Kevin.Puckett@uky.edu

UK’s Meredith Swallom Wins Top Honors for Flood Research

Meredith Swallom, a 4th year PhD student supported under Project 2 of CLIMBS’ Paleo-Perspectives initiative, won top honors in the Lightning Talk competition at the 2025 John P. Wyatt, M.D. Environment and Health Symposium on April 22nd. Her talk, “Drainages, Dams, and Downpours: What Makes a Flood?”, explored how past and present landscape changes may …

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Karin Pekarchik, KY NSF EPSCoR’s New Statewide Program Coordinator, To Cultivate CLIMBS Connections

From Manhattan to Kentucky’s country cafés and then research labs filled with code, crops, and climate models, Karin Pekarchik’s career has always been about bridging gaps and making connections. Her latest mission? Helping CLIMBS cultivate a resilient academic ecosystem—one rooted in research and relationships.    Throughout her career, Pekarchik has gravitated toward spaces where community …

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Bryson Champions CLIMBS in TED Talk

“CLIMBS will provide incalculable benefits to society… and ultimately enable us to save lives.” On March 25th, Dr. Sebastian Bryson championed the work of CLIMBS at TEDxUKY. Bryson told a gripping story–how floods and landslides have rocked our commonwealth–but also how spatial analysis, remote sensing, and artificial intelligence can help our Kentucky communities better predict …

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SP&M Lab Updates: Exciting Developments in Landslide Research and Flood Modelling

Press Release from Kentucky Geological Survey:  The Surface Processes & Modelling Laboratory (SP&M) at the Kentucky Geological Survey (KGS) is making significant strides in research and collaboration, including welcoming an esteemed international scholar, publishing research, and securing new funding. The SP&M Lab is funded by the NSF EPSCoR ‘Climate Resilience through Multidisciplinary Big Data Learning, Prediction & Building …

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McGlue, Marks, Puckett Speak on UK’s Appalachian Center Panel

The 2025 Graduate Appalachian Research Community (GARC) Symposium, hosted by the University of Kentucky Appalachian Center on March 8th, brought together scholars and researchers from UK and the region to discuss pressing issues in Appalachia. This year’s theme, Insider/Outsider, connected history, culture, science, and art to exemplify Appalachia’s past, present, and future. One of the …

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Predicting the Future: CLIMBS Meteorology Student Wyatt Crutcher’s Work to Update Kentucky’s Storm Response Protocols

By Avi Judd “I need a forecast in two minutes. What do you have?”   Wyatt Crutcher is used to being put on the spot by his meteorology professor, Joshua Durkee. A storm encroaches his campus’ football game. High lightning proximity, six miles from the stadium. Within moments Crutcher assesses the impending storm and relays the …

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Suriano Awarded Prestigious NSF CAREER Award, a First at WKU

Since 1986, KY NSF EPSCoR Track-1 funding has supported hundreds of new faculty hires across Kentucky institutions. These faculty have helped build Kentucky research infrastructure, leading to innovations in energy, agriculture, advanced manufacturing, and most currently, climate hazard resilience through the CLIMBS project.  Many of these researchers, after an initial support boost through their Track-1, …

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UK Researchers, Hired Under Track-1, Awarded $1 Million DOE Metal Recovery Grant

Congrats to Jian Shi and Isabel Escobar, two Track-1 EPSCoR recruits from our Bioeconomy project (2014-2018), on their new U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) grant at the University of Kentucky. Shi is leading a group that will spearhead innovative methods to recover valuable metals from discarded devices and industrial waste. A perfect example of how …

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Another testament to the connective power of KY NSF EPSCoR.

The National Institutes of Health grant titled, Radon on the RADAR, is a project led by Nursing Professor Stacy Stanifer, PhD, APRN, AOCNS and UK EES PhD student Donna Robinson, GIT of the Kentucky Geological Survey. It seeks to analyze soil processes and characteristics that correlate to high radon values indoors. A key factor in …

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KGS, Project 2 Unveils State-of-the-Art Lab for Flood Modeling Research

Taken from the KGS Website: https://www.uky.edu/KGS/news/2025_2_3_SPaM.php The Kentucky Geological Survey (KGS) opened a new computational lab on the third floor of the Mining and Mineral Resources Building in January 2025. The Surface Processes and Modelling Laboratory (SP&M Lab) was funded by the NSF EPSCoR ‘Climate Resilience through Multidisciplinary Big Data Learning, Prediction & Building Response …

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