Sustainability and Conservation Science Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania in partnership with The Nature Conservancy 

Deadlines for 2027: 

• Preliminary Eligibility Inquiries due by January 8, 2027

  • Application portal will open on December 1, 2026

• Full applications from selected applicants will be due January 29, 2027

PROGRAM GOALS

This postdoctoral fellowship program aims to bridge the excellence in academic research at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) and in conservation practice at The Nature Conservancy (TNC) to address climate and sustainability challenges, while creating a new generation of sustainability and conservation leaders who combine the rigor of academic science with real-world application.

Penn and TNC share a commitment to addressing climate change and related sustainability challenges through science-based solutions, innovation, and collaboration. Climate change is deeply interconnected with human and environmental well-being, economic prosperity, access to clean and reliable energy, food and water security, biodiversity, and community resilience. Meeting these challenges requires expertise that spans the natural and social sciences, engineering, business, policy, communications, and conservation. It also requires connecting world-class research with opportunities for testing, implementation, and real-world impact to advance a more sustainable and resilient future for people and the planet.

The specific program goals are to:

• Invest in the talent and leadership potential of a new generation of sustainability and conservation leaders. 
• Recruit outstanding scientists whose diverse academic pathways, lived experiences, and perspectives enhance creativity, discovery, and innovation.
• Support innovative, impact-oriented research that advances both scientific knowledge and TNC's conservation priorities. 
• Provide fellows and the broader Penn research community with opportunities to engage directly with conservation practitioners and real-world environmental challenges.

Postdoctoral Fellows will be supported annually with a $70,000 stipend and benefits, a $10,000 research fund, and up-to $2,000 for professional travel. A one-time relocation reimbursement of up-to $2,000 is also available. Fellows will be eligible for support for up-to two consecutive years.

For the 2027 round of applications, the project areas and Penn faculty/TNC Scientist mentor teams participating are:

Project Area 1: Mapping Airscapes for Wildlife-Compatible Wind Energy Development

Wind-energy siting decisions are typically informed by wind resources, engineering constraints, and terrestrial habitat features, but largely overlook the atmospheric pathways and turbulence patterns that influence wildlife movement. Turbines can alter local airflow, atmospheric mixing, and turbulence, potentially affecting birds, bats, insects, and other airborne ecological processes. We are seeking a candidate to develop methods to map and characterize these “airscapes” and examine how they may be altered by turbine placement. Developing an airscape framework that links atmospheric processes, wildlife movement, and turbine-induced turbulence could support more wildlife compatible wind energy siting while advancing both biodiversity conservation and clean energy goals.

Candidates should have a Ph.D. in ecology or wildlife biology, mechanical engineering, atmospheric science, environmental engineering, or a related field. The ideal candidate will have experience with atmospheric boundary-layer processes, fluid mechanics, turbulence, microclimate research, statistical modeling, geospatial analysis, or large environmental and ecological datasets. Experience with wildlife movement, animal tracking, sensor-based data, remote sensing, wind-energy development, machine learning, or spatial decision-support tools would also be valuable. 

Mentor team: Dr. Liz Kalies and Prof. Nathan Wei

Project Area 2: From Climate Risk to Resilience: Adaptation Pathways in the Global South

Climate change is increasing risks to people, livelihoods, and ecosystems across the Global South, yet systematic and comparable evidence remains limited on how societies respond to climate stressors and which adaptation strategies reduce vulnerability and build resilience. We are seeking a candidate to investigate what drives adaptation, what works, where, and under what conditions. Doing so could help identify pathways from climate risk to resilience and provide a stronger evidence base for targeting adaptation and conservation investments. This collaboration can connect large-scale empirical research at Penn with real-world conservation and adaptation practices at TNC to create a platform for a postdoc to develop research questions at the intersection of climate hazards, human responses, adaptation, and resilience, with flexibility to determine the most promising geographies, datasets, methods, and questions as the research develops.

Candidates should have a strong background in climate science, climate adaptation, environmental science, geography, sustainability science, or a related field. The ideal candidate will have strong quantitative and analytical skills, experience with geospatial analysis or statistical modeling, and an interest in interdisciplinary research connecting environmental change with human responses, vulnerability, adaptation, and resilience. Experience with machine learning, causal inference, predictive modeling, natural-language or text-based datasets, nature-based solutions, adaptation planning, or research in the Global South would be especially valuable. 

