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INSTAAR conducts interdisciplinary research and education on the past, present, and future of Earth systems in service of a just and thriving world.

 

With deep roots in polar regions, alpine environments, and Quaternary history, today we embrace a global perspective on bellwethers of environmental change.

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Sarah Crump Graduate Fellowship 

Sarah Crump, in purple coat, stands in front of a dramatic Baffin Island landscape of colorful tundra suddenly broken by towering cliffs.

With the help of Sarah, her family, and friends, INSTAAR has established a fellowship in her name. Please help us raise an endowment sufficient to support a full-year Graduate Research Fellowship, providing salary and tuition for one INSTAAR grad student each year. The fellowship will give a boost to their study of Earth or environmental science in Arctic or alpine regions and also be a lever for equity and underserved communities.

Learn about Sarah & her fellowship  Contribute to Sarah's fellowship

News

11,000 summers & winters

A study of Antarctic ice cores led by Tyler Jones and published in Nature is the first seasonal temperature record of its kind, from anywhere in the world.

More at CU Boulder Today

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An ice core from the West Antarctic Ice Sheet Divide is giving scientists a hint at the continent’s seasonal temperatures across millennia. Photo by Heidi Roop/NSF, CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

Ice cores record long-ago seasons in Antarctica (AGU Eos)

Researchers led by INSTAAR Tyler Jones used ice core data to reconstruct seasonal temperatures throughout the Holocene. The results link especially hot summers with patterns in Earth’s orbit. The results are the first seasonal temperature record stretching back 11,000 years. Read more
A series of atmospheric rivers in early 2023 covered the Sierra Nevada in snow. Mario Tama, Getty Images.

Why rain on snow in the California mountains worries scientists (The Conversation)

Another round of powerful atmospheric rivers is hitting California, following storms in January and February 2023 that dumped record amounts of snow. This time, the storms are warmer, and are triggering flood warnings as they bring rain higher into the mountains on top of the snowpack. Keith Musselman explains the complex risks rain on snow creates and how they might change in a warming climate. Read more
Elephant bird eggshells lie exposed on a beach in Madagascar. Photo by Giff Miller.

How 1,200-year-old eggs from a 9-foot tall, 1,500-pound bird led to a scientific breakthrough (USA Today)

Towering over nine feet tall and weighing over 1,500 pounds, the now-extinct aepyornis lived more than 1,200 years ago and was Madagascar’s largest land animal. Scientists at the University of Colorado Boulder and Curtin University in Australia recently discovered a new lineage of the birds using eggshell remnants, as well as isotope geochemistry and protein extraction. The findings were published in Nature Communications. Read more
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Children’s book explores The Living Landscape

Eric Parrish and Suzanne Anderson are the authors of a new children’s book centered in the Critical Zone, the thin outer layer of Earth’s surface where life exists and interacts with rock, soil, water, and air.

More about the book
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Labs & Groups

  • Advanced Laser Technology for Atmospheric Research (Fried)
  • Amino Acid Geochronology (Miller)
  • AMS Radiocarbon Preparation & Research (Lehman)
  • Coastal Oceanography Modeling (Moriarty)
  • Core Processing & Sedimentology (Roth & Anderson)
  • Cryosphere and Surface Processes (Overeem et al.)
  • Diatoms (Spaulding)
  • Ecohydrology (Barnard)
  • Ecosystem Analysis (Turetsky) ↪︎
  • Hydroecology Science & Engineering (Gooseff) ↪︎
  • ICP-MS Trace Metals (Marchitto)
  • Micropaleontology (Jennings)
  • Mountain Hydrology (Molotch et al.)
  • Ocean Biogeochemistry (Lovenduski)
  • Organic Geochemistry (Sepúlveda)
  • Organic Matter Spectroscopy (McKnight)
  • Polar & Environmental Geochemistry (Diaz) ↪︎
  • Polar & Paleoclimate Modeling (Jahn)
  • Stable Isotopes (Vaughn)
  • Suding Lab - plant community ecology (Suding) ↪︎


Programs

  • Center for the Geochemical Analysis of the Global Environment (GAGE)
  • Community Surface Dynamics Modeling System (CSDMS)
  • Consortium for Capacity Building (CCB)
  • DFO - Flood Observatory
  • Dynamic Water critical zone project
  • McMurdo Dry Valleys Long-Term Ecological Research (MCM LTER)
  • Mountain Research Station (MRS)
  • Niwot Ridge Long-Term Ecological Research (NWT LTER)

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Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research

INSTAAR

         

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Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research
University of Colorado
Campus Box 450
Boulder, CO 80309-0450 USA

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University of Colorado
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Boulder, CO 80303 USA

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