Prof. Mark A. Cane

Pronouns: he/him
G. Unger Vetlesen Professor of Earth and Climate Sciences, Emeritus, Ocean and Climate Physics, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (LDEO), Columbia Climate School
Special Research Scientist, Ocean and Climate Physics, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (LDEO)
Oceanography 104D 61 Route 9W Palisades, NY 10964

BIOGRAPHY:

Like so many other oceanographers, I was born in Brooklyn, New York, in the days before the Dodgers left and precipitated the decline of American civilization. I was lucky enough to work on the tropical oceans in the era when we came to understand and predict El Niño and the Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the now famous pattern of interannual climate variability with well-publicized global consequences. Together with then student Steve Zebiak, I devised the first numerical model able to simulate ENSO, and in 1985 we used this model to make the first physically based forecasts of El Niño. Over the years the Zebiak-Cane model has been the primary tool used by many investigators to enhance understanding of ENSO. Making predictions led to asking what to do with them. So I began to work on the impact of El Niño and other climate variability on human activity, especially agriculture and health. My 1994 paper (with student Gidon Eshel) on the strong effect of El Niño on the maize crop in Zimbabwe has been influential in prompting decision makers to consider climate variability. This line of inquiry led to the creation of the International Research Institute for Climate and Society, housed here at Lamont. I also founded and directed the Masters Program in Climate and Society. While I continue to work on equatorial dynamics, El Niño, prediction of climate variations and climate impacts, and global climate issues, current work is dominated by concern for the impacts of human influence on the climate system. IN addition to the futurre and the present , my interest is drawn to explaining the variations in the paleoclimate record, especially the astoundingly strong abrupt changes and the succession of droughts over the past millennium.

PROJECTS

Only select projects listed below

Name	Start Date	End Date
ADVANCE at the Earth Institute	1/1/04	12/31/10
Extended-Range Prediction with Low-Dimensional, Stochastic-Dynamic Models: A Data Driven Approach	6/1/12	5/31/17
Generation and Evaluation of Long-Term Retrospective Forecasts with NCEP Climate Forecast System: Predictability of ENSO and Drought	7/1/08	6/30/13
P2C2: North American Megadrought: Atmosphere-Ocean Forcing and Landscape Response from the Medieval Period to the Near-term Greenhouse Future	7/1/09	6/30/13
Present and Future Models of Low Frequency Climate Variability	9/15/10	9/14/13
Collaborative Research: P2C2 - Insights Into Tropical Pacific Climate From Paleoproxy Data Assimilation Into an Intermediate Complexity Dynamical Model	6/1/20	5/31/23
Collaborative Research: Response of the Upper Tropical Pacific Ocean to Greenhouse Gas Forcing in Observations and Models	8/15/22	7/31/25

48 PUBLICATIONS ON COLUMBIA | ACADEMIC COMMONS

Only select publications listed below

Name	Published Date
Persistent discrepancies between observed and modeled trends in the tropical Pacific Ocean	2022
Atmosphere-ocean dynamics of persistent cold states of the tropical Pacific Ocean	2021
Coupled mode of cloud, atmospheric circulation, and sea ice controlled by wave-3 pattern in Antarctic winter	2021
A quantitative hydroclimatic context for the European Great Famine of 1315-17	2020
Predictability in process-based ensemble forecast of influenza	2019
Strengthening tropical Pacific zonal sea surface temperature gradient consistent with rising greenhouse gases	2019
Climate and the Global Famine of 1876-78	2018
The Interconnected Global Climate System—A Review of Tropical–Polar Teleconnections	2018
Trans-Pacific ENSO teleconnections pose a correlated risk to agriculture	2018
Commentary on the Syria case: Climate as a contributing factor	2017
Crop production variability in North and South America forced by life-cycles of the El Niño Southern Oscillation	2017
Is there a role for human-induced climate change in the precipitation decline that drove the California drought?	2017
Life cycles of agriculturally relevant ENSO teleconnections in North and South America	2017
Predictability and prediction of persistent cool states of the Tropical Pacific Ocean	2016
Climate change in the Fertile Crescent and implications of the recent Syrian drought	2015
The Annual Cycle of East African Precipitation	2015
The Rainfall Annual Cycle Bias over East Africa in CMIP5 Coupled Climate Models	2015
The East African Long Rains in Observations and Models	2014
Links between tropical rainfall and North Atlantic climate during the last glacial period	2013
Zonal Momentum Balance in the Tropical Atmospheric Circulation during the Global Monsoon Mature Months	2013
Adjustment of the atmospheric circulation to tropical Pacific SST anomalies: Variability of transient eddy propagation in the Pacific–North America sector	2010
Changes in storm tracks and energy transports in a warmer climate simulated by the GFDL CM2.1 model	2010
The role of linear wave refraction in the transient eddy-mean flow response to tropical Pacific SST anomalies	2010
Mexican drought: an observational modeling and tree ring study of variability and climate change	2009
An Experiment in Institutional Transformation: The NSF ADVANCE Program for Women at the Earth Institute at Columbia University	2005
Predictability of El Niño over the past 148 years	2004
Righting the Balance: Gender Diversity in the Geosciences	2003
Is the Gulf Stream responsible for Europe's mild winters?	2002
Current approaches to season-to-interannual climate prediction	2001
Enhanced sensitivity of persistent events to weak forcing in dynamical and stochastic systems: Implications for climate change	2001
Current Approaches to Seasonal to Interannual Climate Predictions	2000
On the Prediction of the El Niño of 1986-1987	1988
A Model EI Niño-Southern Oscillation	1987
El Niño	1986
Experimental forecasts of El Niño	1986
A Theory for El Niño and the Southern Oscillation	1985
Hindcasts of Sea Level Variations during the 1982–83 El Niño	1985
A Numerical Model for Low-Frequency Equatorial Dynamics	1984
Modeling Sea Level During El Niño	1984
Reflection of low-frequency equatorial waves at arbitrary western boundaries	1984
The Near Surface Equatorial Indian Ocean in 1979. Part I: Linear Dynamics	1984
A Model of the Semiannual Oscillation in the Equatorial Indian Ocean	1983
Equatorial oceanography	1983
Oceanographic Events During El Niño	1983
On Equatorial Dynamics, Mixed Layer Physics and Sea Surface Temperature	1983
A Note on Low-Frequency Equatorial Basin Modes	1981
On the Sensitivity of Numerical Weather Prediction to Remotely Sensed Marine Surface Wind Data: A Simulation Study	1981
On the dynamics of equatorial currents, with application to the Indian Ocean	1980