What's next, Dr. Broadman?
Postdoctoral Affairs congratulates Dr. Ellie Broadman for being brought on to work for the US Geological Survey as an ecologist and data analyst. Broadman’s shift in Spring 2024 from her U of A postdoc position to the United States Geological Survey (USGS) has allowed her to start creating practical solutions for the future of forests in California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains, a departure from the more academic and retrospective research she had conducted as a postdoc.
One part of Broadman’s job with the USGS is to develop a tool that assesses fuel levels (i.e., anything that can burn in a wildfire) on the forest floor in the Sequoia/Kings Canyon National Parks. Her team looks at how drought affects these forests and monitors the accumulation of fuel on the forest floor. She is developing a model that will illustrate which areas of the park have the potential to burn at high intensity in future wildfires. Broadman collected field measurements for this geospatial model this past summer, leading a field crew through the southern Sierras.
Broadman described her postdoc experience at the U of A as a time of independence and responsibility. She fully tapped into the postdoc experience, mentoring undergraduates for a project funded by the Arizona Institute for Resilience, serving on grant panels, and researching drought histories and jetstream patterns through tree ring samples. Broadman was a College of Science Galileo Circle Awardee in 2024 in recognition of her exceptional research contributions. She expressed gratitude to Postdoctoral Affairs for the resources and funding she received, and is grateful for the welcoming community of postdocs on campus.
Although Broadman had felt the pressure to find work in academia, she was proactive in creating a path towards an applied ecological science career. When asked what advice she would give current postdocs, Broadman said, “Think about what you want, and ask for the resources to get you there.”
Check out our 2023 Postdoc Success Story about Dr. Broadman’s publication in Nature: https://postdoc.arizona.edu/news/postdoc-success-stories-dr-ellie-broadman