Chelsea Nagy is a terrestrial ecologist and biogeochemist with a PhD from Brown University in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. She is the Deputy Director for ESIIL, an NSF-funded synthesis center, where she identifies strategic science initiatives, builds partnerships with others in the environmental data science network, and oversees the planning and coordination for key programs and events. She studies drivers of global change (e.g., land use change, climate change) and consequences for ecosystem structure, function, and composition. One of her current research projects explores the role of grass invasion and wildfire on ecological transformations and the impacts of this transformation on carbon storage in the North Central U.S. Chelsea is the founder of the North Central Regional Invasive Species and Climate Change (NC RISCC) network. The goal of the NC RISCC is to develop a community of researchers, managers, policymakers, and other stakeholders to improve management of invasive species in a changing climate.