The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine will organize a workshop that seeks to identify potential future paleoclimate research directions that will help advance understanding of current and potential future change in the Earth?s climate system. Drawing upon broad community input collected via an online questionnaire, workshop discussions will address gaps in the current understanding of past climate variability and processes, and new research strategies and technological capabilities that could practically be undertaken to effectively fill these knowledge gaps. In preparation for an update of the research themes and goals of the Paleo perspectives on Climate Change (P2C2) annual competition, this project plans to engage the broad science community via online questionnaire and a workshop to identify potential priority areas for research in a possible follow-on call for proposals and beyond. Engagement with the science community at the outset will help identify themes with high potential to advance the field and that are feasible for NSF to support and for the community to tackle.
The project seeks input from a broad community with efforts to achieve diversity in geographic representation, institutional affiliation, career stage, gender, and race. Additionally, identifying future research themes in paleoclimate has inherent broader impact related to the scientific and socioeconomic applications of paleoclimate research and their relevance to decision making on issues such as water management, biodiversity, infrastructure adaptation, etc. Other broader impacts include a report of the workshop and questionnaire activities, available in paper (limited quantities) and free PDF, which will be disseminated to NSF and other interested stakeholders as appropriate. The Workshop report will be made available to the public without restriction and will be posted on the National Academies Press website. The National Academies will conduct extensive outreach and engagement to ensure that the results are widely disseminated. This outreach could include briefings for agencies, briefings for Congressional offices, continued facilitation of on-line discussion forums with the broader community, briefings and webinars, presentations and sessions at relevant conferences, and other related activities.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
