worldsoul14 asked: Your blog is one of my favorites here in Tumblr. I am doing my MSc thesis about Climate change and there are lots of things I should learn. And I want to continue my Ph.D in Climate change too. Any suggestion ? :) Again thanks for your awesome blog :)
Hey, and thanks!
Well, there is climate and climate change research, which already covers several fields (physics, chemistry, etc.), and there is a rising call for interdisciplinary research that includes climate as a strong component of the work (hydrology, meteorology, glaciology, ecology, etc.). The first might be the area covering those researchers who contributed to the IPCC AR4 (and soon, AR5) Working Group 1, the second those (like me) who identify better with the products of Working Group 2, and there’s also Working Group 3 to investigate the potential for CC mitigation. Read the reports and see what parts of the work appeal to you. When you run across something that you don’t understand, look it up before you move on. It’s not a fast rule for choosing a research path — you can always shape and expand and refine and change that along the way, according to your interests — but it may make your plans for the future a little clearer. Depending on your undergraduate background, you can’t go wrong with the fundamentals (physics, chemistry, biology, computer science) because they will help you everywhere, and there remains a vast field of work still to be done in all areas of CC.
As for up-to-date information sources on CC issues, there are a couple of Tumblrs on the topic now, and two of my favorite web sources are Judith Curry’s blog “Climate Etc.” and the RealClimate blog. Both are updated frequently. Also keep a watch on the primary literature and journals in the field — there is a long list of many of those at my own macro-blog. Finally, I use omnibus sources like textbooks and Wikipedia only to fill knowledge gaps on fundamentals that I did not get in graduate school classes, and primarily to point out topics and authors that I can search for in the primary literature, usually through Google Scholar. When looking for journal publications to read, start with review articles in recent years (if there are any for your selected search topic) and branch out from there using references and citations to find more detail-specific papers.
As for schools, if that is what you are looking for, my own M.S. programs were at Colorado State University and I’m now working on my Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin. None of that has been specifically in climate or CC research, but climate and CC have been among the running threads through my interests and research all along. I know that there are many great programs around the world on climate and CC — you can usually find the best by checking out the academic affiliations of those publishing researchers whose work you like and appreciate most.
Good luck in your studies!
