November 10, 2014
UW’s Ian Joughin one of Seattle Mag’s ‘Most Influential People’ of 2014
The November issue of Seattle Magazine includes a list of 51 local people who made 2014 what it was. Along with Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and the Seahawks team’s “12th man” fans, it includes UW glaciologist Ian Joughin, whom the magazine dubs the “ice breaker.”
The magazine notes:
Ian Joughin measuring the ice sheet on the west coast of Greenland.Chris Linder
“In the face of global warming, it’s people like Ian Joughin—a glaciologist and affiliate professor of earth and space sciences at University of Washington, researching the surface motion and topography of ice fields—who arm us with the information we need if humanity plans to stay put on this planet. In May, Joughin published findings in the journal Science revealing that Antarctica’s western ice sheet already has begun an irreparable meltdown.”
Joughin co-authored the paper showing the West Antarctic Ice Sheet has begun to collapse, causing global seas to rise several feet and as much as 10 feet or more in the coming centuries. Joughin is a glaciologist at the UW’s Applied Physics Laboratory and affiliate professor in Earth and space sciences.
Media coverage of the result included articles in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Seattle Times and an interview with Joughin on NPR’s Science Friday.
Watch a UW video where Joughin explains the study (warning: don’t watch this if you need a pick-me-up):
