Elizabeth Saunders

As a student researcher at CU Boulder's Sustainability Research Initiative, I organized the May edition of "Sustainability on Tap" — my final event in the series before passing the torch to a colleague. The evening brought together two researchers whose work sits at a fascinating and underexplored frontier: the chemistry of life itself, and what it might mean for how we build our world.

The night opened with Dr. Danielle Beatty, a postdoctoral researcher in CU Boulder's Civil, Environmental, and Architectural Engineering Department, who delivered a talk titled "Coccolitho-what?: Growing Minerals for Sustainable Cement Production." Dani completed her PhD in Materials Science and Engineering at CU Boulder in May 2025 and has continued her research ever since — work that sits at the intersection of biology, materials science, and civil engineering, with a focus on making building materials more sustainable. She was an instant audience favorite: approachable, sharp, and clearly someone who can hold a conversation about coccolith biomineralization and competition cooking shows in the same breath.

Dr. Eve-Lyn Hinckley followed with "A Long-Ignored Element Has its Big Moment," a talk drawn from her NSF-, USDA-, and National Geographic Society–funded research on the global sulfur cycle. A Stanford-trained geoscientist with a BA from Middlebury, Dr. Hinckley studies how human activities are reshaping the elemental cycles that underlie all life — and what those shifts mean for human welfare in return. Her work using stable and radioisotopes to trace sulfur transformations in agricultural systems and the broader environment gave the audience a window into a planet-scale story hiding in plain sight.

Together, the two talks sparked exactly the kind of conversation "Sustainability on Tap" is designed to create — casual enough for a Wednesday night at a brewery, substantive enough to stick with you afterward.

This was my final event to organize for SRI — and it went out on a high note. The May edition exceeded every expectation: strong turnout, genuinely curious attendees, and two speakers who made complex science feel like dinner conversation. It was the kind of evening that validates the whole premise of the series. Because of that success, I'm confident passing the baton to Xochitl Ryan, who will carry "Sustainability on Tap" forward. The next edition is already on the calendar for June 17, 2026 with Kaitlin Urso and Dr. Shelly Miller with a theme of air quality impacts. The series is in good hands, and I can't wait to see where they take it.

The SCARPA Boot Fitter app, made for the ATLAS Social Impact Practicum, is an iOS application that uses LiDAR scanning technology to capture precise 3D measurements of a user's foot and recommend the best-fitting SCARPA ski boot from the brand's full catalog. The project addresses a real and frustrating problem in the ski industry: boot fitting is highly technical, deeply personal, and often inaccessible — most skiers end up in the wrong boot, leading to pain, injury, and unnecessary returns. By partnering with SCARPA North America, the app brings expert-level fitting guidance directly to the consumer, with meaningful impact across three dimensions: improved skier safety through better-fitting equipment, reduced environmental emissions from fewer return and exchange shipments, and richer foot geometry data that feeds back to SCARPA's development team to inform more inclusive boot designs for underrepresented foot shapes.

Built in Swift using ARKit, the app guides users through a four-phase scanning flow — setup, capture, reconstruction, and measurement — and maps the resulting foot geometry against SCARPA's boot specifications to surface a personalized recommendation. The project sits at the intersection of spatial computing, consumer health technology, and the outdoor industry, demonstrating how emerging hardware capabilities can drive both individual outcomes and systemic change.

What if learning about the physics of the aurora borealis felt less like a lecture and more like cooking? Aurora A La Carte is a hands-on museum exhibit designed for elementary-aged visitors, built for CU Boulder's Fiske Planetarium as part of ATLS/CSCI 4519: Design a Science Exhibit — a course taught in collaboration with makers, scientists, and science communicators Eddie Goldstein, Ann Eisenberg, Wayne Seltzer, and Michael Banks. I built it alongside teammates Erin Fels, Julia McKeag, Ayesha Rawal, Sylvia Robles, and Kira Warren in Spring 2026.

Visitors step up to a tangible dashboard of sliders and buttons and "cook up" their own aurora — adjusting altitude, geomagnetic activity, light pollution, and proximity to the poles. Each combination drives a real-time Pepper's Ghost illusion projection, rendering a customized aurora in the air in front of them. They leave with a printed recipe card souvenir: their aurora, their conditions, their creation.

My role spanned science communication, research, and the interactive digital prototype. I translated the underlying atmospheric physics — charged solar particles funneling through Earth's magnetic poles, colliding with oxygen and nitrogen at varying altitudes to produce distinct colors — into an accessible, joyful experience that a seven-year-old could navigate intuitively. I built and iterated on the digital aurora simulation, incorporating feedback from teammates and instructors to make the projection more dynamic, organic, and responsive across the full range of input values.

The exhibit was tested at Fiske Planetarium and shown at the ATLAS Expo, with one guiding principle throughout: idiot-proof, unbreakable, and genuinely fun.

Give5 Mile High is a citywide volunteer initiative led by First Lady of Denver Courtney Johnston and the Mayor's Office outreach team. In partnership with Aaron Neyer and Shawn Duncan, I led the development of a responsive web platform connecting Denverites with volunteer opportunities while enabling seamless hour tracking and incentive redemption. Elected by the team as Project Manager, I oversaw the 15-month development lifecycle—from initial conception through design, development, and launch preparation—including a strategic pivot from mobile app to web platform that eliminated app store barriers and enabled SEO-optimized volunteer discovery.

As Project Manager and Lead Designer/Developer, I coordinated weekly team meetings, established project milestones, and designed the complete UI/UX system featuring Denver's signature Blue, Bold Red, and Clean White branding. I developed the responsive web architecture including user authentication, event discovery with intelligent filtering, hour tracking with check-in validation, an incentives redemption system, and a comprehensive nonprofit admin dashboard.

The platform features a dual-sided architecture serving both volunteers and nonprofit administrators through browser-based tools, eliminating dependencies on app stores while providing modern management capabilities. I successfully guided the team through the mobile-to-web pivot while maintaining project momentum, established a scalable component architecture and design system, and completed security audits and WCAG accessibility improvements. The responsive design works seamlessly across desktop, tablet, and mobile browsers with integrated analytics for tracking user behavior and engagement.

Give5 Mile High strengthens Denver's volunteer ecosystem by removing friction from the volunteer experience and empowering nonprofits with accessible management tools. The platform incentivizes civic engagement through a rewarding, trackable volunteer journey, positioning Denver as a leader in technology-enabled community service. With launch preparation complete and comprehensive support materials developed, the project demonstrates how thoughtful technical leadership and user-centered design can drive meaningful social impact.

The DL is a platform that brings local thrift store inventory online—making the best finds in your city actually findable. Shoppers can browse, filter, and buy (or hold) items from real local stores without having to walk in blind. Stores list for free; shoppers get the hidden gems. No mystery, no middleman.

Currently: building and launching the prototype—product concept, branding, web development, and go-to-market strategy. Currently in active partner development, recruiting consignment and thrift stores to join the marketplace.