Professor Lonnie Thompson: Climate Change and the Arctic

OSU Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center, 1090 Carmack Road, Columbus
Thursday, February 9th at 6:00 pm

Join the Harvard Business School Club Columbus members and guests for a startling presentation about climate change and its affect on the Arctic by Lonnie Thompson, Distinguished University Professor, School of Earth Sciences and Senior Research Scientist, Byrd Polar Research Center, The Ohio State University.

Following the discussion, attendees will have an opportunity to tour OSU’s Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center.

The Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center at The Ohio State University (BPCRC) at is recognized internationally as a leader in polar, alpine, and climate research. Its research programs are conducted throughout the world. The Center is named in honor of Admiral Richard E. Byrd, America’s most famous polar explorer. Research at the Center focuses on the role of cold regions in the Earth’s overall climate system, and encompasses geological sciences, geochemistry, glaciology, paleoclimatology, meteorology, remote sensing, ocean dynamics, and the history of polar exploration.

Schedule
6:00 pm   Networking, appetizers, refreshments
6:30 pm   Presentation by Professor Lonnie Thompson
7:15 pm   Small group tours of the Polar Research Center*
8:30 pm   Conclusion

* Includes tour of the Center, along with videos, satellite images, clean room lab, ice core freezer, and polar rock repository.

Dr. Lonnie G. Thompson is one of the world’s foremost authorities on paleoclimatology and glaciology. He has led 60 expeditions during the last 40 years, conducting ice-core drilling programs in the Polar Regions as well as on tropical and subtropical ice fields in 16 countries including China, Peru, Russia, Tanzania and Papua, Indonesia (New Guinea). Thompson and his team were the first to develop lightweight solar-powered drilling equipment for the acquisition of histories from ice fields in the high Andes of Peru and on Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania (see New York Times article). The results from these ice-core-derived climate histories, published in more than 230 articles, have contributed greatly toward improved understanding of Earth’s climate system, both past and present. Lonnie is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and in 2007 he was awarded the National Medal of Science, the highest honor the U.S. awards to American scientists. In April of 2012 he received the Benjamin Franklin Medal in Earth and Environmental Science and in September, 2012 the Friendship Award from the People’s Republic of China. On January 18th, 2013 he was awarded the International Science and Technology Cooperation Award of the People’s Republic of China by the President of China in the Great Hall of the People, the highest honor given to a foreign scientist.

RSVP and read more at http://www.hbsclubcolumbus.com/events/#17.