Executive Committee
Robin Bell
Director, ADVANCE at the Earth Institute
Doherty Senior Research Scientist, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory
robinb@ldeo.columbia.edu
Dr. Robin E. Bell is the Director of the ADVANCE program at the Earth Institute. She is also a Doherty Senior Research Scientist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, where she directs major research programs on the Hudson River and Antarctica.
Dr. Bell has studied the mechanisms of ice sheet collapse and the chilly environments beneath the Antarctic ice sheet, including Lake Vostok, and she has led seven major aero-geophysical expeditions to Antarctica. After receiving her undergraduate degree from Middlebury College in Vermont, she built a 24-foot dory, which she sailed and rowed down the Hudson River past Lamont and Columbia on to Woods Hole where she worked for several years. Returning to the Hudson River Valley, she received her doctorate in marine geophysics from Columbia University. Presently she is chair of the National Academy of the Sciences Polar Research Board and Vice Chair of the International Planning Group for the International Polar Year.
Click here to see Robin Bell's CV.
Patricia Culligan
Associate Professor, Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics
pjc2104@columbia.edu
Dr. Patricia Culligan is a Professor of civil engineering and engineering mechanics at Columbia University. She also chairs the diversity initiatives committee at Columbia's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. Her research focuses on applying geoengineering principles to the solution of problems related to subsurface contamination and remediation. Her particular interests include multiphase transport behavior in soils and fractured rock, including nonaqueous phase liquid behavior, colloid transport and transport in unsaturated media. She also has interest and experience in the design of land-based disposal sites for waste materials. Dr. Culligan has received numerous awards including the Arthur C. Smith Award for Undergraduate Service (1999) and the National Science Foundation CAREER Award (1999). She is also the author or coauthor of more than 50 journal articles, book chapters, and refereed conference papers. She holds a Ph.D. in civil engineering from Cambridge University in England.
Mark Cane
Chair of the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences and the G. Unger Vetlesen Professor of Earth and Climate Sciences
mcane@ldeo.columbia.edu
Dr. Mark Cane is the Chair of the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University and the G. Unger Vetlesen Professor of Earth and Climate Sciences in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences and the Department of Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics.
Dr. Cane received his Ph.D. in Meteorology from MIT in 1975 and his B.A. and M.A. from Harvard University. With Lamont colleague Dr. Stephen Zebiak, he devised the first numerical model able to simulate El Niño and the Southern Oscillation (ENSO), a pattern of interannual climate variability centered in the tropical Pacific, but with global consequences. In 1985 this model was used to make the first physically based forecasts of El Niño. Dr. Cane has served on numerous international and national committees and authored or co-authored over 200 scientific papers. In 1992 he received the Sverdrup Gold Medal of the American Meteorological Society and in 2003 he received the Cody Award in Ocean Sciences from Scripps Institution of Oceanography. He is a fellow of the American Meteorological Society; the American Association for the Advancement of Science; the American Geophysical Union, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
For more information on Dr. Cane's research, click here.
Kuheli Dutt
Assistant Director, Academic Affairs and Diversity
Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory
kdutt@ldeo.columbia.edu
Dr. Kuheli Dutt joined ADVANCE in October 2008, as the Assistant Director for Academc Affairs and Diversity at Lamont.
Kuheli holds a Ph.D. in public policy and a Master’s degree in economics. Her interests lie in the areas of climate change and sustainable development, especially in the context of environmental policy and economic development. Prior to joining Columbia, she taught economics and statistics at Northeastern University, Boston. She is also experienced in the area of faculty development and has extensive experience developing and managing programs pertaining to faculty development. Kuheli will be working in the Director’s Office at Lamont and will assist Lamont Director, Dr. Michael Purdy, on the longer-term implementation of ADVANCE programs. She will provide support to LDEO search committees, serve on the LDEO promotions and careers subcommittee, and provide long-term support to the Science of Diversity lecture series. In her role as Assistant Director for Academic Affairs and Diversity she will work closely with senior management to enable and facilitate policies and processes pertaining to academic affairs and diversity at Lamont. Kuheli will also be closely involved with the implementation of the Research Professor initiative, a key program for providing long-term stability to the research scientists at Lamont, where the majority of women scientists reside.
For more information on the Office of Academic Affairs and Diversity, click here.
John Mutter
Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences
Deputy Director of the Earth Institute
jmutter@ei.columbia.edu
Dr. John Mutter received a B.Sc. in Physics and Pure Mathematics from the University of Melbourne, Australia, a M.Sc. in Geophysics from the University of Sydney, Australia, and a Ph.D. in Marine Geophysics from Columbia University.
Dr. Mutter's early research interests included marine seismology and tectonics, the study of physical mechanisms and processes associated with seafloor spreading, continental extension and the development of passive continental margins. He continues those research thrusts with recent studies of active rifting in the Woodlark Basin off Papua New Guinea, as well as his other work on complex system dynamics. More recently he has turned his attention to the vexing issue of the role of earth systems in sustainable development. Since 1980, Dr. Mutter has been at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and the Columbia Earth Institute, serving in research, teaching and administrative positions with increasing responsibility. He has authored or co-authored more than 70 articles in scientific journals and many popular articles. His fieldwork includes over 30 cruises aboard Columbia's research vessels and others in all parts of the world's oceans.
Click here to view Dr. Mutter's homepage.
Fredrik C. Palm
Assistant Dean for Faculty Development and Diversity
The Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science
fred.palm@columbia.edu
Fredrik C. Palm is the Assistant Dean for Faculty Development and Diversity in the Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science. Dr. Palm received his Ed. D. in Education Leadership, Administration and Policy from Fordham University. His research focuses on the impact of faculty development on university professors career development and growth. Dr. Palm is also interested in access and equity issues in higher education. In addition, Dr. Palm holds a M. A. from the Steinhardt School of Education at NYU in Higher Education Administration with a focus on International Higher Education Reform in Southern Africa and a B. A. from Gustavus Adolphus College.
Dr. Palm has held several positions at New York University relating to faculty affairs and diversity and has numerous years experience working with issues of diversity and faculty development. Most recently, he served as the assistant director of the Faculty Resource Network.
For more information on the Office of Faculty Development and Diversity, click here.
Stephanie Pfirman
Chair, Environmental Science Department
Barnard College
spfirman@barnard.edu
Dr. Stephanie Pfirman, a specialist in the study of environmental changes in the Arctic, is chair of the Department of Environmental Science at Barnard College, which she joined in 1993.
Her publications have focused on the trajectory and origin of Arctic sea ice, an analysis of contaminant risks in the Arctic marine environment, and the use of digital data in Earth science instruction. Dr. Pfirman has participated on several national and international environmental panels. She now chairs the National Science Foundation's Advisory Committee for Environmental Research and Education. She chaired the Office Advisory Committee to the Office of Polar Programs, National Science Foundation (member 1997-2000, chair 1998-1999). From 1993 to 1997 she was a regular member of US delegations to meetings of the international Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme. Dr. Pfirman received her Ph.D. in 1985 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology/ Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Joint Program in Oceanography and Oceanographic Engineering, Department of Marine Geology and Geophysics, and a BA in 1978 from Colgate University's Geology Department.
Click here to view Dr. Pfirman's homepage.
G. Michael Purdy, Ex Officio
Director, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory
Professor, Department of Earth and Environmental Science
mpurdy@ldeo.columbia.edu
Peter Schlosser, Ex Officio
Associate Director, the Earth Institute and Vinton Professor of Earth and Environmental Engineering
schlosser@ldeo.columbia.edu