The people who make LandPKS

Our Team

Jeff Herrick

Global Lead

Laura Hamrick

Communications & Research Coordinator

Maximilian Contreras

Program Specialist

Ciaran Kenny

Lead Programmer

Sabina Maniak

Research Assistant

Jonathan Maynard

Soil Scientist

George Peacock

Rangeland Scientist

Lilian Ndungu

RCMRD Liaison

Jason Neff

Modelling Lead

David Kimiti

Technical Advisor

Travis Nauman

Technical Advisor

Jason Karl

Technical Advisor

Terri Schulz

Advisor

Tegan May

Advisor

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Jeff Herrick

Global Lead

Jeff is a soil scientist with the USDA Agricultural Research Service in Las Cruces, New Mexico and holds adjunct faculty appointments at New Mexico State University and Colorado University Boulder. His research focuses on the factors that control the resistance and resilience of dryland ecosystems, and he has developed a number of inventory, assessment, monitoring and knowledge management tools that are applied at plot to national scales. He serves as an advisor to US government agencies on increasing return on investments in rangeland monitoring and assessment, is a member of the International Resources Panel, and is the US Government’s science representative to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD). His international work also includes collaboration with scientists, land managers, and development organizations in over 20 countries spanning humid tropical to dry temperate ecosystems.

Laura Hamrick

Communications & Research Coordinator

Laura Hamrick is the Communications & Research Coordinator for LandPKS; she coordinates training and communications efforts, as well as conducting research on soil texture. Laura is passionate about communicating complex and technical topics to non-experts in an understandable way. In her previous and other current roles, Laura has taught technology to middle and high school students and managed training and outreach about digital accessibility at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Maximilian Contreras

Program Specialist

Maximilian is a program specialist and local coordinator for LandPKS based in Las Cruces, NM. His main roles are coordinating team communication and projects, database management, providing administrative and user support, managing app development, and website maintenance. He holds a BA in Music and Theater, and a background in media library management.

Ciaran Kenny

Lead Programmer

Ciaran Kenny is the lead programmer for LandPKS. He has ten years experience architecting, developing and managing full life cycle of software and technology for a variety of web, mobile, e-commerce, middleware and database systems. Five years experience working with customers to define, scope and estimate projects, and providing training and consulting services to bring new clients up to speed. Proven background building and managing technical teams, and adaptable to a variety of technologies, industries, situations and audiences. He has a PhD in Numerical Modeling and BEng in Electrical Engineering. As the Director of Web Technology for Gaiam (2010-2016), he built an app development team that deployed two top ten Apps in the iTunes Health and Fitness category.

Sabina Maniak

Research Assistant

Sabina is a graduate student in CU Boulder’s Masters of the Environment program, studying Resilience and Sustainability. Her capstone work focuses on equity and community resilience research in wind energy development with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Her career interests center around equitable resilience and adaptation development in the context of anthropogenic climate change. Before starting at CU, she worked in app design and development, and ran a nonprofit focused on advocacy and accessibility work in international climate policy, attending several UNFCCC meetings internationally. She holds a BA in Linguistics from Washington University in St. Louis.

Jonathan Maynard

Soil Scientist

Jonathan is a research ecologist with the USDA Agricultural Research Service in Las Cruces, NM. He holds a Ph.D. is Soils and Biogeochemistry and a M.S. in Soil Science from the University of California, Davis. Jonathan’s current research is focused on the use of remote sensing and spatial modeling techniques to quantify and predict patterns and processes of human-affected ecosystem change. His research strives to generate management relevant information and novel technologies to assist national land resource monitoring programs. Jonathan is currently working to develop new techniques for the synthesis and delivery of ecological site information for LPKS.

George Peacock

Rangeland Scientist

George has Master of Science in Range Science from Texas Tech University and a Bachelor of Science in Range Management from Sul Ross State University. He has worked as a rangeland management specialist for USDA-NRCS at the field, area, state, and national level. George has experience in natural resource databases, requirements analysis, design and testing of web services for several resource conservation projects. He is currently working on development of a land capability classification module for LandPKS.

Lilian Ndungu

RCMRD Liaison

Lilian has a Masters of Science in Geographic Information Systems and a Bachelors of Science in Business Information Technology. Based in Kenya, her role is to liaise with local, national and regional organizations in Kenya and Namibia to obtain datasets that will help populate LandPKS global inputs.

Jason Neff

Modeling Lead

Jason is the modeling lead for LandPKS. He is an Associate Professor in the Environmental Studies program at CU Boulder where he also directs the undergraduate program in Environmental Studies. His research area is in biogeochemistry with a focus on a diverse array of subjects ranging from studies of the carbon cycle to atmospheric mineral aerosols. Through all these areas, Neff’s primary interest is in how human activities influence the movement of nutrients and material through the Earth System and the impacts of changing biogeochemical cycles on both natural ecosystems and human society. He has served in a wide variety of roles at the University of Colorado and nationally and has authored over 80 scientific publications and a forthcoming introductory environmental science digital text titled ‘A Changing Planet: the Science of Sustainability’. Neff speaks frequently to the media and public on the topic of land use change and dust storms in the deserts of the western US and has served on advisory panels for a wide variety of organizations including the US DOE, NASA, NSF, NCEAS, and other international science agencies. Professor Neff received his BA in Biology from The University of Colorado at Boulder (1993) and a Ph.D. in Biology from Stanford University (1999).

