Thomas Chalk

I am interested in ocean-climate interactions on short seasonal to long geological timescales. Using ocean and land archives (called « proxies ») we can compare past climate data to what we know and think we know about the Earth system and how it will respond to future stresses.

Understanding the impact of carbon on our atmosphere and the fate of carbon in our oceans is a crucial requirement as we continue to emit carbon dioxide from our civilizations. By studying fossil records such as corals and deep sea sediment cores using geochemical tools we can tease out the environments of the geological past. I work with both chemical data from these fossil archives and models to enhance our understanding of the nature of our planet.

I am particularly interested in the reconstruction of atmospheric carbon dioxide in the past, expanding our data records back millions of years.