LaurenÌýHerwehe

  • Ph.D. Student of Geography
  • Remote Sensing
  • Land Use Change
  • Climate Change
  • Data Science
  • Natural Resource Conflict
  • Political Geography
  • M.A. from University of Arizona, 2014
  • ENVIRONMENT-SOCIETY

Faculty Advisor:Ìý John O'Loughlin

Current ResearchÌý

My dissertation research is at the intersection of land use change, climate hazards, agricultural livelihood adaptations, and political geography. In the past 10 years, Mozambique has been impacted by three of the most devastating cyclones to ever hit the African continent, the worst drought in decades, and the onset of an armed conflict fueled by grievances over socioeconomic and political inequality. I aim to understand the mechanisms by which these multiple exposures--and agricultural adaptations to them--have led to agricultural land use change and disputes. I am doing this with a mixed-method comparative approach, using both remote sensing data and qualitative fieldwork to compare multiple provinces based on shock exposure and subsequent outcomes.

More Info

Outside of this research, I work at the NASA National Snow and Ice Data Center Distributed Active Archive Center (DAAC) where I am a Data Product Team Lead, leading a team that published all data coming from NASA Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) satellite mission as well as all NSIDC-produced data coming from the U.S. Department of Defense Special Sensor Microwave Imager/Sounder (SSMIS) satellite mission.

Recent Publications

  • Entekhabi, D., Yueh, S., Bindlish, R., Garcia, M., Entin, J., Colliander, A., Chaubell, M.J., Crow., W., Dunbar, R.S., Herwehe, L., et al. The NASA Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) Earth Observation Satellite Mission. Proceedings of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics EngineersÌý(in review).
  • Quarderer, Nathan, Wasser, Leah, Herwehe, Lauren, Gold, Anne U., Montaño, Patricia A., Halama, Katherine., Balch, Jennifer. Fostering the Development of Earth Data Science Skills in a Diverse Community of Online Learners: A Case Study of the Earth Data Science Corps. Journal of Statistics and Data Science Education (2024).
  • Mahood, Adam L., Joseph, Maxwell B., Spiers, Anna I., Koontz, Michael J., Ilangakoon, Nayani, Solvik, Kylen K., Quarderer, Nathan, McGlinchy, Joe, Scholl, Victoria M., St. Denis, Lise A., Nagy, Chelsea, Braswell, Anna, Rossi, Matthew W., Herwehe, Lauren, Wasser, Leah, Cattau, Megan E., Iglesias, Virginia, Yao, Fangfang, Leyk, Stefan, Balch, Jennifer K. Ten simple rules for working with high resolution remote sensing data. Peer Community Journal,(2023): 4(e4).
  • Wasser, Leah, Palomino, Jenny, Herwehe, Lauren, McGlinchy, Joe, Quarderer, Nathan, Balch, Jennifer, Joseph, Maxwell, Student Directed Learning in the Open Earth & Environmental Data Science Classroom. OSF Preprints, (2022). https://osf.io/preprints/osf/xdj4z
  • Herwehe, Lauren, and Scott, Christopher A. Drought adaptation and development: small-scale irrigated agriculture in northeast Brazil. Climate and Development 10.4 (2018): 337-346.
  • Lee, Ryan H., Herwehe, Lauren, and Scott, Christopher A. Integrating Local Users and Multitiered Institutions into the IWRM Process. Sustainability of Integrated Water Resources Management. Springer, Cham (2015): 365-386.
  • Herwehe, Lauren. Developing Alaska’s Oil and Gas Resources: How Should the U.S. Proceed? The Professional Geologist. November/December (2011): 15-16.

Updated April 2026