Mentor team: Prof. Irina Marinov and Dr. Nicholas Wolff

Project Area 3: A Digital Twin for Smarter, Greener Stormwater Decisions in Philadelphia

Cities such as Philadelphia increasingly experience flooding when intense rainfall, high river flows, and elevated tides coincide, with these risks amplified by sea-level rise. Current high-resolution flood models can capture these interacting processes but are too computationally demanding to rapidly evaluate the many combinations of green stormwater infrastructure, storage, and smart controls available to planners. We are seeking a candidate to develop an intervention-aware digital twin that combines Penn’s compound flood model with machine-learning surrogates and TNC’s experience in adaptive stormwater control. The resulting open and validated tool will help cities evaluate and prioritize green, gray, and smart-control interventions for flood-risk reduction and equity and would provide Brightstorm with a transferable surrogate-modeling and digital-twin method for scaling smart watershed management to other cities.

Candidates should have a Ph.D. in civil or environmental engineering, hydrology, earth or atmospheric science, mechanical engineering, fluid dynamics, applied mathematics, or a related quantitative field. The ideal candidate will have experience with physics-based flood, hydrodynamic, or hydrologic-hydraulic modeling; strong scientific programming skills, preferably in Python; and experience with large spatiotemporal datasets and high-performance or GPU computing. Experience with machine learning for physical or environmental systems, compound or urban flooding, geospatial analysis, uncertainty quantification, open-source software, stakeholder engagement, or equity analysis would also be valuable. 

Mentor team: Prof. Hugo Ulloa and Mr. Matthew Rea

IDEAL CANDIDATE PROFILE

Ideal candidates for this fellowship are outstanding early-career scientists or engineers who seek to advance their research while addressing complex challenges at the intersection of climate, conservation, sustainability, technology, and society. Successful applicants will be intellectually curious, collaborative, and motivated to translate scientific discovery into real-world solutions that advance environmental sustainability, resilience, biodiversity conservation, and human well-being. We welcome applications from candidates with a broad range of academic backgrounds, experiences, perspectives, and career pathways whose contributions will enrich the fellowship community and strengthen interdisciplinary approaches to environmental problem-solving.

Applicants must have completed all requirements for their doctoral degree by the fellowship start date, and their PhD must have been awarded no more than three years prior to the application deadline. Fellows are expected to begin their appointment by September 1, 2027.

HOW TO APPLY

Applications for the 2027 Penn-TNC Sustainability and Conservation Science Postdoctoral Fellowship will follow a two-stage process.

Step 1: Preliminary Eligibility Inquiry (Required)

Prospective applicants must first submit a preliminary eligibility inquiry by January 8, 2027. This initial review will assess eligibility for the fellowship program and help identify alignment between applicants' interests and the available project teams. Preliminary eligibility inquiries must be submitted through SurveyMonkey Apply. A link to the application portal will be posted on this page when the application period opens.

Applicants will be asked to provide:

• A current curriculum vitae (CV).
• A brief statement describing (<350 words): 
  • Why the applicant is interested in the Penn-TNC Sustainability and Conservation Science Postdoctoral Fellowship.
  • How their background, expertise, and career goals align with the fellowship's mission.
  • Which project team(s) they are most interested in joining and why.

Following an initial eligibility review, materials from eligible applicants will be shared with the relevant project teams for consideration. Project teams will review the applicant pool and identify candidates with whom they are interested in developing a full fellowship proposal.

Deadline for preliminary eligibility inquiries: January 8, 2027

Step 2: Proposal Development and Full Application

Applicants selected by a project team will be invited to work collaboratively with the team to develop a full fellowship proposal. Detailed instructions for preparing and submitting the full application will be provided at that time.

Because fellowship awards are made to applicant-project team partnerships, submission of a preliminary eligibility inquiry does not guarantee an invitation to submit a full application.

Deadline for full applications: January 29, 2027

Our Current Sustainability and Conservation Science Postdoctoral Fellows

Past Fellows