front row (l-r): Tess Stafford, Scot Waye, Diana Hun, Michael Waring, R. J. Briggs, Ellison Carter, Jessica Cobarrubia
  not shown: Matt Earnest, Sonny Rosenthal

RJ BRIGGS

R.J. is a fourth year Ph. D. student in Economics at UT, with fields in Public Economics and Environmental and Natural Resource Economics. His indoor environmental quality research interests include the effects of information on the public choice to ban smoking indoors and the impacts of home characteristics on infant and child health. R.J.'s most recent paper investigates optimal policy to control pollution from mining, and he has working papers on oil prices and the effects of ambient air quality on human health.

R.J. is a native of the Sierra Nevada foothills in Northern California. He holds a Bachelor's degree in Arts and Sciences from the University of California, Davis, with majors in Economics and Mathematics. R.J. is a former participant in the American Economic Association's Minority Summer Training Program and a past recipient of the Donald D. Harrington Fellowship at UT. Prior to pursuing his doctorate, he worked as a research programmer at RAND in Washington, DC, supporting research on education policy and national defense.

Beyond academia, R.J. plays a mean game of chess and loves to DJ. More frequently, however, he spends his spare time chasing runaway soccer balls at local parks for his two sons, Aidan and Merrick. R.J.'s wife Javan makes a claim on every evening that he is not preoccupied with research. Together, they enjoy trying out the many ethnic restaurants in town. In fact, one of R.J.'s recent claims to fame is that he has convinced both his young sons that they love sushi!

 

ELLISON CARTER

Ellison Carter is from Indiana, where, in 2004, she received a B.S. in Biology, a minor certificate in Chemistry, and a B.A. in Spanish while at Indiana University in Bloomington. She developed a specific interest in environmental engineering during a year long stint in Costa Rica as volunteer at two biological stations. Her pursuit of that interest led her to the University of Texas at Austin, where she is in her final semester of the Environmental and Water Resources Engineering Masters degree program. Ellison is excited to be continuing as a PhD student and IGERT trainee at UT. During her first year at UT, her research focused on adsorptive processes of the soil-water interface. Ellison intends to carry that focus indoors and investigate adsorptive processes and surface chemistry of treatment media, such as activated carbon, to improve removal mechanisms for recalcitrant chemicals, like organophosphorus flame retardants. She sees her participation in the IGERT program as a great opportunity to add breadth and depth to her graduate experience, by building relationships within and outside of her field of expertise.

Ellison has thoroughly enjoyed adapting to life in Austin, where city transit is cheap and extravagance muted. In what other city can you take unlimited bus rides for a dollar a day? Austin also makes an easy sell for a visit from her friends and family still living in the frigid, northern United States. While she may beg to differ with its moniker, "live music capital of the world", there is no question that the prospect of four more years (or more) in Austin is anything but onerous.

JESSICA COBARRUBIA

Jessica grew up in Portland, Oregon, and after finishing high school she joined the U.S. Army. She served as a Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical Specialist, and was trained to detect and decontaminate these agents on personnel and equipment. She spent her first two years in Germany, and then came back to the U.S. to serve at Fort Hood, TX. Jessica completed one tour in Iraq before being honorably discharged from the military, and now resides in Killeen with her husband, Rich, who is still in the service.

Jessica is a second year graduate student at the Institute of Cell and Molecular Biology, and is currently working in Dr. John Richburg's reproductive toxicology lab. She completed her B.S. in Cell and Molecular Biology at The University of Texas at Austin, and decided to continue her graduate work here in order to be close to her husband. Dr. Richburg's lab studies the effect of phthalates, specifically mono (2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (MEHP), on spermatogenesis and male reproduction. Phthalates are commonly used in plastic products such as PVC tubing, medical supplies, and children's toys to provide flexibility. These chemicals tend to leach out of their products, so they are found dispersed throughout the environment, especially indoors where the plastic products are used most often. Jessica hopes to decipher the mechanism by which MEHP disrupts sperm production in order to better predict and prevent environmental-associated testicular injuries.

MATT EARNEST

Matt Earnest is a first year graduate student in Environmental Engineering at UT focusing on indoor air quality. His research revolves around non-industrial exposure to toxic air contaminates. He is particularly interested in expanding the knowledge base of near source exposure and developing exposure models that consider source proximity and concentration peaks. Thus, the IGERT program on Indoor Environmental Science and Engineering was a natural fit. He feels privileged to participate in a program that allows him to focus on his research while not forgetting to address the larger, interdisciplinary questions facing his field. Matt grew up all over Texas and Oklahoma, living the majority of his life in Houston and Tulsa. He graduated magna cum laude from Vanderbilt University with a B.E. (Honors) in Chemical Engineering in 2007. His undergraduate research focused on vapor-liquid equilibrium molecular modeling and simulation of binary polar mixtures with the aim of finding environmentally friendly solvents for use in industrial application. While at Vanderbilt he competed nationally on the cross-examination debate squad and got seriously involved in ceramics on the wheel. Now he still enjoys ceramics on the wheel but spends most of his free time playing with his puppy, Toby.

DIANA HUN

Diana Hun was born and raised in Panama City, Panama, as a Hispanic with a Chinese facade. She received from the University of Texas at Austin her B.S. in Electrical Engineering in 1993, and M.S. in Architectural Engineering in 1997. After this long and fun stay at UT, she resided for eight years in the world of construction as a structural engineer with Walter P. Moore & Associates. During this time she became a registered Professional Engineer in the state of Texas; served as Secretary and Vice President of the Structural Engineers Association of Texas - North Central Texas Chapter; became a LEED Accredited Professional; and was member of the Events and Education Committee of the U.S. Green Building Council - North Texas Chapter. These professional experiences not only showed her the intricacies of the construction industry, but also its indoor and outdoor environmental consequences.  Due to growing environmental concerns, she returned to UT as a Ph.D. student in Civil Engineering to obtain tools to decrease the harmful effects of buildings.

