The theme of the Swiss Climate Summer School 2020 is "Extreme weather and climate: from atmospheric processes to impacts on ecosystems and society place". The Summer School takes place on 23 - 28 August in Grindelwald, Switzerland and is open to young researchers (PhD and Postdoc) from all fields of climate research.
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Oeschger Seminar Series
23 September 2019
Physicist and OCCR member Thomas Frölicher played a central role in the IPCC's report on the ocean and cryosphere (ice, permafrost), which will be published on Wednesday, September 25. In an interview, he explains his role as lead author and talks about how he came to explore heat waves in the sea as an inhabitant of a landlocked country.
15 October 2019
The OCCR and the Institute of Mathematical Statistics and Actuarial Sciences of the University of Bern invite applications for a Postdoc position opening February 1, 2020. The successful candidate holds a PhD in Statistics and has a strong interest in climate and weather applications, or he/she holds a PhD in Climate or Atmospheric Science, Meteorology or similar with a very good background in statistics.
24 September 2019
Europe’s first farmers lived in pile dwellings in the Balkans. How did they adapt to new climate conditions and how did they influence their environment? A major EU project, initiated by Bernese researchers, is looking for the answers. We followed the research team for two days.
3 September 2019
An international team of scientists lead by the OCCR reveals that Lake Ohrid in the South Balkans is indeed Europe's oldest lake. A study published in Nature shows that the lake came into being 1.36 million years ago.
25 July 2019
In contrast to pre-industrial climate fluctuations, current, anthropogenic climate change is occurring across the whole world at the same time. In addition, the speed of global warming is higher than it has been in at least 2,000 years. That’s according to two studies from the OOCR.
27 August 2019
Spaniard Ana Vicedo-Cabrera studied pharmacology, environmental toxicology and epidemiology. Today she leads the research group on Climate Change and Health, which the OCCR and the Institute for Social and Preventive Medicine at the University of Bern have jointly established.
25 July 2019
Five large volcanic eruptions occurred in the early 19th century. They caused cooling and – as a study led by the OCCR shows – to drying in the monsoon regions and glaciers growing in the Alps. The study shows that the pre-industrial climate was not constant: if one takes this cold period as the starting point for current global warming, the climate has already warmed up more than assumed in the current discussions.
21 May 2019
Nicole Glaus decided on a climate master’s at the OCCR's Graduate School of Climate Sciences because of its versatility. Today she works as a TV meteorologist.
11 June 2019
Huge floating solar islands on the ocean that produce enough energy to enable CO₂-neutral global freight traffic – what sounds like science fiction could indeed prove to be a major contribution to climate protection. An international group of researchers, including OCCR members, has calculated for the first time, the potential contribution to CO₂ mitigation of this concrete proposal.
25 April 2019
The Oeschger Centre has just launched a new brochure which presents its activities in a concise form for anybody interested in climate research. Beside the OCCR’s scientific excellence, the publication stresses the collaboration among 28 research groups: “The Oeschger Centre doesn’t just talk about interdisciplinary cooperation, it lives it“, one of the key messages reads. The new booklet is 20 pages strong and comfortably fits into a jacket pocket. There are an English and a German edition.
9 April 2019
A European research consortium, in which the OCCR is involved in, wants to drill a 1.5 million year old ice core in Antarctica. An analysis of the climate data stored in the ice should contribute to a better understanding of the alternation between warm and cold periods.
14 April 2019
OCCR researcher Sandra Brügger reconstructs past vegetation changes. As an expert on pollen found in glacier ice, she’s even been featured in The New York Times.
26 March 2019
Tropical storms that move poleward influence the weather in Europe much more than previously supposed. A study from the Mobiliar Lab for Natural Risks oft he OCCR shows that the probability of heavy rainfall is twice as high when mid-latitude weather is disrupted by cyclones. These findings could ensure better extreme weather forecasts in the future.
