Research

Lamont oceanographer Pierre Dutrieux, published research in August 2019, demonstrating, for the first time, that melting of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet is linked to human-caused global warming. If this trend continues, the melting could cause tens of centimeters of sea-level rise by the year 2100.

2019 was one of the worst years on record for the Greenland ice sheet, which shrunk by hundreds of billions of tons. A study led by Lamont polar scientist Marco Tedesco published in April found that mind-boggling ice loss wasn’t caused by warm temperatures alone; the new study identifies exceptional atmospheric circulation patterns that contributed in a major way to the ice sheet’s rapid loss of mass.

This year Lamont bioclimatologist Park Williams, Ed Cook, Jason Smerdon, Ben Cook, Kasey Bolles, Seung Baek, and colleagues derived deeper understanding of the severity of drought and its relationship to wildfires in southwestern North America. The research demonstrated that the period 2000-2018 was the second driest 19-year period for that region in the past 1200 years. (The driest was a megadrought in the late 1500s.)

In September, Williams published another landmark study of the link between global warming and rampant forest fires.

Global warming is also linked to conditions that imperil the future production of the U.S. corn belt. Lamont atmospheric scientist Mingfang Ting’s research reveals that climate change has triggered two changes that threaten the region’s crop production; warming temperatures are both increasing the evaporation of soil moisture and causing summer storms to carry even more moisture away from the Midwest. The region has dominated corn production in the U.S. since the 1850s, accounting for more than a third of the global supply of corn. It is also the world’s largest source of soybeans.

In January, Lamont climate scientists Lorenzo Polvani, Mike Previdi, Karen Smith, and collaborators published a study on the contribution of ozone-depleting substances in the atmosphere to Arctic warming over the second half of the twentieth century. From ensembles of models of Earth’s climate over the period 1955–2005, Lorenzo and his colleagues showed that when ozone-depleting substances are held fixed, surface warming and sea-ice loss in the Arctic are only half as great as when such substances increase rapidly in a manner consistent with observations.

Yes, that’s a little backpack on this robin’s back. In April, Lamont ecosystem ecologist Natalie Boelman co-authored a study demonstrating that climate change is disrupting the American robin’s seasonal rhythms, and that springtime is arriving earlier in many parts of the Arctic. Together with lead author Lamont doctoral student Ruth Oliver, the scientists found that robin migration is beginning earlier by about five days each decade. To track the pattern, Boelman and Oliver attached tiny data-collecting GPS backpacks onto 55 birds.

Also in April, Lamont oceanographer Joaquim Goes published research linking algal bloom outbreaks that are disrupting food chains, fisheries, and desalination plants around the Arabian Sea to disappearing snow in the Himalayan-Tibetan mountains. This uniquely resilient organism, Noctiluca scintillans (also known as sea sparkle), has an extraordinary capacity to survive, thrive, and force out diatoms, the photosynthesizing planktonic species that have traditionally supported the Arabian Sea food web.

“This is probably one of the most dramatic changes that we have seen that’s related to climate change,” said Goes who, along with Lamont researcher Helga do Rosário Gomes, has been studying the rapid rise of this organism for more than 18 years. “We are seeing Noctiluca in Southeast Asia, off the coasts of Thailand and Vietnam, and as far south as Seychelles, and everywhere it blooms it is becoming a problem.”

In May 2020, Lamont-led research produced evidence that Earth will experience combinations of heat and humidity so severe as to ravage economies and possibly surpass the physiological limits of human survival. The research by Colin Raymond, a graduate student at Lamont, and Lamont climate scientist Radley Horton builds upon an earlier study that had predicted such conditions to escalate in the latter part of the century. This latest study shows that such conditions are already appearing in some coastal subtropical locations, that the incidence of such events has doubled since 1979, and that global maximum sea-surface temperatures have recently exceeded this threshold as well.

The financial sector is also responding to the realities of our changing planet by proactively studying Lamont’s research and knowledge base to understand where climate change must be factored into investment strategies. Lamont has been on the forefront, collaborating with leading global investment management firm AllianceBernstein L.P. (AB) to create a first-of-its-kind curriculum focused on climate risk and investment performance.

Close to home, the Observatory unveiled its reimagined and beautifully renovated Hudson River Field Station. The Lamont-Doherty Hudson River Field Station has expanded its mission from that of a research outpost to an active laboratory that also engages the community to come inside to learn and explore. Here’s a virtual look at Lamont's Home on the Hudson.