May 2021
We are excited to welcome new and incoming lab members to the Hallett lab. Marina LaForgia, Paul Reed, and Chhaya Werner are joining as new postdocs and Cal Penkauskas will be joining as a new masters student in the fall.
Marina received her PhD from the University of California-Davis in 2019 where she worked with Susan Harrison and Andrew Latimer. Marina is USDA NIFA Postdoctoral Fellow studying seed trait trade-offs in arid and semi-arid annuals in order to understand how the environment shapes seed strategies and how the invasiveness and persistence of these strategies may shift under climate change.
Paul will be defending his dissertation this May and will be joining the Hallett lab as a postdoc this summer. Paul has been working with Scott Bridgham at University of Oregon studying the conversion of perennial native prairies to annual grasslands with climate change. Paul will be extending this work as a postdoc.
Chhaya recieved her PhD from the University of California-Davis in 2018. She is currently a postdoc at the University of Wyoming where she is studying coexistence theory. Chayya will be joining the lab in September, working on coexistence of annual and perennials in California grasslands.
Cal is a familiar face in the Hallett lab and is finishing his BS this term at UO. The Hallett lab is lucky to keep him on as a Biology masters student! He will be extending his work on Hazelnut Orchard management, working to find sustainable solutions to hazelnut farming.