People

Luke D. Trusel, Ph.D.

Wilson Faculty Fellow in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences
Assistant Professor
Department of Geography
Penn State University

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Department profile

Prior to joining Penn State, I was an Assistant Professor at Rowan University, a Postdoctoral Scholar at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and a NASA Earth and Space Science Fellow during my PhD in Geography at Clark University.

Graduate students

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Mahsa Bahrami

PhD Student, Geography and Climate Science
2024 NASA FINESST Recipient

Mahsa completed her master’s degree in Climate and Environmental Sciences at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany, where her research focused on the evolution of supraglacial lakes using Sentinel-2 imagery in Greenland. At Penn State, her research focuses on the assessment of hydrological processes at the surface of the Antarctic ice sheet using remote sensing data.

Jessica Kromer

Ph.D. Candidate, Geography and Climate Science

Jess joined the group in 2020 after earning an M.A. in Geography from California State University - Los Angeles. For her master’s thesis research, Jess interned at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and used atmospheric reanalysis products and the Ice Sheet System Model to quantify surface mass balance for the Greenland ice sheet. At Penn State, Jess is studying cryosphere system interactions in the Antarctic using satellite remote sensing and other observational and modeled climate datasets.

Undergraduate Students

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Camilla Baumer

Major: Geography

Certificates: Geographic Information Science, Geospatial Big Data Analytics

Camilla’s research explores high-resolution digital elevation models as an indicator of surface hydrological dynamics in Antarctica.

Anton Fatula

Major: Environmental Resource Management

Minors: Climatology; Jazz Performance

Anton’s research is improving the understanding of the drivers of surface hydrological change on East Antarctica’s Amery ice shelf.

Join Us!

We are seeking a PhD student to join our group in Fall 2025. See the announcement on main page!

Prospective graduate and undergraduate students with interests in cryospheric sciences and joining our research group are encouraged to reach out about potential opportunities. Additional helpful information can also be found via the Department of Geography’s website on Graduate Degrees and the listing of faculty in our department. You may also be interested in reaching out to other cryosphere-interested faculty members, Dr. Shujie Wang in Geography, and affiliates of the Penn State Ice and Climate Research Center.

Former lab members

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Emma Robertson

Degree: M.S. Geography, 2023

Emma was a NSF Graduate Research Fellow Program (GRFP) recipient whose research focused on assessing the geochemical signatures of extreme precipitation events in West Antarctic ice cores. Since completing her M.S., Emma has moved on to pursuing a Ph.D. at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Germany.

Zhuolai Pan

Degrees: M.S. Geography, 2022; B.S., Earth Sciences, 2020

Zhuolai’s research focused on Antarctic surface hydrology and climate. Since completing his M.S., Zhuolai is now employed in the geospatial industry.

Leanne Cioffi

Degree: B.S., 2019
Major: Geographic Information Science
Minor: Geoscience

Cheyenne Rickabaugh

Degree: B.A., 2019
Major: Geography
Minors: Geoscience; Geographic Information Science