The USC Wrigley Institute for Environment and Sustainability announces the selection of its 2026 cohort of Wrigley Institute Graduate Fellows. This year’s fellows are Ph.D. students from across the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts & Sciences, including disciplines in the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities. All are tackling environmental and sustainability questions through the lens of their particular field.

Throughout the spring 2026 semester, fellows will participate in professional development activities arranged by the Wrigley Institute. Each fellow will also receive a summer stipend to help support the continuation of their Ph.D. research. Fellows will complete their field experiences on USC’s main Los Angeles campus, at the Wrigley Marine Science Center on Catalina Island, and around the world.

Learn more about the Wrigley Institute Graduate Fellowship >>

 

Meet the 2026 Fellows

 

 

Akhim Alexis

English

Advisor: Devin Griffiths

Project: “Renewed Possibilities: Toward Reimagining the Caribbean Climate Catastrophe through Short Fiction”

Alexis’s project explores how authors who write in and about the Caribbean conceptualize the future in ways that rework common ideas about dystopias. How do they use science and narratives about ecology to help people (re)imagine meaningful life in the future, despite predictions that environmental collapse will soon ravage the Caribbean?

 

 

Disha Baidya

Earth Sciences

Advisor: Sarah J. Feakins

Project: “Wood burial on the Iberian Margin – carbon and climate implications”

During the Messinian period 5.3 million years ago, intense flash floods buried wood debris in Iberian river sediments. This study aims to quantify the amount of wood-based carbon stored in those sediments and to understand both how the stored carbon may have affected the Messinian climate and how its release may affect our climate today.

 

 

Kurt Castro

Biological Sciences

Advisor: Julia Schwartzman

Project: “Characterizing microbial community dynamics, effects, and interactions with giant kelp gametophytes in Southern California kelp forests”

Castro’s research investigates the microbes found in giant kelp forests, a crucial marine ecosystem. He studies which microbes are most successful at colonizing kelp, how these microbes differ by location, and how they interact with kelp seeds (gametophytes) to affect kelp growth.

 

 

Pierre Coster

Economics

Advisor: Thomas Chaney

Project: “When weather hits hard: How aid and insurance help French farmers cope”

Coster researches how France helps farmers recover financially after extreme weather events, and whether this safety net reduces farmers’ use of adaptive or precautionary measures. He is also investigating whether current policies and market forces work together to create a fair, effective safety net as climate change increases the frequency of extreme weather.

 

 

Ayon Das

Chemistry

Advisor: Megan Fieser

Project: “Repurposing Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) Waste with Metal Catalysis”

PVC is the third-most common plastic in the world, but under current methods, more than 50% of its mass turns into corrosive hydrochloric acid during the recycling process. Das’s project tests the use of metals to convert PVC entirely into benign polymers that are reusable for applications in the circular economy.

 

 

Jaycee Lanza

Biological Sciences

Advisor: Andrew Gracey

Project: “Harnessing Hybrid Vigor in Kelp to Advance Sustainable Aquaculture”

Kelp aquaculture offers a promising way to produce nutritious food without relying on Earth’s limited soil or fresh water, and hybrid kelp has proven especially successful as a cultivated crop. Lanza’s project seeks to identify the genes behind hybrid kelp’s success, to help support effective breeding programs for commercial kelp aquaculture in warming oceans.

 

 

Sarvenaz Oloomi

Psychology

Advisor: Santiago Morales

Project: “Impact of Prenatal Environmental Exposures on Early Brain Development”

Oloomi’s project examines whether extreme heat and environmental toxins – such as air pollution, chemicals, and heavy metals – affect babies’ early brain development, as well as how neighborhood factors like safety, stress, and socioeconomic conditions may intensify the effects of these toxins.

 

 

Mychaela Paetow

Economics

Advisor: Paulina Oliva

Project: “Internalizing Environmental Externalities: A Coasean Approach to Urban Solid Waste Management in Kampala, Uganda”

Paetow’s research uses Kampala, Uganda, as a case study of methods for deterring open dumping of solid waste. The two-part project will (1) install nets to catch household waste that would otherwise flow through rainwater drainage channels, causing downstream flooding, and (2) test residents’ willingness to pay for and install nets along shared drainage channels.

