Scripps Distinguished Professor Receives Fridtjof Nansen Award

Lynne Talley, a distinguished professor of oceanography at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego, was awarded the 2017 Fridtjof Nansen Award from the European Geosciences Union (EGU). Talley was honored for her important research contributions in the field of oceanography.

The medal was awarded to Talley for her “innovative research and leadership in observing and understanding the global ocean circulation and its role in climate,” according to EGU.

Talley’s research focuses on the general circulation of the ocean and the role of various oceanic and atmospheric conditions that affect ocean currents and property distributions, including salinity. Her work involves analysis of data from most of the world’s oceans, depicting the movement of heat, salinity, and water masses, and the formation of water masses, particularly in subpolar regions.

Her research combines analysis of ocean observations with advanced theoretical work to describe and map large-scale circulation. She was a lead author of the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (Working Group I chapter “Observations: Oceanic Climate Change and Sea Level”), which earned contributing scientists a share of the Nobel Peace Prize, and a lead author on the same topic for the Fifth Assessment Report.

Each year, the EGU Awards and Medals program recognizes eminent scientists for their outstanding research contributions in the earth, planetary, and space sciences, and identifies the awardees as role models for the next generation of early career scientists to foster geosciences research.

Talley will receive the award at EGU’s 2017 General Assembly meeting, which will take place April 23–28 in Vienna, Austria.

EGU’s Division on Ocean Sciences established this award in recognition of the scientific achievements of Fridtjof Nansen, whose first major contribution to oceanography was an 1893 transpolar expedition in the Arctic drift ice north of the New Siberian Islands north of Russia.

-- Annie Reisewitz