A volcanologist, or volcano scientist, is a geologist who focuses on understanding the formation and eruptive activity of volcanoes. Volcanologists frequently visit volcanoes, sometimes active ones, to observe and monitor volcanic eruptions, collect eruptive products including tephra, rock and lava samples. One major focus of inquiry in recent times is the prediction of eruptions to alleviate the impact on surrounding populations and monitor natural hazards associated with volcanic activity. Geologists who research volcanic materials that make up the solid Earth are referred to as igneous petrologists.
Uranium–thorium dating, also called thorium-230 dating, uranium-series disequilibrium dating or uranium-series dating, is a radiometric dating technique established in the 1960s which has been used since the 1970s to determine the age of calcium carbonate materials such as speleothem or coral. Unlike other commonly used radiometric dating techniques such as rubidium–strontium or uranium–lead dating, the uranium-thorium technique does not measure accumulation of a stable end-member decay product. Instead, it calculates an age from the degree to which secular equilibrium has been restored between the radioactive isotope thorium-230 and its radioactive parent uranium-234 within a sample.
Wallace "Wally" Smith Broecker was an American geochemist. He was the Newberry Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University, a scientist at Columbia's Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory and a sustainability fellow at Arizona State University. He developed the idea of a global "conveyor belt" linking the circulation of the global ocean and made major contributions to the science of the carbon cycle and the use of chemical tracers and isotope dating in oceanography. Broecker popularized the term "global warming". He received the Crafoord Prize and the Vetlesen Prize.
The Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) is a research institute that is sponsored jointly by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (OAR) and the University of Colorado Boulder (CU). CIRES scientists study the Earth system, including the atmosphere, hydrosphere, cryosphere, biosphere, and geosphere, and communicate these findings to decision makers, the scientific community, and the public.
An abrupt climate change occurs when the climate system is forced to transition at a rate that is determined by the climate system energy-balance. The transition rate is more rapid than the rate of change of the external forcing, though it may include sudden forcing events such as meteorite impacts. Abrupt climate change therefore is a variation beyond the variability of a climate. Past events include the end of the Carboniferous Rainforest Collapse, Younger Dryas, Dansgaard–Oeschger events, Heinrich events and possibly also the Paleocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum. The term is also used within the context of climate change to describe sudden climate change that is detectable over the time-scale of a human lifetime. Such a sudden climate change can be the result of feedback loops within the climate system or tipping points in the climate system.
Paleoceanography is the study of the history of the oceans in the geologic past with regard to circulation, chemistry, biology, geology and patterns of sedimentation and biological productivity. Paleoceanographic studies using environment models and different proxies enable the scientific community to assess the role of the oceanic processes in the global climate by the re-construction of past climate at various intervals. Paleoceanographic research is also intimately tied to paleoclimatology.
Raymond Thomas Pierrehumbert is the Halley Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford. Previously, he was Louis Block Professor in Geophysical Sciences at the University of Chicago. He was a lead author on the Third Assessment Report of the IPCC and a co-author of the National Research Council report on abrupt climate change.
Professor Henry "Harry" Elderfield, was Professor of Ocean Chemistry and Palaeochemistry at the Godwin Laboratory in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Cambridge. He made his name in ocean chemistry and palaeochemistry, using trace metals and isotopes in biogenic carbonate as palaeochemical tracers, and studying the chemistry of modern and ancient oceans - especially those of the glacial epoch and the Cenozoic.
GEOTRACES is an international research programme for improving understanding of marine biogeochemical cycles.
Arctic geoengineering is a type of climate engineering in which polar climate systems are intentionally manipulated to reduce the undesired impacts of climate change. As a proposed solution to climate change, arctic geoengineering is relatively new and has not been implemented on a large scale. It is based on the principle that Arctic albedo plays a significant role in regulating the Earth's temperature and that there are large-scale engineering solutions that can help maintain Earth's hemispheric albedo. According to researchers, projections of sea ice loss, when adjusted to account for recent rapid Arctic shrinkage, indicate that the Arctic will likely be free of summer sea ice sometime between 2059 and 2078. Advocates for Arctic geoengineering believe that climate engineering methods can be used to prevent this from happening.
Sir Alexander Norman Halliday is a British geochemist and academic who is the Founding Dean Emeritus of the Columbia Climate School, and Former Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University. He joined the Earth Institute in April 2018, after spending more than a decade at the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Oxford, during which time he was dean of science and engineering. He is also a professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University.
John Graham Shepherd CBE FRS is a British Earth system scientist, Emeritus Professor at University of Southampton, and a former director of the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton. He has worked on a wide range of environment-related topics, including the transport of chemical tracers in the atmospheric boundary layer and in the deep ocean, the management of marine fish stocks, and the dynamics of the Earth system. More recently he led a comprehensive review of geoengineering for the Royal Society.
David John Beerling FLSW is the Director of the Leverhulme Centre for Climate change mitigation and Sorby Professor of Natural Sciences in the Department of Animal and Plant Sciences (APS) at the University of Sheffield, UK. He is also Editor-in-Chief of the Royal Society journal Biology Letters.
Albrecht Werner Hofmann is a German geochemist who is emeritus professor at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry and an adjunct professor at Columbia University. He is best known for his contributions to the field of geochemistry.
Rosalind Emily Majors Rickaby is a professor of biogeochemistry at the Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford and a Professorial Fellow at University College, Oxford. She is an Emeritus Fellow of Wolfson College, Oxford.
Meredith G. Hastings is an American atmospheric chemist and a professor of earth, environmental, and planetary sciences at Brown University. Her research focuses on the reactive nitrogen cycle and how atmospheric chemistry affects climate. She is also the founder and president of the Earth Science Women's Network (ESWN).
Edouard Bard, born on September 1, 1962, is a French climatologist, Professor of Climate and Ocean Evolution at the Collège de France and a member of the French Academy of Sciences.
Jean-Claude Duplessy, born in 1942, is a French geochemist. He is Director of Research Emeritus at the CNRS and a member of the French Academy of Sciences.
Joy Sargita Singarayer is a British climate scientist and Professor of Palaeoclimatology at the University of Reading, where she is joint Head of the Department of Meteorology. She has made contributions to understanding past climate change and has used that knowledge to constrain current and future environmental changes. Her work focuses on interactions between humans, land cover/use and climate, and future implications for agriculture and water resources.
