Cool Trees Team | Ghosh Lab

Last updated date

12:41pm

The Cool Trees team's goal is to create heat-adaptive tree planting scenarios to reduce heat-related health outcomes through a transdisciplinary approach and community engagement. Please see the Resources page for community-facing materials.

Our project has the following goals:

1. Model tree identification and climate data to create a tree-enhanced urban climate model (TE-UCM) for NYC

2. Using the TE-UCM, examine the relationships between trees and heat-related health outcomes using epidemiological methods

3. Explore the practical considerations of urban foresters and values and preferences of community leaders through qualitative interviews

4. With both the scientific modeling and multistakeholder input, analyze tree planting scenarios of tree species configurations that both best reduce heat-related health outcomes and improve environmental justice

Graphic depicting the project aims. On the left side it shows two aims under the category "Relating Trees to Heat Risk" and two under "Stakeholder Engagement" to ultimately produce tree planting scenarios

We have a multidisciplinary team with researchers across institutions.

Arnab Ghosh, M.D., MSc MA (PI) – Physician-scientist with expertise in environmental epidemiology, health services research and causal inference methods

Daniel Katz, Ph.D. (Co-I) – Plant Ecologist and Environmental Health Scientist with expertise in remote sensing, urban plant distributions, and use of tree datasets

David Miller, Ph.D. (Post-Doc) – Ecosystem and Remote Sensing Scientist focused on climate, trees, and built-in environment across various scales

Qi Li, PhD MS (Co-I) – Urban Climatologist, with expertise in environmental fluid mechanics and hydrology in the urban environment

Aalayna Rae Green, BS (Pre-Doc) – PhD Candidate in Cornell’s Department of Natural Resources, obtaining her training in intersectional studies in environmental and climate justice, gender, and conservation

Alexander Young, MS (Consultant) – Urban Forestry expert on secondment from the US Forestry Service, University of New Hampshire

Wenna Xi, Ph.D. (Co-I) – Biostatistician focused on spatial epidemiology, instructor at Weill Cornell Medical College

Olivia Keenan, BA (Research Assistant) – Works with Dr. Ghosh on climate and health portfolio, in addition to urban greening work; with Ms. Green helping lead community-focused work

Sarah Young, Ph.D. (Qualitative research expert) - Associate Professor of Social Work Research in Medicine at Weill Cornell with expertise in qualitative research methods and analysis

Fiona Lo, Ph.D. (Collaborator)– Climate scientist with the Environmental Defense Fund and has expertise in research that examines the human health impacts due to the warming climate and explores methods to reduce heat risk to vulnerable populations