The Who

As a self-diagnosed serial adventurer, Isabel R. Hilgendag has dedicated a life to pursuing her curiosities in exploring the world. As an avid outdoor and adventure enthusiast, Isabel has travelled to many different places and completed several lengthy solo expeditions. Some of these include: travelling across Europe and South America in her late teens and early 20’s, a 27,000 km road trip throughout North America, a 5-month hike from the Mexican border into Canada on the Pacific Crest Trail, and completing the 900-km Bruce Trail hike in just 18 days. In addition to travel and exploration, Isabel has also opted for unconventional lifestyle choices when possible, such as experiencing vanlife when she chose to live in her 2004 GMC Savana van while completing her Master of Science degree.

In addition to her self-directed explorations, Isabel seeks to further understand our world through a more formal, scientific lens. She has a Bachelor of Science degree in Environmental Science from Laurentian University and a Master of Science degree in Biology from the University of Waterloo. With a keen interest in northern aquatic contaminant ecology, Isabel’s most recent research involves using stable isotopes to understand the prevalence of contaminants, such as heavy metals, in natural northern marine and freshwater food webs and ecosystems. Isabel also has research experience in measuring radionuclides in house dust at the University of Ottawa (Canada, UROP) to understand human exposure to radioactive materials in everyday life, and sampling water reservoirs for toxic microcystin-producing cyanobacteria at the University of Konstanz (Germany, OBW-SRP).

Scientific research has taken Isabel to many remote, wild places in Canada’s North, such as Nunavut and the Northwest Territories, as well as over to Europe. For her scientific contributions in researching contaminants in coastal Arctic marine ecosystems, she’s been awarded the Brian M. Jessop Graduate Scholarship in Fisheries Science, the Weston Family Award in Northern Research, and the prestigious Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada’s Alexander Graham Bell Canada Graduate Scholarship. She also spent two years living in the Northwest Territories as Wilfrid Laurier University’s Northern Research Coordinator.

Isabel has appeared as a guest on the Learn Real Good podcast (episode #8) and the Fact Up podcast (episode #53); as a panelist for the Global Institute for Water Security: Women Plus Water Conversation Series and the Let’s Talk Science: National Summer Symposium Series; as a guest speaker for the Probus Club and Rockefeller University’s Science and Education Policy Association. Isabel also has scientific publications in the Journal of Fish Biology and in Science of the Total Environment.