Eli Risten Nergård is the most recent addition to the EALAT team. Eli Risten has started her Phd this summer and it will be a part of WP 6 'Reindeer Welfare and Nutrition: Herders' Observations and Scientific Data'. The objective of this work package is to determine the effects of local climatic variability and climate change on nutritional status and welfare of reindeer through understanding of physiological adaptation to change. The nucleus of Eli Risten's research will be the effects of castration on reindeer within the core themes within this work package and the working title of her Phd is Aspects of castration and animal welfare in the reindeer herd in a changing climate.

Eli Risten is a Sami, lives in Karasjok and is formally trained as a vet, a profession she practices in Karasjok. She is also a Major in the Norwegian Army, a position she will continue alongside her Phd studies. Her Phd supervisors are  Lars Moen, Rector of the Norges veterinærhøgskole, Svein Mathiesen, Sami University College / Norges veterinærhøgskole and Johan Mathis Turi of the Assn. of World Reindeer Herders/  International Centre for Reindeer Husbandry.