In 2013 Luke traveled to Siberia to shoot exploratory footage for a documentary about Pleistocene Park.  That is finished and avalable for streaming here via Vice Media.  Participant observation is a slippery slope.  Over the course of making the film Luke got more involved in Pleistocene Park that originally intended, first helping with a fundraiser, then helping transport bison across two continents.  With the documentary wrapping up Luke took on the project of first researching, then planning, and then developing a parallel research effort in Alaska.  

Luke grew up "off the grid" in rural Northern California and  got a degree in cultural anthropology at UC Santa Cruze.  He currently resides in Haines Alaska with his wife and daughter.  

​Kristy is an ecosystem ecologist who is generally interested in how to incorporate animals into current ecological paradigms. Presently, she exploring how animals impact their environments, including how animals interact with carbon and nitrogen cycles. She is also a conservation ethicist, where she examines how conservation considers and incorporates animals into decision-making. 

http://www.kristymferraro.com/ 

Jeff Welker has been studying Arctic plant & ecosystem ecology, biogeochemistry and biosphere-atmosphere interactions since his research activities at NyAlyesund, Svalbard and Abisko, Sweden started in 1990. His research program focuses on four themes: a) tundra plant and ecosystem structure and function now and in the future using the ITEX (International Tundra Experiment) program; b) the Arctic Water Isotope Cycle and sea ice controls on shifting patterns, sources and distribution of precipitation; c) terrestrial and marine food web processes focused on diets and space-use of wolves, polar bears, brown bears, caribou and reindeer and d) herbivore and climate effects on greenhouse gas emissions, sources and ages. Dr. Welker serves on the US Arctic Icebreaker Coordination Committee (AICC), the NSF Office of Polar Programs Advisory Committee and as the Arctic Research Advisory to the Chancellor at the University of Alaska Anchorage. He is convening a UArctic Congress 2018 session on caribou-reindeer-cultural practices and is leading a new project titled: “Pan Arctic Water Isotope Network” which was granted INTERACT remote access to research stations. The project involves colleagues from Iceland, Denmark, Greenland, Czech Republic, Poland, USA, Finland, UK, Canada and Norway.

Amongst many other things to do with environmental change in the Arctic, in our research lab we study the ability of animal activity to modulate the responses of vegetation to climate change and to engineer and modify habitats and niches, altering the properties of the Earth's surface and feeding back to climate. The large-scale effects of animals on vegetation –top-down effects– are only beginning to be understood and quantified.

We focus on the potential for large mammal herbivory to modulate the response of tundra vegetation to climate change and encompasses present observational and paleoecological data. This research line informs Nature-based solutions, rewilding, and the field of biodiversity conservation.

https://www.spri.cam.ac.uk/people/macias-fauria/

Climate change is altering biomes across the earth, but its effects have been most rapid and pronounced in the Arctic. Research in my lab focuses on understanding the ecological consequences of climate change in high latitude regions, primarily in the Arctic.

I strive to employ a "big picture" approach by studying effects of climate change on multiple components of arctic terrestrial ecosystems. This includes plants-both above and below ground-as well as animals, including insects, birds, and mammals. My lab places considerable emphasis on how interactions among component parts of terrestrial ecosystems are affected by climate change and how such interactions may feed back to climate. Understanding the effects of climate change in highly vulnerable and rapidly warming regions such as the Arctic can inform us of impacts to come at lower latitudes with further warming. This in turn can help shape wildlife conservation and climate change adaptation and mitigation efforts.

postecology.net/ 

Andrew finished his master's degree at Oxford University and in his PhD work at NAU he studies the role of animals on nutrient distribution using the madingley model and field studies.  He describes his research here.  Andrew just finished his PhD and has a Marie Curie fellowship based in Aarhus, Denmark.

Olya is the founder of Frost Methane Labs, a company that destroys continuous and concentrated methane emissions from unregulated sources. Olya is interested in large, under-addressed problems, which led her to methane and its strange—yet cumulatively significant—sources: permafrost methane vents, closed-down coal mines, and agricultural manure ponds.

Before Frost Methane Labs, Olya was a system architect at Zola Electric, building mini-grids in remote communities; a tech lead at Google X, developing early-stage climate projects in geothermal HVAC and long-duration storage; and a software team lead at Google Energy, focusing on smart grid technologies.

Olya is also the architect of the Diamond List and Cleantech Experts and a board member of Terraformation. She is a Mulago fellow, a kitesurfer, and speaks five languages.

Derek has lived at Mosquito Lake since 2008 and began working at TWC in 2017.  He studied Fish and Wildlife Biology at Montana State University, worked on a number of research projects over the years, mostly with birds, sometimes with fish, and two years with Yellowstone National Park bison.  Derek's primary motivator at TWC is the need to discover the ways that the human community here in the Chilkat Valley can continue to thrive, while also conserving the near-pristine natural environment with which we have been blessed.