Alice Xu, an EII Faculty Fellow and assistant professor in Penn’s School of Social Policy and Practice, with a secondary appointment in the Dept. of Political Science, has published "Bureaucratic Backing in the Brazilian Amazon: How Political Competition Drives Deforestation" in the Journal of Politics (available here).  Also, Xu's dissertation "Segregation and the Spatial Externalities of Inequality: A Theory of Interdependence and Public Goods in Cities" won the Mancur Olson Best Dissertation in Political Economy award from the American Political Science Association.  

Image

Amrit Thapa, senior lecturer in the International Education Development Program (IEDP) in Penn’s Graduate School of Education (GSE), has received a 2-year grant by Penn Global (Holman African Research Engagement Fund), to support Climatic hazards, education and schooling in Sub Saharan Africa with co-PIs Jere Behrman and Emily Hannum from SAS/Population Studies Center, and Wendy Chan from Penn GSE. Thapa also presented as a guest speaker at the International Conference on Environment and Climate Action organized by Asian University of Women in Bangladesh in August 2025.

Penn SAS Anthropology professor and EII Faculty Fellow Mallika Sarma is profiled in a Penn Today article that shares how she is challenging what we think of as an extreme environment—beyond settings like low temperature or high altitude—and who gets studied.   

New research co-authored by EII Faculty Fellow Allison Lassiter of the Weitzman School of Design highlights the threat of salt contamination in water supplies—resulting from a combination of climate change and localized human impacts.  

Emily Falk, an EII Faculty Fellow and and vice dean of the Annenberg School for Communication, has, with colleagues including Allie Sinclair and Michael Mann, published a study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that examines why many U.S. adults who believe that climate change is happening are not motivated to make changes. Read more about the project's 'intervention tournament' in Penn Today. 

Julie Ellis, an EII Faculty Fellow and adjunct professor of pathobiology at Penn Vet — who will also serve as EII Interim Faculty Director for 2025-26 — is part of two projects that have been awarded Draw Down the Lightning grants. In collaboration with interdisciplinary teams, Julie will be working on the One Campus, One Health Certificate Program and Accessing Nature. Read more about each of these projects in Penn Today.

Chenyi Ma, research assistant professor in Penn’s School of Social Policy & Practice:
Pandemic Anxiety: How Job Loss, Food Insecurity, and Vaccination Shaped Mental Health 
Chenyi Ma, Tony E Smith, Dennis P Culhane 
The Journals of Gerontology Series B, February 2025, Oxford University Press (OUP) 
This study examines how job loss, food insecurity, and COVID-19 vaccination influenced anxiety levels, particularly among different racial and age groups, and what lessons can be applied to future disaster preparedness and response. 
Journal article: DOI: 10.1093/geronb/gbae181 
Plain-language Summary: https://www.growkudos.com/publications/10.1093%25252Fgeronb%25252Fgbae181/reader