7 March 2019
Over the last million years, ice ages have intensified and lengthened. According to a study led by the OCCR researchers, this previously unexplained climate transition coincides with a diminution of the mixing between deep and surface waters in the Southern Ocean. The study confirms that the Antarctic region plays a crucial role during periods of climate change.
18 February 2019
The well known German climate scientist Hans von Storch has conducted a series of interviews with impressive scientific personalities, mostly from climate science, oceanography and meteorology. He now teamed up with Heinz Wanner, the founding president of the OCCR to interview the climate historian and OCCR member Christian Pfister. This conversation is a tribute to the the ground-breaking work Christian Pfister has done in connecting climate history with quantitative climate science.
Read the interviewRead the preface by Thomas Stocker
13 February 2019
Anna Kulakovskaya and Thomas Rölli who were the top climate master’s students last year have been awarded the 2018 Oeschger Young Scientist’s Prize. In an interview, they talked about their reasons for doing a master’s degree in climate sciences. “What mattered most to me was the multidisciplinary approach”, Thomas Rölli said. Anna Kulakovskaya was particularly impressed by the attitude of the professors towards their students.
“I really felt I was taken seriously.”
Read more: Anna KulakovskayaRead more: Thomas Rölli
29 November 2018
The OCCR was involved in a new study that has found two types of climatic connection between the North Atlantic and Antarctica. One is a rapid atmospheric channel and the other a much slower connection through the ocean. During the last glacial period, these links resulted in abrupt climatic changes – and could so again in future.
5 November 2018
The next International Swiss Climate Summer School will take place from 8 – 13 September 2019 at Monte Verità, Ascona, Switzerland. It focuses on the theme “Carbon and climate in the Paris world: getting out of the fossil fuel carbon budget crunch”. With conventional mitigation and adaptation options not sufficiently exploited, humankind may need to deploy unconventional methods to meet its internationally recognized warming targets of 2°C or even 1.5°C.
13 November 2018
The OCCR played a key role in developing the Climate Scenarios CH2018. Based on these model calculations, climate researchers in Bern are developing new tools to better identify flood risks. To this end, they are now launching the “Research Initiative Flood Risk”.
23 October 2018
An interdisciplinary team from the universities of Bern (Oeschger Centre), Oxford and Thessaloniki was awarded a grant of 6.4 million euros from the European Research Council (ERC). The team included researchers from the fields of archeology and biology. They received one of the highly competitive “ERC Synergy Grants”. Aided by studies conducted in the lakes in Greece and in the south of the Balkans, the project should show how the climate, environment and agriculture have developed over the last 10,000 years and what influences these factors have had on each other.
12 September 2018
The OCCR has launched a new publication called “1868 - a flood that changed Switzerland”. This 60 pages strong brochure, written for an non-scientific audience, is the fruit of the collaboration of researchers from all fields of the OCCR. The project has produced an in-depth analysis and reconstruction of the flood that affected large parts of the Alpine region in Switzerland in autumn 1868. The brochure can be downloaded free of charge.
18 June 2018
The research station at Jungfraujoch where the OCCR group „Environmental Isotopes and Gases“ plays a prominent role is at the top of Europe – and not only because of its unique location. Within the framework of the European research infrastructure „Integrated Carbon Observation System" (ICOS), the laboratory in the heart of the Alps is now officially certified. ICOS provides data to better understand the global carbon cycle and how human activities affect it. The backbone of ICOS is a network of stations that have to meet the highest quality standards.
20 August 2018
32 students from 11 nations participated at the first International Bachelor Summer School for Climate Change Research co-organized by the OCCR. The two-week event was entitled “Confronting Climate Change - from Science to Policy” and brought together students from different disciplines, including natural sciences, economics, and law. Participants were full of praise for high level lectures, the interdisciplinary focus, and the joys of summer in Bern.
15 August 2018
Marine heatwaves can irreversibly damage ecosystems and, therefore, also present a threat to fishing. As a team led by OCCR memberThomas Frölicher showed in a study just published in the journal Nature, the number of marine heatwaves has increased dramatically in past decades. This trend will further intensify as a result of climate change.
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