Research Spotlight: Ally Jacoby

Welcome to our first early career research spotlight of 2026! Today we are highlighting Ally Jacoby, a PhD student at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities working in one of the most remote environments in the world: the tropical glaciers and páramo ecosystems of Ecuador. This unique region has thick peatlands that hold some of the highest carbon stocks in the world, and, despite lying near the equator, has mountains so tall that they bear glaciers. In fact, the equator runs directly through the Cayambe Volcano, the mountain that Ally focuses on in her work. Atop Cayambe Volcano sits the aptly-named Hermoso (“Beautiful”) Glacier, whose meltwaters Indigenous Andean communities living in the valleys of the volcano depend on for their water and way of life. 

As global temperatures steadily rise under climate change, the Hermoso Glacier, which used to fill an entire glacial valley, has retreated upslope alarmingly fast — the canary in the coal mine for the devastating effects of climate change. Ecuador’s glaciers have lost an approximated 30-50% of their mass over the past few decades according to Ecuador’s National Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology (INAMHI). Ally Jacoby’s PhD thesis centers around studying the effects of this glacial retreat on the hydrology and carbon cycling of this fragile region — while working with Indigenous communities directly affected by this environmental injustice.

Ally in front of the Hermoso Glacier, the glacier on top of Volcán Cayambe which supplies vital water resources to downstream Indigenous agrarian communities. Only a couple of decades ago, within the lifetime of some Cayambe community members, the Hermoso Glacier used to fill the valley behind her. 

Thank you for taking the time to share your experience with current early career researchers in hydrologic science! Could you introduce yourself and your research focus?

Hi! I’m Ally Jacoby, I’m a PhD candidate studying Hydrogeology at the University of Minnesota in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Department. I grew up in rural, northern Wisconsin and have always been drawn to waterways, spending many summer days canoeing and hanging out at the Namekagon River, which is a tributary of the St. Croix River, which is a tributary of the Mississippi River! I’m currently nearing the end of my PhD program, and when I’m not in the field or analyzing data, I like biking around Minneapolis, trying new coffee shops, and checking out local music. Throughout my PhD, I’ve been part of an interdisciplinary research team that is broadly interested in characterizing climate change impacts in the data-sparse glacierized tropics, particularly the downstream impacts of tropical glacier retreat. I quantify the hydrological and hydrochemical impact of glacier retreat and landcover change in a watershed located in the Ecuadorian Andes Mountains. I collaborate with scientists from across the U.S. and Ecuador, in addition to working with Indigenous Kichwa community partners in Ecuador.

How did you end up in the field of hydrology? What or who inspired you to be a scientist?

My initial interest in pursuing an advanced degree in environmental sciences was inspired by my environmentally-conscious parents, who have always done everything they can to reduce their carbon footprints. This, paired with my love for the waterways of the Midwest US, compelled me to pursue a bachelor’s degree in Environmental Science from Purdue University, with the ultimate goal of obtaining a career related to water conservation.

While completing my undergraduate degree, I was fortunate enough to be involved in research opportunities with a number of supportive mentors. For my first big research experience, I traveled to Peru as part of Purdue’s Discovery Undergraduate Interdisciplinary Research Internship (DUIRI), where my research project focused on identifying the presence of heavy metals in soils from a heavily-managed, arid agricultural site. While hydrology was not the focus of this project, this experience enabled me to learn about water resource management in a water-stressed environment, which reinforced my interest in hydrology. 

When I began looking into graduate school programs, I was undecided about whether to pursue MS or PhD. However, I found a research profile of my now-PhD advisor, Dr. Crystal Ng, and her pursuit of ethical, community-driven science made me realize I wanted to follow a similar track and was ultimately why I decided on a PhD program. 

Ally trekking to one of the discharge stations deployed in the base of the glacier by her research group. 

You integrate both field sampling and numerical modeling into your PhD research. Which of those came first, and why did you ultimately decide to pursue both?

Tropical glaciers are unique and understudied compared to their higher latitude counterparts, so one of the motivations for conducting research in the tropical glacierized Andes was to increase hydrometeorological monitoring in a data-sparse region. Our research team started out by collecting continuous records of meteorological and hydrologic variables, and these data have been helpful in developing a baseline understanding of the drivers of streamflow and solute export in this region. 

