The day after some guy tells a room full of women physicists at CERN a bunch of nonsense, a [Canadian] woman, Donna Strickland of the University of Waterloo, wins the Nobel Prize in physics. Nice! As only the third female Nobel laureate in physics, she has august company: Maria Göppert-Mayer (1963), and Marie Curie (1903). IContinue reading “Nobel in physics for 2018”
Author Archives: zizroc
Simulated impact of paleoclimate change on Fremont Native American maize farming in Utah, 850–1449 CE, using crop and climate models
Our paper in Quaternary International just went online today. The pithy takeaway: Ancient dryland farmers in Utah adapted to warming and drying during the MCA but were unable to adapt to increased variability at the MCA-LIA transition, and abandoned the area for maize farming. Because increased variability is one of the near certainties for temperate semi-aridContinue reading “Simulated impact of paleoclimate change on Fremont Native American maize farming in Utah, 850–1449 CE, using crop and climate models”
After the monsoon
The North American Monsoon (NAM) is a major delivery system of water to the interior of the American Southwest, the Sonoran Desert in particular. The NAM usually peaks in the mid to late summer, arising from the south over the Sonoran desert (Adams and Comrie 1997; Higgins et al. 1997; Metcalfe et al. 2015). But theContinue reading “After the monsoon”
Climate determinism! Of cholera outbreaks.
The UK Met Office is involved in some very interesting things. I was not aware of this, but read about it just this morning on BBC News Online. The basic idea is simple: predict precipitation fields (not trivial in itself) and determine where there is likely to be increased local flood risk. I don’t knowContinue reading “Climate determinism! Of cholera outbreaks.”
Vienna images
A poster adhered to a public building in a park along Taliastrasse, 25 August 2018.
This guy
Jadav Molai Payeng, Forest man of India. Recently, a colleague here at IIASA and I have been doing some thinking about the concept of natural capital, those elements of the natural world that are (have been/will be) exploited as resources, or otherwise contribute economically. Trees are a classic example. What is the value of a tree?Continue reading “This guy”
I’m inclined to agree with The Economist here
Vienna tops the world’s most livable cities index from The Economist. I certainly find it pretty livable, though we do miss LA from time to time. But what’s really interesting is how the “most livable cities” are clustered (1) on or near coastlines (except for Calgary and Vienna; for Toronto, Lake Ontario counts), (2) in onlyContinue reading “I’m inclined to agree with The Economist here”
Eocene extreme
About 50 Ma ago [CO2]_atmos was about 1000 ppm. The climate was radically different than it is today. This article in the Atlantic summarises the results of a study on a terrestrial proxy of temperature, which suggest that land surface temperature was greater than previously believed. This is interesting from a climate change perspective becauseContinue reading “Eocene extreme”
Presentation to Climates and Cultures: Perspectives for the Future conference put on by the Royal Academy of Overseas Sciences
A one-person, packable lake coring rig
Abstract We designed and built a floating rig for coring top-level sediments on a small lake or pond. This rig was designed for ease of packing, assembly, and use by a 2-person team. It is light enough to be backed in by 2 people, assembled in 25 minutes, and used by one researcher to coreContinue reading “A one-person, packable lake coring rig”
Marcus James Thomson, Ph.D. 