Katherine Hegewisch is a project scientist at the University of California Merced, where she is an applied researcher in the Applied Climate Science Lab. She helps to maintain large climate datasets (past observations, forecasts and future projections) and develops web tools to improve the accessibility of climate data. She is a lead developer of the Climate Toolbox, an online suite of over 20 web tools which provide climate and hydrology summaries on maps and graphs to inform decision making related to heat stress, drought, agriculture and wildfire danger. Hegewisch earned her B.S from California State University Chico, and her M.S. and PhD from Washington State University. The data and tools she helps develop have been used in National Climate Assessments and in peer-reviewed scientific publications and are used every day by decision makers to monitor the climate.