2016
1 September 2016: My popular article titled, “Could climate engineering save the Greenland Ice Sheet?,” has now been published on climanosco.org. Climanosco is a new organization that asks scientists to write articles about their work in accessible language.
30 June 2016: I’ve just published an R package called mise to the Comprehensive R Archive Network (CRAN; https://cran.r-project.org/index.html). The name refers to the cooking term “mise en place,” to set up the workspace before starting a project. It clears away variables and functions from R’s working memory, closes open figures, clears the console, and/or detaches any attached packages. You can install it from within R using the command install.packages(“mise”). There is also a Github repository for the code.
27 June 2016: Our e-textbook, Risk Analysis in the Earth Sciences: A Lab Manual with Exercises in R, reached 300 downloads over the weekend! It’s worth noting that this number represents the unique users who have downloaded the book, so we’ve now reached out to 300 different people through the book.
17 June 2016: I taught one final lesson on scientific computing to SCRiM’s Summer Scholars. The slides are online here. This lesson covered how to use for loops.
13 June 2016: An updated version of our e-textbook, Risk Analysis in the Earth Sciences, is now available from leanpub.com! This version includes a table of contents with active links to all headings in the book, continuous page and figure numbers, and corrections to various small errors noted by readers (thanks to Thomas Patrick Walsh and Naomi Radke for their suggestions). There is also a Github repository for the book at https://github.com/scrim-network/raes. Plus, the book has now been downloaded 288 times!
1 June and 8 June 2016: I taught two more lessons on scientific computing to SCRiM’s Summer Scholars. The slides are online here and here. We covered the basics of downloading and cleaning data (“data munging”), plus how to make plots in R.
23 May 2016: I taught an introductory lesson on scientific computing to SCRiM’s Summer Scholars (summer research students; there were 19 students in the room). We covered the basics of the command line, as well as how to log in to Penn State’s computer systems. You can see the slides I used here.
16 May 2016: I’ve started a new position as a Scientific Programmer in the Sustainable Climate Risk Management (SCRiM) research network hosted in the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute at Penn State. I’ll write code in support of ongoing projects, help scientists to curate their code and data sets, and teach research students how to do the computing-related parts of their work more effectively. I’m looking forward to the new job.
24 April 2016: I’ve just published a Shiny app titled Energy Use, Carbon Dioxide Emissions, and Quality of Life. This app lets users explore relationships between energy use, carbon dioxide emissions, and quality of life among countries. For example, energy use drives a higher standard of living, but people in some countries live longer than people in other countries where more energy is used. I’ve posted a five-slide description of the app on RPubs.
14 February 2016: Our e-textbook, Risk Analysis in the Earth Sciences, has now been downloaded 200 times from leanpub.com!
11 February 2016: I gave a talk titled, “Why R is awesome and how you can get started using it,” as part of Hacky Hour at the New Leaf Initiative in downtown State College. About 15 R enthusiasts came and asked good questions about getting started with R. You can get the slides here.
2015
15 December 2015: I gave a talk about our e-textbook, Risk Analysis in the Earth Sciences, at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco.
7 December 2015: A press release about my use of R in teaching my hydrogeology course appeared today on Penn State’s news site.
3 December 2015: There is now a press release about our e-textbook, Risk Analysis in the Earth Sciences, on Penn State’s news site.
10 November 2015: With other faculty from the Earth Sciences and Business programs here at Penn State DuBois, I talked to 20 gifted junior high and high school students as part of an outreach activity. The Earth Science activity involved having the students use toothpicks to look for hidden objects in boxes of sand. There is an article about this outreach activity on Penn State DuBois’ news page.
2 November 2015: I talked about the Earth Sciences program to about 10 prospective students and their families during one of Penn State DuBois’ Wildlife Visitation Days. There is a post about my participation in the Visitation Day on Penn State DuBois’ Facebook feed.
1 November 2015: I submitted an article to Climanosco’s Launch Challenge. Climanosco is a new, Switzerland-based organization that helps climate scientists communicate their results to non-scientists. For my contribution to the Launch Challenge, I rewrote my paper on geoengineering and the Greenland Ice Sheet (see below) in nontechnical language. I’m excited to see the other participating papers.
29 October 2015: My new textbook, Risk Analysis in the Earth Sciences, is now published on Leanpub! The book teaches the Earth science and statistical concepts needed to assess climate-related risks, using the R programming environment. My co-editor on the book is Klaus Keller, and the contributors to the book include Ryan Sriver, Greg Garner, Alexander Bakker, and Richard Alley. The book is completely free to download and use.
18 October 2015: I took my Geomorphology class from Penn State DuBois on a field trip to Jo Hays Vista and Tytoona Cave near State College and Arch Springs, Pennsylvania. We looked at the differences in rock type (lithology) between the ridges and the valley floors in central Pennsylvania. There is an article about the trip (including photos and quotes from the students!) on Penn State’s news site.
14 October 2015: I talked about the Earth Sciences program to about three prospective students and their families during one of Penn State DuBois’ Wildlife Visitation Days.
7 October 2015: I gave a talk titled, “Why it’s great to be an earth scientist,” to the Environmental Science and Calculus classes at Elk County Catholic High School. The talk was about how I got to be an earth scientist and what it’s like to do field work and go to college. The students asked some great questions. There is a post about this visit on Penn State DuBois’ Facebook feed.
22 September 2015: I talked about the Earth Sciences program to about seven prospective students and their families during one of Penn State DuBois’ Wildlife Visitation Days.
17 August 2015: I recently published an article on geoengineering and its effects on the Greenland Ice Sheet in Environmental Research Letters. Geoengineering, specifically albedo modification, involves deliberately changing the Earth’s climate by putting reflective particles into the upper atmosphere. We found that this technique could slow sea level rise from the Greenland Ice Sheet, but might not stop it altogether. There’s a press release about the article on Penn State’s news site.
1 August 2015: I’m now an Instructor in Earth Sciences at Penn State’s DuBois campus! I’ll maintain ties to the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute, the Sustainable Climate Risk Management network, and the Penn State Ice and Climate research group at Penn State’s main campus. I’m looking forward to my fall courses in Geomorphology and Hydrogeology!
16 April 2015: My talk at the European Geosciences Union General Assembly was mentioned in an article on BBC News.
14 April 2015: I gave a talk titled, “Limited effectiveness of SRM geoengineering in preventing sea-level rise from the Greenland Ice Sheet,” in a session on geoengineering at the European Geosciences Union meeting in Vienna, Austria.
7 April 2015: I gave a talk titled, “Cold to Warm to Warmer: Big Ice and Sea Level Rise,” at Thiel College in Pennsylvania during their annual Earth Week. The talk was about Pennsylvania’s topography, sea level rise, doing field work in cold places, and computer modeling of ice sheets. The talk was featured in Thiel College’s alumni magazine The Bell (Spring 2015, p. 9). There are also photos from my talk on Thiel’s Flickr page.
20 January 2015: I recently published a paper on the time scales of mass loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet in Climate Dynamics. The Greenland Ice Sheet may melt more quickly in the future, leading to sea-level rise. However, the speed of melting is not well known. Many scientists assume that this speed is constant, even though it almost certainly depends on air temperatures over Greenland. We used a computer model to determine how the time scale of Greenland Ice Sheet melting changes with temperature. There’s a press release about the article on Penn State’s news site.
2014
1 October 2014: I’m now a Co-Principal Investigator on a $500,000 National Science Foundation grant to Penn State that will use advanced statistical methods and computer modeling to assess how the Antarctic Ice Sheets might contribute to future sea-level rise. There is a press release about the grant on Penn State’s news site.