Synopsis of lecture

Antarctica is vast—more than 50 times the size of the United Kingdom or New Zealand. Most of its land is covered by ice, up to four kilometres in places. Only occasionally do mountain ranges peek out from underneath the ice.

The remote and beautiful white continent is said to provide one of the purest experiences of nature that our planet still has on offer. But just like the rest of our planet, Antarctica is feeling the consequences of human-induced climate change.

It is losing ice, and this is happening at an accelerating rate. What happens in Antarctica, however, does not stay in Antarctica. The amount of ice lost under 1, 2 or even 3 degrees Celsius of future warming will determine sea level around the shores of our continents and impact livelihoods in coastal regions across the globe.

What will the scale of future sea-level rise be and how quickly will it happen? These are difficult questions to answer. In this talk, Professor Tina van de Flierdt will take you on her personal journey of asking questions, finding answers, and uncovering more questions.

Tina van de Flierdt

Tina van de Flierdt is a professor of isotope geochemistry and head of the Department of Earth Science and Engineering at Imperial College London.

She grew up on a dairy farm in rural Germany and is a passionate football fan and potter. Her academic background includes a Diploma in Geology from the University of Bonn (Germany), a PhD in Natural Science from the ETH Zurich (Switzerland), and fellowship, research scientist, and lecturer positions at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University in New York (United States). She currently co-leads the MAGIC (Mass Spectrometry and Isotope Geochemistry at Imperial College London) facility. She is also co-chief of the upcoming SWAIS-2C scientific drilling project in Antarctica.

Her research spans a variety of fields from understanding chemical cycles of trace elements and pollutants in the ocean, over the reconstruction of ocean circulation and its relationship to climate, and to the history of the polar ice sheets and their vulnerability to future climate change.

Tina is particularly interested in the response of the Antarctic Ice Sheet to warmer temperatures and the implications for future sea levels around the world. She is a stubborn optimist and values working across disciplines and in collaboration with diverse teams of people.