David Kimiti

Technical Advisor

David has a PhD from New Mexico State University and his dissertation looks at the utility of LandPKS in rangeland restoration and management in Eastern Africa. He also holds a Master of Science degree in Range Ecology and a Bachelors of Science degree in Range Management from the University of Nairobi in Kenya. David is broadly experienced in natural resource management in Eastern African rangelands and spent three years working at Mpala Research Center and Wildlife Foundation in Laikipia, Kenya. His experiences include rangeland health assessment and monitoring, rangeland restoration, and elephant conservation. David’s area of focus was on use of land-potential knowledge for the restoration of degraded rangelands, with special consideration to developing and evaluating methods that reduce bare ground cover and promote conservation of resources in a cost effective manner.

Travis Nauman

Technical Advisor

Travis is a soil scientist with the US Geological survey in Moab, Utah with a PhD in Plant and Soil Science from West Virginia University and M.S. from University of Arizona in Soil and Water Science. His work generally encompasses the role of soils in ecosystem responses to different drivers of change. He has pioneered new methods to improve soil surveys using remote sensing and spatial modeling to meet needs of land management decision support systems. He has also worked in development and interpretation of natural resources inventory and monitoring programs with a wide variety of public, private, non-profit, and academic entities to help integrate data-driven research into land management frameworks emphasizing soil processes, site potential frameworks, and erosion mitigation. Travis has worked across the southwestern United States, Appalachian Mountains, and in parts of China to integrate field assessments of soil and vegetation into agricultural, rangeland, and forest management plans.

Jason Karl

Technical Advisor

Jason is a research ecologist with the USDA Agricultural Research Service in Las Cruces, New Mexico with a PhD in Fisheries and Wildlife and Environmental Science and Public Policy from Michigan State University. His research focuses on the applications of geographic information systems (GIS), remote sensing and ecological informatics to sustainable land management. Jason has 20 years of experience in conservation planning, spatial analysis and natural resource monitoring with the ARS, The Nature Conservancy, and other NGOs. He currently works extensively with the Bureau of Land Management, Natural Resource Conservation Service, and other U.S. federal agencies on the development and implementation of techniques, tools and strategies for land health monitoring. Jason is the developer and principal investigator for the JournalMap and Landscape Toolbox projects.

Terri Schulz

Advisor

Terri Schulz is a Senior Conservation Ecologist for the Colorado Nature Conservancy. She is working on integrating biodiversity habitat information into LandPKS. Terri is a science leader in conservation land management in Colorado and works with ranchers on improved management and conservation outcomes. She also leads large-scale conservation planning efforts and has trained Nature Conservancy, students, and partner staff in the Rocky Mountains as well as in Thailand, Kenya, Mongolia, China and India. Terri also is a conservation coach serving on the executive board for the Conservation Coaches Network and Conservation Measures Partnership. Terri earned a B.S. in Wildlife Biology and a M.S. in Range Ecology from Colorado State University.

Tegan May

Advisor

Tegan is a Conservation Program Associate at The Nature Conservancy, Colorado, based in Boulder, CO. She works closely with the LandPKS team creating two new modules for the app; habitat and utilization. The work is funded by an NRCS Conservation Innovation Grant. Tegan has a background in ecology, land management, agriculture and project management. Hailing from Australia, Tegan has also worked in conservation for more than 10 years, including 5 years in Canada and the US. She holds an MS in Conservation and Wildlife Science and a BS in Marine Science from Murdoch University, Australia.

The people who make LandPKS

Our Team

Jeff Herrick

Laura Hamrick

Maximilian Contreras

Ciaran Kenny

Sabina Maniak

Jonathan Maynard

George Peacock

Lilian Ndungu

Jason Neff

David Kimiti

Travis Nauman

Jason Karl

Terri Schulz

Tegan May

LandPKS in the Field

Mobile App

LandPKS at your Desk

Data Portal

Get News and Updates

Jeff Herrick

Global Lead

Laura Hamrick

Communications & Research Coordinator

Maximilian Contreras

Program Specialist

Ciaran Kenny

Lead Programmer

Sabina Maniak

Research Assistant

Jonathan Maynard

Soil Scientist

George Peacock

Rangeland Scientist

Lilian Ndungu

RCMRD Liaison

Jason Neff

Modeling Lead

David Kimiti

Technical Advisor

Travis Nauman

Technical Advisor

Jason Karl

Technical Advisor

Terri Schulz

Advisor

Tegan May

Advisor