Susan L. Cutter

Dr. Susan Cutter is a Carolina Distinguished Professor of Geography at the University of South Carolina. She is also the Director of the Hazards Research Lab, a research and training center that integrates geographical information science with hazards analysis and management. She is the co-founding editor of an interdisciplinary journal, Environmental Hazards, published by Elsevier. In 1999, Dr. Cutter was elected as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), a testimonial to her research accomplishments in the field. Her stature within the discipline of geography was recognized by her election as President of the Association of American Geographers in 1999-2000.

Dr. Cutter has been working in the risk and hazards fields for more than twenty-five years and is a nationally recognized scholar in this field. She has authored or edited nine books and more than 50 peer-reviewed articles. Her boos include American Hazardscapes (2001), South Carolina Atlas of Environmental Risks and Hazards (1999); Living with Risk (1993); Environmental Risks and Hazards (1994), and Exploitation, Conservation, Preservation: A Geographic Perspective on Natural Resource Use (2003), now in its 4th edition.

In response to the 9/11 terrorist attack, Dr. Cutter led a team of researchers who examined the use of geographical information processing techniques in the World Trade Center rescue and relief efforts. She is the co-principal investigator on a National Science Foundation award to the Association of American Geographers to bring the nation’s geographic resources to bear on this important national and international priority. This agenda and supporting documents available in book form, The Geographical Dimensions of Terrorism (edited by S.L. Cutter, D. Richardson, and T. Wilbanks and published by Routledge Press in 2003).