Laura Musacchio

College of Design
Department of Landscape Architecture
612-626-0810
musac003@umn.edu

Laura Musacchio is an associate professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture at the University of Minnesota. She teaches landscape ecology and urban ecology for resilient and sustainable regions. Her classes include metropolitan landscape ecology, regreening minds, cities, and regions seminar, and the resilient cities and regions seminar. Her courses are interdisciplinary-oriented and attract students from many different majors. Her research bridges curiosity-driven empirical analysis and simulation research in sustainability science and land change science to applied place-making in urban design and planning.

Her current projects emphasize how to operationalize key concepts and research priorities for urban resilience and sustainability. At the Institute, she will work on how knowledge brokering can produce shared knowledge for enhancing the cultural dimension of ecosystem services. Her other research projects include guest editor of a special issue of Landscape Ecology called “Key Concepts and Research Priorities for Landscape Ecology” and a collaborative research study about how land use, settlement patterns, and the shapes of cities influence severe weather in the Great Plains region.

Musacchio is on the editorial boards of Landscape Ecology and Landscape and Urban Planning. In addition, she is active in the Conservation Biology program and is a member of its steering committee.

See Musacchio’s web page for more information.

BEYOND THE BIO

  • Fun Fact:
    I like good jokes.
  • Environmental Hero:
    The Buddha
  • Favorite Reads:
    Refuge by Terry Tempest Williams, The Sustainability Revolution by Andres Edwards, Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv, and The Hidden Connections by Fritjof Capra
  • Unusual Hobby:
    I like to ride horses bareback.
  • Interesting Experience:
    I learned how to kayak for the first time this summer.