Julie Brigham-Grette 
Professor of Geosciences | University of Massachusetts Amherst
Amherst, MA, UNITED STATES
Julie Brigham-Grette is an internationally-renowned expert on climate evolution in the Arctic.
Areas of Expertise (10)
Polar climate
Arctic Science
Climate Change
Sedimentology
Glaciology
Stratigraphy
Geological Mapping
Chronology of Geologic Systems
Arctic
Polar Science
Biography
Julie Brigham-Grette is an internationally-renowned expert on climate evolution in the Arctic. She is a frequent contributor to media reports including in Science magazine, PBS, NPR and the CBC.
Since 1991, she has participated in nine field expeditions to remote regions of Arctic Russia and I was co-chief scientist in 2002 of an expedition on the U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker Healy, taking sediment cores from the Bering and Chukchi Seas. Brigham-Grette is the US Chief Scientist of the El’gygytgyn Lake Scientific Drilling project, a $10M multinational field program leading to the first unprecedented recovery in 2009 of a 3.6 Myr record of paleoclimate from the terrestrial Arctic.
Video Appearances
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Education (3)
University of Colorado: Ph.D., Geology 1985
University of Colorado: M.Sc., Geology
Albion College: B.A., Geology
Links (2)
Press Coverage (4)
NOVA: Polar Extremes
PBS tv
2020-02-05
Julie Brigham-Grette, featured in the NOVA program “Polar Extremes," how ice cores from a frozen lake in northern Russia show how the climate has changed over time. (Segment begins at 1:04:00)
Vanishing Arctic ice will open the way for more science voyages, analysis suggests
Science magazine print
2019-08-12
“The overall picture is mixed,” says Julie Brigham-Grette, a geologist at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. “We’re opening up an entire environment that has otherwise been cut off from human influence.”
Melting Ice, Raging Fires: Summer In The Arctic, Courtesy Of Climate Change
WBUR radio
2019-08-16
In the Arctic, a warming planet is accelerating the loss of sea ice and raising the stakes for the region. Julie Brigham-Grette joins two other scientists in a discussion.
New Arctic Science Cooperation Agreement Comes into Force
Earth & Space Science News
2018-05-24
“This agreement is extremely important to foster scientific collaboration among all Arctic nations, as we are witnessing the rapid transition of the entire Arctic system due to climate change. The massive loss of summer sea ice and the reality of ice-free Arctic summers perhaps only 10 years from now [are] an international game changer,” Brigham-Grette, a professor in the Department of Geosciences at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, told Eos. “The sea ice is changing, commercial fisheries are migrating, the permafrost is thawing, shipping routes are changing, etc. As the Arctic opens up to new challenges and opportunities, we need to collectively manage and share responsibilities for what humans do to the Arctic. Honestly, we cannot screw this up!”
Publications (1)
Antarctica is headed for a climate tipping point by 2060, with catastrophic melting if carbon emissions aren’t cut quickly
The ConversationJulie Brigham-Grette and Andrea Dutton
2021-05-17
Julie Brigham-Grette writes: "New research shows it is Antarctica that may force a reckoning between the choices countries make today about greenhouse gas emissions and the future survival of their coastlines and coastal cities, from New York to Shanghai."
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