 

 

Shreya Ramesh

Earth Sciences

Advisor: Josh West

Project: “The Weight of Gold: Assessing Forest Disturbances Due to Artisanal Scale Gold Mining in the Peruvian Amazon”

Ramesh’s research focuses on the effects of small-scale gold mining on Peru’s Amazon rainforest. Using machine learning and satellite imagery, they seek to quantify not only how these mines have contributed to deforestation, but also how they are affecting the health of the remaining forest around them.

 

 

Saloni Taneja

Economics

Advisors: Jeffrey Broadman Weaver

Project: “Pricing the Aquifer: Groundwater and Property Valuation”

Taneja’s project investigates whether India’s groundwater supplies, which are often used to supplement intermittent public water, affect property valuations in urban areas. By mapping groundwater availability to housing prices, she hopes to develop insights relevant to large cities where climate change affects water supply.

 

 

Natalie Villafranca

Biological Sciences

Advisor: Carly Kenkel

Project: “Validation of immune gene expression as a biomarker for predicting restoration success in the branching coral Acropora cervicornis”

Villafranca’s research has found that certain immune-system genes seem to improve resilience in Acropora cervicornis, a coral that has been decimated by climate change. Her fellowship project will further test this finding and look for practical ways to encourage expression of beneficial genes in corals planted for reef restoration.

 

 

Iskar Waluyo

Spatial Sciences Institute

Advisor: Robert Vos

Project: “An examination of the potential impacts of farmers’ markets on the Los Angeles food system”

Waluyo’s project explores ways to make food systems more sustainable, using Los Angeles County farmers’ markets as case studies. In particular, his research focuses on the relationship between food accessibility and food choice at farmers’ markets, and how those factors may affect health and the environment in L.A. County.

 

 

Lena Williams

Chemistry

Advisor: Travis Williams

Project: “From Rags to Riches: The Biological Upcycling of Nylon 6,6 Waste”

Williams’s research focuses on converting waste nylon into compounds that can be used in medicines, agricultural chemicals, and textiles. By generating materials for high-value industries, her work helps provide a financial incentive for the recycling and reuse of plastics that would otherwise become pollution.

 

 

Paige Wise

Earth Sciences

Advisor: Seth John

Project: “Plume to Policy: Advancing Equitable Marine Carbon Removal for Small Island Developing States”

Wise’s project investigates whether natural hydrothermal activity near the small island nation of Tonga makes the area especially suited to carbon storage, a key tactic for managing climate change. Her ultimate goal is to help identify possible avenues for small island states to participate in the global carbon market and become more resilient to climate change.

 

 

Iris Wu

Biological Sciences

Advisor: Cameron Thrash

Project: “Building culture-validated models of SAR11 to predict metabolic response to sea level rise”

Wu’s project explores the role of SAR11 bacteria in managing the carbon stored in coastal waters and wetlands. Through the use of metabolic models, she hopes to predict how sea level rise and other environmental changes will affect these important microbes and, by extension, our planet’s ability to keep carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere.

 

 

Jiayi Yu

Chemistry

Advisor: Clay C. C. Wang

Project: “Upcycling Plastic Waste into Valuable Fungal Secondary Metabolites”

Yu’s research helps refine the biological upcycling of plastic waste, a process that uses chemical catalysts and fungi to turn plastics into valuable, reusable compounds. In particular, her fellowship project investigates whether certain plastics can be fed to fungi on their own, or must be combined with other chemicals to make the process more effective.

 

Wrigley Institute Graduate Fellows are generously funded through the USC Dornsife Wrigley Institute Graduate Fellowship, the Victoria J. Bertics Graduate Fellowship Fund, and the Diane Sonosky Montgomery and Jerol Sonosky Graduate Fellowship for Environmental Sustainability Research.