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Biography
Dr. Khristopher Nicholas is an interdisciplinary food systems scientist with a focus on human-environment interactions. Beyond understanding how climate change and other environmental stressors shape human (and planetary) health, he seeks to understand the bi-directional relationship of human behavior as both adaptive and reactive. He employs mixed methodologies to assess empirical measures of planetary health alongside subjective measures that emphasize community, traditional ecological knowledge, and lived experience.
Khristopher’s research agenda is driven by the following two interrelated objectives:
- A methodological objective to link social and ecological systems by assessing the role of human behavior in environment-diet relationships.
- An equity-driven focus on climate vulnerability in settings that reflects the pitfalls of a global food system built on colonialism and institutional disenfranchisement.
Khristopher’s overarching research objective is to identify—and ultimately reinforce—new and existing strategies that foster resilience in climate-vulnerable settings. Reflecting his own upbringing in the Caribbean, much of his prior work builds on collaboration with communities practicing smallholder farming and small-scale fishing in climate vulnerable small island settings such as the Galápagos islands of Ecuador and in southwestern Madagascar.
As assistant professor in the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, Khristopher intends to continue his global health collaborations that foster sustainability of community-led interventions and expand to include a focus on immigrant farming and fishing communities in the United States. Khristopher’s non-academic loves include cycling, motorcycles, science fiction novels, his cats, and cooking.