Where are they now?: Scientist follows dream of working in nature

When she was a student at Davis High School, Elise Tulloss knew she wanted to work with nature, but she never thought she'd go through 10 years of post-college schooling to get there.

"I thought that only (medical) doctors did that!" she said.

Now, the 2000 Davis grad is about a year away from finishing her doctoral dissertation in ecology. And as a final boost this summer she was awarded a prestigious Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant from the National Science Foundation, one of the few students in her field to get it.