Dr. Paul Bertsch, Director

Colleagues,

Grand environmental challenges facing the global community are complex and multifaceted and directly or indirectly influence human health and well-being. Adequately addressing these challenges to maximize biodiversity, maintain/restore ecosystem integrity, and avoid detrimental effects on human health and well-being will require major breakthroughs in science and technology for developing and promoting sustainable development, alternate energy sources and usage, and measures for managing known and emerging environmental contaminants. These breakthroughs along with development and implementation of strategies for addressing these challenges will require novel interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches requiring expertise from all traditional academic disciplines. Through a novel cross college institute, the Institute of Sustainability and the Environment (ISE), the University of Kentucky is committed to adopting recommendations of the National Academy of Sciences report on facilitating interdisciplinary research, to leverage and augment existing strengths in environmental science and policy and develop a flexible world class organization poised to address the grand environmental challenges.

I hope you enjoy visiting our web site. Please feel free to contact us for a visit to the University and the Institute at any time.

Respectfully,

Paul Bertsch, Ph.D.
Director
Tracy Farmer Institute for Sustainability and the Environment