Polar-Palooza Bios

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Julie Brigham-Grette
Professor, Department of Geosciences, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Julie Brigham-Grette received her Ph.D. from the University of Colorado’s Institute for Arctic and Alpine Research, INSTAAR. After post-doctoral research at the University of Bergen, Norway, and the University of Alberta, Canada with the Canadian Geological Survey, she joined the faculty at the University of Massachusetts in the fall of 1987. Dr. Brigham-Grette has been conducting research in the Arctic for nearly 29 years, including eight field seasons in remote parts of northeast Russia since 1991, participating in both the science program, as well as dealing with difficult logistics.

Her research interests and experience span the broad spectrum of arctic marine and terrestrial paleoclimate records dealing with the Late Cenozoic to recent evolution of the Arctic climate, especially in the Bering Strait region. She served as member of the Arctic Logistics Task Force for the NSF OPP 1996-1999 and 2000-2003, chaired the US Scientific Delegation to Svalbard for Shared Norwegian/U.S. Scientific Collaborations and Logistical Platforms in 1999, and was member of the NSF -OPP Office Advisory Council 2002-2004.

Brigham-Grette is currently Chairman of the International Geosphere/Biosphere Program’s Science Steering Committee on Past Global Change (PAGES) with an international program office in Bern, Switzerland; Past President of the American Quaternary Association; and a former member of a National Academy of Sciences committee studying the role and future uses the US Icebreaker fleet. She also serves as one of two US representatives to the International Continental Drilling Program.

She lives in Amherst MA with son’s Karl (11th grade) and Erik (8th grade) and husband Roger Grette. She is as committed to education and outreach as to basic research, and enjoys sharing her research with the public.

George Divoky, PhD
Research Associate at the Institute of Arctic Biology, University of Alaska Fairbanks

George Divoky has been studying seabirds in arctic Alaska since 1970 and holds a Ph.D. from the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Studying the Black Guillemots of Cooper Island has largely been a solitary venture for George. While the discovery and initial years of the study were part of governmental research related to oil development in northern Alaska, for the past two decades the work has been conducted with occasional grants and much personal dedication. Long-term studies, such as George’s – now more than 30 years long – can rarely be conducted by government, which typically focus on immediate agency needs, while the duration of most academic research is insufficient to allow exposition of multi-decadal trends. Yet it is precisely this type of extended data set that is needed to monitor the long-term cycles and trends related to climate change and other atmospheric variation.

George is founder of the “Friends of Cooper Island,” a nonprofit scientific organization whose mission is to compile, preserve and distribute Cooper Island research for use by researchers studying climate change and other Arctic phenomena. He also serves director of the organization in collaboration with a governing board.

George is a dynamic and engaging speaker, with an infectious passion for his work. FOCI programs will use George’s data and desire to communicate his findings to others as the basis from which to examine a host of issues and challenges including climate change, arctic adaptations, and anthropogenic (human) influences on high latitude species.

Kathy Licht, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Earth Sciences, Indiana University-Purdue University, Indianapolis

Kathy Licht has completed recently her third trip to Antarctica to study the history and effects of glaciers on the landscape and climate system. She first became interested in glacial geology as a graduate student at the University of Colorado, Boulder, where she received her doctorate in 1999.

“One of my main research interests is examining change in the Antarctic ice sheet over time. Antarctica represents the biggest unknown in predicting global sea level rise. Constraining the magnitude of the Antarctic ice sheet’s future response to changing climate and rising sea level depend, on a large extent, to improving our knowledge and understanding of ice dynamics during the last glacial minimum (approx. 18,000 years ago.)”

Licht also serves as an advisory board member for the Women in Science House, an academic residential community at IUPUI. Her role as an advisor and mentor is one she particularly enjoys, affording more time for her to interact with students one-on-one.

Atsuhiro “Atsu” Muto
Ph.D. student in the Geography department at the University of Colorado at Boulder,
under the guidance of Dr. Ted Scambos and Dr. Konrad Steffen

Atsu received his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Earth Sciences from Chiba University in Japan. He has participated in deep ice core drilling at Dome Fuji, East Antarctica, as a member of the 46th Japanese Antarctic Research Expedition in 2004-05. He also spent one month at McMurdo Station in 2006.

In preparation for his work on the Norwegian-US Scientific Traverse of East Antarctica, he tested his self-designed and built weather stations at Summit Station, Greenland, in Spring 2007. On the Traverse, he is responsible for firn temperature profile measurements and aims to write his Ph.D. thesis on surface temperature reconstruction using data obtained during traverses.

Atsu appears in several POLAR-PALOOZA podcasts: his enthusiasm for science and sharing his adventures can be seen at:

http://passporttoknowledge.com/polar-palooza/pp06nordic03.php
and
http://passporttoknowledge.com/polar-palooza/pp06nordic02.php

For his appearance at the SNOMNH, Atsu will be relatively “just in” from one of the longest single season traverses ever in Antarctica, and will be full of new discoveries and exciting stories.

Sean Topkok
Alaska Native Knowledge Network

Sean Topkok is an Indigenous Curriculum Specialist with the Alaska Native Knowledge Network, currently based in Fairbanks. Sean worked with ARCUS (the “Arctic Research Consortium of the United States”) from 1997 to 2005. Currently employed as Information Systems Professional with the University of Alaska Fairbanks, he continues to be closely associated with ARCUS on various educational programs. Sean can usually be found working to maintain the Alaska Native Knowledge Network website, or helping rural communities document cultural knowledge with Cultural Atlases.

When not identifying, cataloguing, and distributing Indigenous curriculum materials, Sean may be found spending time with his wife Amy and their three sons Christopher, Aaron, and Joseph. With relatives from Shismareff, an isolated community on Alaska’s coast, threatened by erosion driven by storms made newly-powerful in part by climate change, Sean is also an enthusiastic member of traditional dance and music groups, believing in the power of culture to transmit Alaskan Native values to new generations.