Dr. Maureen E. Raymo

Co-Founding Dean Emerita, Columbia Climate School

G. Unger Vetlesen Professor of Earth & Climate Science and of Climate, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (LDEO)

P.O. Box 1000
61 Route 9W
Palisades, NY 10964-1000

BIOGRAPHY:

Maureen E. Raymo is Co-Founding Dean Emerita of the Columbia Climate School, past Director of Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (July 2020-June 2023), and G. Unger Vetlesen Professor of Earth & Environmental Sciences.

She has degrees from Brown and Columbia Universities and studies the history and causes of climate change in Earth's past. She is best known for the Uplift-Weathering Hypothesis that ties global cooling and the onset of the ice ages to a drawdown in atmospheric CO2 caused by the uplift of the Himalayas and Tibetan Plateau.

In addition to publishing fundamental work on the stratigraphy and chronology of the recent geologic epochs, Raymo has also proposed hypotheses explaining the patterns of ice sheet variability observed over the last few million years and developed new ways of studying past sea level change. In 2014 she was the first woman to be awarded the Wollaston Medal by the Geological Society of London, their most prestigious award given out annually since 1831.

Raymo’s research has always focused on documenting how and discovering why the Earth's oceans, biogeochemical cycles, and climate have changed in the past, knowledge that is integrated with numerical models of past and future climate. Through detailed analysis of deep sea sediment cores, she has generated records of geochemical, paleontological, and paleoclimatic change that have advanced the study of Earth’s climate on tectonic, orbital, and millennial time scales.

For much of her career she has also worked to improve the timescales and stratigraphy that provide the foundation for the study of Earth’s history. Most recently her research group has focused on the reconstruction of sea level and ice volume during past warm climate intervals with the goal of improving predictions of future sea level rise in response to global warming.

VIDEO

PROJECTS

Only select projects listed below
Name Start Date End Date
Management of the U.S. Science Support Program (USSSP) associated with the International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) 12/1/14 2/28/25
Advanced Imaging Techniques Combined with In Situ Analyses used to Assess Diagenesis in Benthic Foraminifera 5/1/17 4/30/19
Earth's Climate History, Ice Sheets, and Sea Level Over Last Four Million Years 8/15/11 8/31/12
FESD Type 1: Pliocene Maximum Sea Level (PLIOMAX): Dynamic Ice Sheet-Earth Response in a Warmer World 9/1/11 8/31/18
Insolation Control of Ice Sheet Mass Balance in the 41-kyr World: a test of Multiple Hypotheses 8/15/11 7/31/13
Lamont Doherty Core Repository: Curation, Service Professional Development, Outreach 6/15/16 5/31/21
Lamont, Doherty Core Repository: Curation, Service Professional Development and Outreach 3/15/13 11/30/16
MRI: Acquisition of an CRF Core Scanner for the Lamont-Doherty Core Respository 8/15/15 7/31/17
North Atlantic Bottom Water Temperature and Ice Volume Records from the Mid-Pleistocene Transition 10/1/14 9/30/16
Reconstructing Last Interglacial Sea Level Based on Models and Observation from the Bahamas 4/15/19 3/31/22
Thermohaline Circulation and Deep Ocean Carbonate Chemistry across the Mid-Pieistocene Transition 9/1/14 8/31/17
Last Interglacial Sea-level Evolution from U-series Chronology of Ooids, Corals, and Caves Deposits from Crooked Island, Bahamas 5/15/21 4/30/23
Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory – Anticipating Earthquakes Initiative 1/1/21 12/31/21
Lamont-Doherty Core Repository: Curation, Service, Professional Development, Outreach 6/1/23 5/31/28
EAGER: QuantiFY20ing Spatial Distribution of Micro- and Nanoplastics along an Antarctic Traverse 12/15/23 11/30/25
A Proposal to Manage the U.S. Science Support Program Office associated with the International Ocean Discovery Program (USSSP-IODP) 12/1/14 2/28/25

PUBLICATIONS

See: Google Scholar