Ben Fitzhugh, associate professor of Anthropology, has been appointed by Dean Graumlich as the new director of the Quaternary Research Center. The Center fosters interdisciplinary environmental research focused on the Quaternary geologic period—the last 2½ million years of Earth’s history—a time encompassing massive and abrupt changes of climate, sea level, global biology, and ice cover, as well the evolution of humans and the advent of civilization.
For scientists studying the climate, clouds are tricky. They are hard to measure, and hard to model. Additionally, the recorded data about clouds only goes back to the 70’s and 80’s, except for the journals from old ships. The effects of clouds on climate change is complicated even more by dust, pollution, smoke, and other tiny particles in the air – aerosols – which interact with clouds, and climate, in a significant and complicated way.
The Future of Ice Speaker Series began with a visit from James Balog, one of several Walker-Ames speakers this year at the UW. His talk focused on his work documenting climate change affecting not only our frozen landscapes and seascapes, but the entire globe. His message was buttressed by stunning images of high-latitude icy ecosystems and time-lapsed photographs documenting the disappearance of some of the world’s largest glaciers.
The Washington Ocean Acidification Center recently awarded funding to a local group of oceanographers, giving them the green light to develop an ocean acidification forecasting model for the Pacific Northwest. The first of its kind, the model will allow aquaculture and natural resource managers to better predict how ocean acidification is taking shape throughout the numerous waterways of our state.
“We are excited to launch this project funded by the Center,” said Jan Newton, the Center’s co-director.
A special issue of the journal Conservation Biology includes a paper written by a team of authors from the Climate Impacts Group, USGS, NOAA, and Stony Brook University on choosing and using climate change scenarios for ecological impacts assessments and conservation decisions. Published in December, the paper’s guidelines are relevant to a diverse range of resource managers.
Amy Snover, assistant dean of applied research at the College of the Environment and director of the Climate Impacts Group, is the lead author on the paper entitled Choosing and Using Climate-Change Scenarios for Ecological-Impact Assessments and Conservation Decisions.
The staff of the College of the Environment’s dean’s office are inspired by the work in the College and across campus to understand and address the environmental challenges of our time. This past year, following sustainability efforts of many students, faculty, and staff in the college and beyond, the dean’s office worked with the Environmental Stewardship and Sustainability Office to identify and align our practices and policies with the goals of sustainable resource use.
During spring break the last five years, a University of Washington class has headed to the Nevada desert to launch rockets and learn more about the science and engineering involved. Sometimes, the launch would fail and a rocket smacked hard into the ground. This year, the session included launches from a balloon that were deliberately directed into a dry lakebed. Far from being failures, these were early tests of a concept that in the future could be used to collect and return samples from forbidding environments – an erupting volcano, a melting nuclear reactor or even an asteroid in space.
The state of the planet has been in the news with the release of the 2013 United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment report. Not surprisingly, a key finding is that our planet’s frozen landscapes and seascapes face an uncertain future. This is an issue of global concern because the glaciers and sea ice at high latitudes are not only crucial sources of fresh water, habitats for unique species, and home to many diverse cultures, but also play a key role in the climate system.
This 4-week, fast-paced workshop is designed for graduate students (2nd year or later) who are on the cusp of publishing their science and have a strong desire to get their messages out beyond the ivory tower. Students will better understand the latest research on effective science communication and engagement; learn tools for developing clear messages about complex research findings; and practice talking about what they do – and it why matters – in clear, lively terms.
The National Center for Science Education is offering a free preview (PDF) of ESS’ Peter D. Ward‘s The Flooded Earth: Our Future in a World Without Ice Caps
Each week we share the latest publications coming from the College of the Environment. This week, seven new articles co-authored by members of the College of the Environment were added to the Web of Science or published online.
1. Title: Large-scale splay faults on a strike-slip fault system: The Yakima Folds, Washington State (Abstract only; subscription required for full text)
Authors: Pratt, Thomas L.
“CoEnv Science in Motion” features community-generated stories from our faculty, staff and students, relating to how they share their science–through such means as blog cross-posts or guest posts, science communication through non-science outlets, and stories about engagement offline as well.
For this installment of SiM, we’re sharing a blog post from Hilary Palevsky, grad student in Oceanography, about the Graduate Climate Conference, a unique annual conference that she helped organize this year.
In late summer 2010, an unprecedented storm-driven flash flood rushed through the small Himalayan town of Leh, killing 193 people and leaving thousands homeless. Now, ATMO‘s Kristen Rasmussen and Robert Houze have identified specific factors that led to this tragic event, factors which can now be incorporated into future storm predictions. Read more here.
This year, two milestones have been reached in the Arctic Ocean — record-low sea ice extent, and an even more dramatic new low in Arctic sea ice volume. What might this mean for the future of Arctic ice, and its effects on the globe? UW’s PIOMAS model is cited; read more here.
Check out this video on the removal of the Elwha River dams and the ecosystem restoration to follow. Learn about what scientists are doing to better understand how the river functions now and how it will change in the future. You can watch the nine-minute video here!