Tom Purucker Tom Purucker received his PhD in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology in 2006 from the University of Tennessee. He is a post-doctoral ecologist for the EPA in the Ecosystems Research Division of the National Exposure Research Laboratory in Athens, Georgia and is also an adjunct faculty member at Gainesville State College. Particular areas of interest include spatial statistical applications to environmental contamination problems, exposure assessment development, fate and transport of contaminants, ecological population models, and applications of uncertainty analysis to these areas in a decision-making context.