The urgent need for action

Abstract

I first learned about the greenhouse gas effect in the 1970s as an undergraduate student. In graduate school in the 1980s, I learned more about the physics involved and began monitoring the status of the Keeling Curve with increasing concern. While the annual cycle that helps visualize the “breathing” of the global vegetation inspired me, the relentless upward trend in the curve alarmed me. Global climate change has been a motivator of my research ever since.