The IGERT program on Indoor Environmental Science and Engineering represents a great opportunity to achieve her desire to improve the built environment. Her interests include public education and green building materials as means to control sources of indoor pollution. She feels very fortunate to be able to participate in the IGERT program as a UT student because of the wide variety of extracurricular activities the university offers. She is currently a member of the 2007 UT Solar Decathlon Team, and trades bruises weekly with the UT Taekwon-Do Club.

SONNY ROSENTHAL

Sonny is a doctoral student in the Department of Advertising at the University of Texas at Austin. Broadly, he is interested in the psychology of media exposure. Specifically, he researches the public's acquisition and application of science knowledge, and how this is moderated by the media. His previous work has examined the effects of film and the Internet on learning. He has also studied the relationship between media use and knowledge of global warming. He is excited to apply his research to the science of indoor air quality, as, with many areas of science, the public would benefit from its effective dissemination. At his leisure, Sonny spends a lot of time on UT's climbing wall in Gregory Gym. His other pastimes include racquetball, biking, swimming, making music (guitar, drum, keyboard, electronic) and tinkering with his desktop computer. And when his computer is working properly, he likes to design in ArchiCAD, compose in Reason, and play RTS games.

TESS STAFFORD

Tess Stafford is a third year PhD student in the economics program at the University of Texas. Her fields include public finance and environmental and natural resource economics although she also plans to study labor economics and its applications to indoor environments. Specifically, she is interested in researching ways to remedy the inefficiency associated with asymmetric information between employers and employees regarding health and the workplace. She is also interested in looking at the rental price differential between apartment buildings that are 'green' certified and those that are not to measure tenants' willingness to pay for a cleaner indoor environment.

Tess grew up in Key West, Florida, where both of her parents and her brother are lobster fishermen. Being the sole non-fisherman in the family, Tess was eager to contribute to the development of the industry in her own way. With help from her family, her most recent research aims to create an integrated bio-economic model of the Florida Spiny Lobster fishery to better analyze policy implications and better guide regulation.

After high school, Tess traveled north to New York for college where she received her B.A. in economics from Vassar College. While at Vassar, she minored in Italian and spent a semester in Bologna learning the language and eating. After college, Tess spent two and a half years working as a paralegal in New York City before moving to Austin to begin her graduate work. She was a four-year member of the Vassar women's soccer team and continues to play in the Austin women's soccer league. Tess also loves to travel on borrowed funds claiming that she practices what she preaches, namely consumption smoothing.

MICHAEL WARING

Michael Waring received his B.S. degree in Architectural Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin in 2005, and he also holds a B.A. from UT-Austin in both English (special honors) and economics. Michael gravitated towards the building environmental systems aspect of the Architectural Engineering program at UT-Austin, and he is currently enrolled in the Environmental and Water Resources Engineering (EWRE) department at UT-Austin studying indoor air quality and is in the final semester of his Masters degree. His research as a graduate student has been rich and varied; and he recently completed work modeling particle mass deposition on HVAC filters and heat exchangers, evaluating indoor air quality in bars in Austin before and after a recent indoor smoking ban, and assessing the impact of portable air cleaners on ultrafine particle concentrations. His future research goals in the IGERT program include using indoor air chemistry modeling to predict ultrafine particle growth due to ozone-terpene reactions in the indoor environment.

Since indoor air quality was already a professional passion of Michael's, he could not be more excited to participate in the commencement of the IGERT program, and he is looking forward to working intimately with students in other disciplines that are important to improving the indoor environment. In his free time, Michael enjoys running around Town Lake, attempting to find time to attend his Tai Chi classes, and generally just spending time outside. Literature has always been an obsession of his, and one day, he would like to have time to read extensively for pleasure again.

SCOT WAYE

Scot Waye received his B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from The University of Utah in 2004. He completed his M.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering (emphasis in Thermal Fluid Systems) in 2005 at the University of Texas at Austin and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in the same field. During the end of his undergraduate work and his Masters work, he focused his research on heat transfer, especially in film cooling in turbine engines. He was introduced into the indoor environment arena through work in developing better ways to detect anthropogenic environmental radionuclides. He has shifted his research interests to examining human exposure to particles that have sorbed various chemicals emitted from various products or sources. A large part of this is modeling the mass transfer of chemicals due to emissions from consumer products. Of particular interest are brominated flame retardants, especially PBDEs, which are found in many electronic plastics and foams. A website with some of his research interests and previous work may be found at http://studentweb.engr.utexas.edu/skw323.

Scot has interned twice at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, NM, working with chemical engineers on a foam decomposition model and civil engineers on bunker busters. This past summer, he volunteered at the National Exposure Research Laboratory, an Environmental Protection Agency lab located in Research Triangle Park, NC.

He is excited to be part of first cohort of IGERT trainees and to work with others from various disciplines on the indoor environment paradigm. Scot grew up in Albuquerque and loves the annual Balloon Fiesta held in October. He and his wife recently adopted a newborn girl. In his free time, Scot enjoys mountain biking, cooking, doing yard work, playing tennis, traveling, volunteering with the youth of his church, including Boy Scouts, and playing with his dog.