Botanizing with my 19th-century girlfriend | Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie | TEDxPiscataquaRiver
What does Thoreau have to do with climate change? What does a 40-something Mount Desert Island woman share with a group of young Harvard boys studying botany, geology and ecology? In this educational and entertaining talk, scientist Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie introduces us to Annie Sawyer Downs, a 19th-century citizen scientist, and shares how data collected by her and others has helped contemporary scientists understand our botanical past, and predict our ecological future. Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie is an ecologist and alpine zone enthusiast. She studies plant ecology above treeline in New England, with an emphasis on understanding changes in plants communities over multiple time scales — from the recent Anthropocene to the last 15,000 years. Caitlin studied Environmental Science and Public Policy as an undergraduate at Harvard University, and Ecological Planning as a master’s student at the University of Vermont. Her PhD in Biology at Boston University explores patterns of species loss and spring phenology in New England’s plant communities, and she conducted field work at Acadia National Park, Maine as a George Melendez Wright Climate Change fellow, a National Park Service researcher, and a National Science Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant recipient. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx
What does Thoreau have to do with climate change? What does a 40-something Mount Desert Island woman share with a group of young Harvard boys studying botany, geology and ecology? In this educational and entertaining talk, scientist Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie introduces us to Annie Sawyer Downs, a 19th-century citizen scientist, and shares how data collected by her and others has helped contemporary scientists understand our botanical past, and predict our ecological future. Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie is an ecologist and alpine zone enthusiast. She studies plant ecology above treeline in New England, with an emphasis on understanding changes in plants communities over multiple time scales — from the recent Anthropocene to the last 15,000 years. Caitlin studied Environmental Science and Public Policy as an undergraduate at Harvard University, and Ecological Planning as a master’s student at the University of Vermont. Her PhD in Biology at Boston University explores patterns of species loss and spring phenology in New England’s plant communities, and she conducted field work at Acadia National Park, Maine as a George Melendez Wright Climate Change fellow, a National Park Service researcher, and a National Science Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant recipient. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx