The RENEW Institute - A Multidisciplinary Initiative
Catalyzing Conversations Series
Nancy Grimm
Arizona State University Regents Professor; Virginia M. Ullman Professor of Ecology; Distinguished Sustainability Scientist; Special Advisor to the Director for Faculty Mentoring and Development, School of Life Sciences.
Nancy B. Gimm is an ecosystem ecologist who studies the interactions of climate change, human activities, resilience, and biogeochemical processes in urban and stream ecosystems. In the urban realm, Grimm was founding director of the Central Arizona–Phoenix Long-term Ecological Research program and co-director of the Urban Resilience to Extremes Sustainability Research Network from 2015–2022. She now co-directs the international network of networks, NATURA (NATure-based solutions for Urban Resilience in the Anthropocene) and the graduate scholars network, Earth Systems Science for the Anthropocene (ESSA).
Professor Grimm’s collaborative research in urban social-ecological-technological systems (SETS) centers on nature-based, technological, and governance solutions that can build resilience to a future with increased frequency and magnitude of extreme events. In streams, Grimm and her students and colleagues study how hydrologic and climatic variability influence ecosystem processes such as stream metabolism and nutrient dynamics, and more recently, the impacts of a novel desert disturbance (wildfire) on stream processes through hydrologic connectivity of upland to stream-riparian corridor. Along with her colleagues and students, Grimm has made >230 contributions to the scientific literature.
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"Nature-based solutions for climate adaptation in cities"
Humans have become the main force shaping the environment in the modern age, which is characterized by rapid change, compounded problems, and increasing complexity and uncertainty. For cities, extreme events driven by climate change pose particular challenges, including threats to lives and livelihoods, compounded infrastructure failures, and unequal distribution of risk due to past unjust practices. Strengthening the capacity of these social-ecological-technological systems (SETS) to maintain their essential structure and function when faced with such events (i.e., resilience) is of paramount importance. Yet solutions have been based on prevailing views that the world is complicated, not complex; that events are predictable, not uncertain; and that people are apart from nature rather than part of nature. In this talk I will explore examples of nature-based solutions, asking if these strategies can build resilience to extreme events in cities. Co-produced visions for present and future urban configurations from neighborhood to regional scales will illustrate the potential for reducing risk from extreme heat and flooding in urbanized central Arizona.
Event Details
- Host Department: Environment & Sustainability
- Date:
Thursday, April 10, 2025 - Location:
Student Union 330, North Campus Pride and Tradition Room - Time: 4:00 pm
with reception following