<p>Margaret Torn</p>
The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) announced yesterday that Margaret Torn, an adjunct professor in the Energy and Resources Group and head of the Biosphere-Atmosphere Program at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, was elected to its ranks.
Election to the NAE is among the highest professional distinctions accorded to an engineer, and honors those who have made outstanding contributions to engineering practice, research, or education.
Torn is an ecologist and biogeochemist whose work focuses on carbon and nutrient cycling in terrestrial ecosystems and trace-gas flux between soil and atmosphere. With field experiments, elemental and isotopic measurements, and analytical modeling, she studies soil carbon, global change, and the impacts of human activities on ecosystem processes.
Torn’s NAE election commends her contributions to the understanding of soil carbon dynamics and her sustained leadership of the long-term monitoring of climate change.
Several other Berkeley faculty and alumni were included in the new cohort of NAE members, and all new members will be formally inducted during the NAE’s Annual Meeting on Oct. 5, 2025.