Our Team
Describe your team here.
Michael J. Puma is a Professor of Climate at Columbia University's Climate School. He is the Interim Director of the Food for Humanity Initiative and also the director of the Center for Climate Systems Research, working in close collaboration with NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies. He oversees a team of ~40 scientists and staff advancing research in climate science, space studies, and climate impact analysis. As Editor of Earth's Future (AGU), Prof. Puma focuses on global food security, human migration, and the interactions between water and climate.
His research explores how shocks—such as conflicts, extreme floods and droughts, volcanic eruptions, and policy changes—disrupt interconnected global food systems. He develops strategies to balance efficiency and resilience in these systems, providing pathways for both short- and long-term stability. Prof. Puma also studies the drivers of human migration, particularly when food and water scarcity arise from environmental change and conflict. Currently, he is developing an innovative approach that applies quantum probability theory to understand and prevent catastrophic cascades in global food systems, aiming to explain better the rapid shifts between cooperative and competitive behaviors observed in food trade networks during recent crises. His work delivers critical insights for policymakers addressing global food insecurity and humanitarian challenges. His research has been funded by major institutions including NASA, the European Commission, the US National Science Foundation, the US Department of Defense, DARPA, and the United Nations Development Programme.
Jochebed Louis-Jean is Associate Director of the Research Program on Sustainability Policy and Management at Columbia Climate School.
From 2010 to 2021, she worked for the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) at its headquarters in Rome as well as in Afghanistan, South Sudan, and Bangladesh. Her main areas of focus included emergencies, information management, monitoring and evaluation, and partnerships. Helping the organization report on its humanitarian and development operations led Jochebed to missions in Iraq and Senegal. Her last posts with WFP were in the office of its Executive Director and its New York office, working on events like the United Nations General Assembly. That decade with WFP underlined the concept of food as a human right and provided context for the many factors that can strain food systems, including conflict and climate change.
After leaving WFP and before joining Columbia, she worked for more than two years at Neon One, a software tech company, as project manager, helping community foundations around the country to build and maintain online fundraising platforms for giving days like Giving Tuesday.
Jochebed has a Master of Arts in International Relations from St John’s University’s Rome campus.