In my research, I explore land cover change impacts on a small, partially glacierized headwater catchment, where glacier melt is a major contributor to streamflow. I use the multi-year hydrometeorological data collected by our team to constrain a numerical watershed model called Flux-PIHM, which represents the physics governing water fluxes across a landscape. Using this model, I simulate the major processes controlling streamflow generation so that the model-simulated streamflow matches our present-day field observations. Upon validating the model, I test catchment-level changes in meteorology and landcover to predict how streamflow dynamics would respond to potential future land cover distributions or conditions driven by climate change. 

So in summary, both the field data collection and numerical modeling are important and interrelated: the field monitoring helps characterize the ecosystem in the present-day and constrain the numerical model results, and the numerical model helps explain the physical processes driving our environmental observations and can be used as a tool for predicting streamflow response to environmental change. 

Measuring water temperature, pH, and electrical conductivity in one of the fingers of melt gushing from beneath Hermoso Glacier. These tiny streams hold the water that sustains downstream Kichwa communities, buffering their water resources during periods of low precipitation.

How has working with Andean Indigenous communities impacted your research and awareness of social issues in the hydrology community/to water access generally? How do you think you will take the lessons you learned in your PhD into your future career?

Spending time in Ecuador has underscored to me that the effects of climate and environmental change are intersectional. On a national scale, I’ve observed Indigenous communities across Ecuador continually lead the fight for environmental protections, from the Amazon to the Andes, while also facing some of the most immediate consequences of resource extraction and climate change. Our research team collaborates closely with Kichwa communities, and they remind me that environmental change is a multi-faceted issue that impacts not only the physical environment but is also tied to change and loss in culture, languages, and ways of life.

Working with our community partners has solidified my interest in pursuing community-centered environmental research in my future career. The project that I’m currently part of has been a wonderful example of community-driven research based in trust and respect for people and the environment. I’ve learned that conducting ethical environmental research (particularly when it is fieldwork-based) must be predicated on the establishment of intentional relationships between academic and community partners prior to starting fieldwork in a given setting. Part of the relationship-building process includes holding ongoing conversations between the visiting academic team and community members to continuously assess the expectations and constraints for the research methodologies and outcomes, which ensures that a reciprocal relationship is maintained. Our team has worked closely with our community partners to develop culturally-informed research protocols, which guide our actions when visiting their lands, handling data, and communicating results back to community partners. I’ve found that honoring relationships within a research collaboration strengthens the scientific outcomes while also increasing the societal impact of the work by grounding the research in the lived-experiences of local communities. 

Working with Kichwa community members to download data from one of the many sensors deployed around the watershed. Ally and her advisor, Dr. Crystal Ng, are part of the interdisciplinary research team that has collected the first on-the-ground measurements of temperature, precipitation, and solar radiation in Cayambe in partnership with local community members. 

If you had to soap box to the hydrology community about any issue in hydrology/environmental justice, what would you say?

Throughout graduate school, I’ve become increasingly aware of the colonial histories behind the field of geology and land-grant institutions. I’ve come to realize that geoscience curricula and university messaging often rely on revisionist histories that omit the role that both geologic mapping/extraction and the Morrill Act of 1862 (which allocated millions of acres of land to establish land-grant universities across the United States) played in the dispossession of Indigenous lands through coercion and violence. Becoming aware of these histories has highlighted for me the importance of reflecting upon one’s own positionality within an institution. As scientists, we should ask ourselves, “How do I fit into the context/history of my institution and the land I work upon, and how may I be unintentionally perpetuating colonialism in my research or teaching?”. Personally, I’ve learned a lot from the TRUTH (Towards Recognition and University-Tribal Healing) Report, a collaborative research report led by the 11 federally recognized tribes in present-day Minnesota, which details the erased histories of tribal-university relations and outlines recommendations for how the University of Minnesota can be in better relation with Indigenous peoples moving forward. 

As hydrologists, our work is inextricably linked to land and people, and therefore I feel that it is our responsibility to learn the history of our institutions and our field sites as a first step in approaching research from an environmental justice-centered framework. For this reason, I encourage all scientists to learn and reflect upon the unique histories of their own institutions and communities.