Robert B. Jackson

Robert Jackson is Michelle and Kevin Douglas Provostial Professor and Senior Fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment at and the Precourt Institute for Energy at Stanford University.

The Jackson lab examines the different ways that people affect the Earth. The lab members seek to produce the building blocks of basic scientific knowledge and to use that knowledge to guide policy solutions for global warming, energy extraction and other environmental issues. They’re currently examining the effects of climate change and droughts on forest mortality and grassland ecosystems. He studies a range of wildfire impacts, including those on the carbon cycle and soils. Recently they’ve also published the first studies looking at fracking and drinking water quality and mapped thousands of natural gas leaks across cities such as Boston, Manhattan and Washington, D.C.

As an author and photographer, Rob has published a trade book about the environment, The Earth Remains Forever, two books of children’s poems -- Animal Mischief and Weekend Mischief -- and also poems in the journals Southwest Review, Cortland Review, Cold Mountain Review, Atlanta Review, LitHub, and more. His photographs have appeared in many media outlets, including the NY Times, Washington Post, USA Today, US News and World Report, Science, Nature, and National Geographic News.