Vetlesen Award Ceremony Recognizes Two Outstanding Researchers in Earth Sciences
This year, not one but two researchers were honored for groundbreaking scientific achievements at prestigious awards ceremony Whitson Award Held April 26 in the Lower Library Rotunda at Columbia University. The event was presented by Maurizio Morello, Executive Vice President of the French National Aeronautics and Space Agency. G. Unger Vetlesen Foundationwhich creates the award, and is given by Miles O’Briennational correspondent pbs news hour and the journalists, producers and directors behind the new film, Chasing carbon zero.
Vetlesen Award winners David Kohlstedt and Anny Cazenave pose with the evening’s emcee, Miles O’Brien. Image credit: Lucas Hoeffel
Established in 1959, the Wittelsen Prize is one of the highest honors in the earth sciences.During this year’s celebration, it was given to Anne Cazenave and David Colstedt “Because scientific achievements lead to a clearer understanding of the earth, its history, or its relationship to the universe.” (Cazenavi is the 2020 recipient of the Vetlesen Award, but due to COVID-19, her ceremony has been postponed until now. ) researchers were each awarded a gold medal and $250,000 in prize money for their accomplishments over the past few decades, and were greeted with applause from the well-dressed audience.
Earlier that day at the Columbia Climate School Lamont-Doherty Earth ObservatoryManagement Vetlesen Prize, two winners given the lecture Their research journey and the scientific questions that drove them forward in their careers. Cazenave presented “Sea Level Rise Today: The Role of Space Observations” and Kohlstedt presented “Under Pressure: The Adventures of Olivine & Beyond”.
Cazeneuve introduced the audience to a central question in her current research: “How much will global and regional sea levels rise in the coming decades and beyond in response to ice sheet mass loss and ocean warming?” She detailed For the first time at a workshop discussing the relationship between satellite altimetry and oceanographic measurements nasa Go back to 1969 and document the advances made in the field and in the accuracy of space observations in the years since. The new challenge, Cazenave told the room, will be to measure sea level rise at coastlines around the world, which may have the greatest societal impact and still have many unknowns.
Anny Cazenave, 2020 Vetlesen Award recipient, accepts the award. Image credit: Lucas Hoeffel
Scientist emeritus of France’s Space Geophysics and Oceanography Research Laboratory and former Director of Earth Sciences at the International Institute for Space Sciences in Switzerland, Cazeneuve is an expert in space geodesy — the study of the Earth’s shape and other features from space — and also Pioneer in the field of satellite altimetry. Her findings improve our practical understanding of global sea level rise and how it has been and will continue to be affected by global warming.
When introducing the next recipient, maureen remoCo-Founding Dean Columbia Climate School G. Unger Vetlesen, director of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences, described Kohlstedt’s laboratory studies of the Earth’s deep mechanics as belonging to “the most dangerous field in experimental physics.” Raymo also noted that while he officially retired in 2019, Kohlstedt hasn’t stopped working — a claim he confirmed.
David Kohlstedt holds up the 2023 Wittelsen Prize medal. Image credit: Lucas Hoeffel
In his talk, Kohlstedt discussed his pivotal transition from studying materials science to a storied career in geophysics, and the many postdocs and mentors who supported him along the way. Kohlstedt is currently Professor Emeritus of Earth Sciences at the University of Minnesota. Formerly at MIT and Cornell, he has been conducting experiments for years to study the mantle as a possible real-world scenario by replicating high-pressure, high-temperature conditions in the lab and observing the results at the atomic and magnified levels. Generate insights. His group’s discoveries have contributed to many important Earth science disciplines, including structural geology, seismology, volcanology and geophysics.
Cazenave and Kohlstedt’s names now top the list as Vetlesen Prize winners An impressive and growing list A great visionary of Earth science in the 20th and 21st centuries.
