Research Programs
The Institute’s research programs explore the interfaces between human culture and ecological systems, with a particular focus on land and water. Our work contributes to integrative practices and bodies of knowledge that advance human understanding and use of complex systems. As an interdisciplinary domain, a complex systems research approach to problem-solving draws contributions from many different fields, including the social and natural sciences, such as anthropology, sociology, economics, psychology, biology, and other fields including nonlinear dynamics and network theory.
StudyTank
Led by Catherine Ingraham, PhD., and Frank Miller, Wright-Ingraham’s StudyTank program promotes multi-sector research and resilient design at the interface of environmental science, policy, law, environment, and complex systems. StudyTank’s current work is anchored in the American West, but the program’s method and scope are operational in a range of geographical contexts.
Explore StudyTank’s Colorado River Basin Project and our Drought Interfaces visualization tool
StudyTank’s Drought Interfaces web app is designed as an interactive tool that enables users to explore layers of data related to drought in the region. Users can visualize water rights geographically and analyze them in relation to stream flow and rights allocations. They can also view tribal lands in relation to cities, eco-regions, and aqueducts, and engage in scenario planning for potential future challenges, such as hydro-electric system losses or deadpool circumstances.
Read the 2021-22 report “What is Drought?”
Analyzing the drought in the Southwestern U.S. thus involves hard science, socio-political and policy issues unique to the formation of federal and state institutions, tribal land histories, common law settlement laws and legislation, the status of rights and property, the use of natural resources, managerial systems, construction of physical structures, and speculative research related to climate change. Read this position paper for the StudyTank team that led to the creation of the Drought Interfaces visualization tool that aims to create an intuitive understanding of water rights in the Colorado River Basin.
Nexus of Land and Water
Learn about our 2024 collaborative research project on Dust-on-Snow in the San Juan Mountains (Colorado)
Nexus of Land and Water: Southwest Initiative on Land Health and Water Resources, convened in partnership with the Mountain Studies Institute, brought together researchers, on-the-ground practitioners, professionals, and scholars in hydrology, agronomy, soil science, agriculture, range management, education, community leadership, and design fields, to generate creative solutions addressing the issue of dust-on-snow in the San Juan Mountains, and communities and ecosystems that depend on them.