Em Blackwell joined the School of Earth and Space Exploration at ASU in 2018 as a graduate student, working towards their PhD in geology. Blackwell's research focuses on the application of InSAR remote sensing to determine the effects of vertical land motion on sea-level rise related hazards. Blackwell also studies the natural and anthropogenic causes of land uplift and subsidence. Currently, they are exploring the tectonic, hydrogrologic, and sedimentological drivers of coastal vertical land motion in the Humboldt Bay Area in Northern California and how the region's land motion signature will affect the barrier dunes and estuaries there.