Kathleen Kay Treseder is an American ecologist who specializes in the interplay between global climate change and fungal ecology.

[6] Treseder graduated from the University of Utah in 1994 with an Honors Bachelors of Science in biology with a minor in chemistry.

[7] She obtained her Ph.D. in biological sciences from Stanford University in 1999, her dissertation title was “Plant-soil interactions across a fertility gradient in Hawaii : nutrient acquisition strategies and effects of genetic variation on ecosystem function” and her primary advisor was Peter Morrison Vitousek.

[10] Beginning in November 2017, Treseder along with 3 other identified members of the School of Biology, Jessica Pratt, Benedicte Shipley, and Michelle Herrera, filed official complaints of sexual harassment against Francisco Ayala, an evolutionary biologist, eventually leading to Ayala’s termination with the university.

In 2015, she was chosen as a United States Representative for the publication Young Women Scientists: A Bright Future for the Americas,[14] 2015, InterAmerica Network of Academies of Sciences.