I am a Project Manager at the Climate Change Research Center where I help operate the West Antarctic Ice Sheet Divide Ice Core Project (WAIS Divide) Science Coordination Office (SCO).

WAIS (West Antarctic Ice Sheet) Divide is a United States deep ice coring project in West Antarctica funded by the National Science Foundation. WAIS Divide's goal is to examine the last ~100,000 years of Earth's climate history by drilling and recovering a deep ice core from central West Antarctica.

Snow that falls on the ice sheet is buried by subsequent snow and forms the layers of ice that make up the ice sheet. The ice layers contain dissolved chemicals, insoluble dust particles, and atmospheric gases that were present when the snow fell. By drilling down into the ice sheet and recovering ice from ancient times it is possible to determine the climate conditions when the snow fell. The ice layers contain a record of how the climate changed. This allows us to determine how and why climate changed in the past. By understanding how and why climate changed in the past, we are able to improve predictions of how climate will change in the future.

Ice core science has dramatically advanced our understanding of how the Earth's climate has changed in the past. Ice cores collected from Greenland have revolutionized our notion of climate variability during the past 100,000 years. The WAIS Divide ice core will provide the first Southern Hemisphere climate and greenhouse gas records of comparable time resolution and duration to the Greenland ice cores enabling detailed comparison of environmental conditions between the northern and southern hemispheres, and the study of greenhouse gas concentrations in the paleo-atmosphere, with a greater level of detail than previously possible. The WAIS Divide ice core will also be used to test models of WAIS history and stability, and to investigate the biological signals contained in deep Antarctic ice cores.

The WAIS Divide SCO is responsible for providing all participating organizations with current and NSF approved scientific requirements that define the scope of the WAIS Divide project. In addition, the WAIS Divide SCO monitors all aspects of the project to assure the scientific return is maximized within the constraints of the available resources and budget. As part of the WAIS Divide SCO my activities involve: communicating with funded Principle Investigators, Raytheon Polar Services, the National Ice Core Laboratory (NICL), and NSF; hiring and supervision of field staff; planning and participation in Antarctic field work; coordination of ice core processing at NICL; website (www.waisdivide.unh.edu) management; and preparation of reports related to WAIS Divide SCO activities.

In addition to my activities with the WAIS Divide SCO, I also assist with the operation of the National Ice Core Laboratory-Science Management Office (NICL-SMO) and also coordinate Morse Hall building modifications for the Institute for the Study of Earth, Oceans, and Space.