western Europe. He currently serves as co-editor of EcoHealth, Journal of Wildlife Diseases and European Journal of Wildlife Research.