Isabelle Laurion is a professor and limnologist whose research focuses on how climate change alters aquatic ecosystems, particularly in northern and Arctic environments. She investigates the role of dissolved organic matter in controlling water transparency, lake mixing dynamics, and microbial food webs, and how these processes influence greenhouse gas emissions and the carbon cycle. Her work examines permafrost thaw ponds as “carbon reactors,” where sunlight and microbial activity release ancient carbon as CO₂ and CH₄, potentially accelerating climate feedbacks. She also explores the production of volatile organic compounds by lakes and tundra ponds, a little-studied but climatically important process. Beyond the Arctic, Laurion studies eutrophication in small lakes and greenhouse gas emissions from wastewater ponds. She also develops optical tools, including hyperspectral detection, to monitor harmful algal and cyanobacterial blooms in Quebec lakes, with applications for satellite and drone-based remote sensing.