Gerald H. Haug

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Gerald H. Haug

Gerald H. Haug (born April 14, 1968 in Karlsruhe ) is a German palaeoclimatologist , Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize winner and professor at ETH Zurich since 2007 , who specializes in the investigation of sediment cores from oceans and lakes. Gerald Haug has been Director of the Climate Geochemistry Department and Scientific Member at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Mainz since 2015 and President of the National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina since March 2020 .

biography

Sediment core from the South Atlantic with alternating dark and light areas, which reflect the Quaternary climate cycles .
Comparison of different scientific concepts in historical climatology using the example of the Middle Ages

Gerald Haug received his diploma in geology from the University of Karlsruhe in 1992 and received his doctorate in 1995 from the University of Kiel . 1995–1996 he was a postdoctoral fellow at GEOMAR, Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research Kiel . 1996–1997 he was a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Oceanography at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver , Canada. He then spent a year as a postdoctoral fellow at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, USA, and then (1997–1998) Research Assistant Professor at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles , USA. 2000–2002 he worked as a senior assistant at the ETH Zurich , where he completed his habilitation in geosciences (2002).

In 2003 he became professor at the University of Potsdam and head of the Climate Dynamics and Sediments Department at the German Research Center for Geosciences . In 2007 he received the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize , endowed with 2.5 million euros , and was appointed Professor of Climate Geology at the ETH Zurich. Since 2008 he has been a member of the Academia Europaea . In 2012 he was elected a member of the Leopoldina and in 2018 he was elected to the Academy of Sciences and Literature Mainz.

His evidence of historical periods of drought from investigations of sediments off the coast of Venezuela met with particular media coverage . Several prolonged periods of drought in the years 810 to 910 led to the fall of the Mayan civilization after Haug . Weaker monsoons could therefore also explain the downfall of several Chinese dynasties such as the Tang dynasty .

In connection with his move to ETH Zurich, Haug expressed himself critically about the German research landscape, which he sees as a conflict between academic freedom and research bureaucracy. Haug criticized “typically German dirigism” and an “insane debate on relevance”, on which he had to spend a substantial part of his working time.

Haug is the signatory of a protest note from 2009, in which the dangers of playing down climate change are pointed out.

On December 11, 2019, Haug was elected 17th President of the National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina . Haug succeeded the microbiologist Jörg Hacker in office on March 1, 2020.

research

The Department of Climate Geochemistry at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry deals with the processes and interactions of the climate, ocean and atmospheric systems from geological to annual time scales. The climate system is characterized by numerous feedback processes and threshold values. These internal feedbacks include changes in ocean-atmosphere interactions, ocean heat transport, oceanic nutrient reservoirs, and biological productivity, which has a major impact on atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations. Of particular interest is the Cenozoic , i.e. the last 65 million years, including the Pliocene Warm Period around three million years ago. The latter is the most recent geological age when the CO 2 content in the atmosphere was 400 ppm (particles per million particles) - the same value that exists today due to man-made CO 2 emissions.

Another focus is on the biogeochemical processes in the polar seas and their role in regulating the atmospheric CO 2 concentration between ice ages and warmer periods of time. The department uses various geochemical methods to determine the mechanisms and causes of drastic changes in the earth's environmental conditions. The analytical spectrum ranges from light, stable isotope measurements on foraminifera (single-celled microorganisms) to isotope analysis of biomarkers and trace metals. In addition, high-resolution, non-destructive analysis techniques, such as XRF scanning, are used. The department examines various geological archives such as sediments from the open ocean, isolated sea basins, freshwater lakes and stalactites.

The working group has been operating the ocean research yacht Eugen Seibold , named after Eugen Seibold (1918–2013), since 2018 in order to investigate the interactions between the ocean and the atmosphere .

Awards

Publications (selection)

  • On paleo-oceanography and sedimentation history in the Northwest Pacific over the past 6 million years. Dissertation. Kiel 1996
  • with Ralf Tiedemann: Effect of the formation of the Isthmus of Panama on Atlantic Ocean thermohaline circulation. In: Nature . Vol. 393, 1998, pp. 673-676, doi: 10.1038 / 31447 ( PDF )
  • with Daniel M. Sigman, Ralf Tiedemann, Thomas F. Pedersen & Michael Sarnthein: Onset of permanent stratification in the subarctic Pacific Ocean. In: Nature . Vol. 401, 1999, pp. 779–782, doi: 10.1038 / 44550 ( PDF )
  • with Ralf Tiedemann, Rainer Zahn & A. Christina Ravelo: Role of Panama uplift on oceanic freshwater balance . In: Geology . tape 29 , no. 3 , January 3, 2001, p. 207-210 , doi : 10.1130 / 0091-7613 (2001) 029 <0207: ROPUOO> 2.0.CO; 2 ( PDF ).
  • with Konrad A. Hughen, Daniel M. Sigman, Larry C. Peterson & Ursula Röhl: Southward Migration of the Intertropical Convergence Zone Through the Holocene. In: Science . Vol. 299, no. 5533, 2001, pp. 1304–1308, doi: 10.1126 / science.1059725 ( PDF )
  • with Daniel M. Sigman: The biological pump in the past. In: Henry Elderfield (Ed.): Treatise on Geochemistry. Volume 6: The Oceans and Marine Geochemistry. Elsevier, 2003, ISBN 0-08-043744-3 ( PDF )
  • with Detlef Günther, Larry C. Peterson, Daniel M. Sigman, Konrad A. Hughen & Beat Aeschlimann: Climate and the Collapse of Maya Civilization. In: Science . Vol. 299, no. 5613, 2003, pp. 1731–1735, doi: 10.1126 / science.1080444 ( PDF )
  • with Andrey Ganopolski, Daniel M. Sigman, Antoni Rosell-Mele, George EA Swann, Ralf Tiedemann, Samuel L. Jaccard, Jörg Bollmann, Mark A. Maslin, Melanie J. Leng & Geoffrey Eglinton: North Pacific seasonality and the glaciation of North America 2.7 million years ago. In: Nature . Vol. 433, 2005, pp. 821–825, doi: 10.1038 / nature03332 ( PDF )

Web links

  • Gerald H. Haug on the website of the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, Mainz

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Samiha Shafy: City for Science . In: Der Spiegel . No. 25 , 2007, p. 164-165 ( online ).
  2. ↑ a b Gerald Haug elected as the new President of the National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina (December 11, 2019). Retrieved December 13, 2019 .
  3. ↑ Leibniz Prize 2007: Ten researchers awarded. In: Spiegel Online . December 7, 2006, accessed October 12, 2013 .
  4. ^ Directory of members: Gerald H. Haug. Academia Europaea, accessed August 9, 2017 .
  5. ↑ Member entry by Prof. Dr. Gerald H. Haug (with picture and CV) at the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina , accessed on July 12, 2016.
  6. ↑ Prof. Dr. Gerald Haug: Academy of Sciences and Literature Mainz. Accessed May 31, 2018 .
  7. ↑ Climate evidence: Drought brought down Maya. In: Spiegel Online . March 14, 2003, accessed October 12, 2013 .
  8. ↑ Findings: Did Weak Monsoons End the Tang Dynasty? In: The Washington Post . January 4, 2007, accessed October 12, 2013 .
  9. ↑ Sven Stockrahm: Paleoclimate: A Breeze Apocalypse . In: The time . No. 46, November 7, 2008
  10. ^ Christian Schwägerl : Leibniz Prize Winner: Gerald Haug Escape from the "German Paradox" . In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung . March 12, 2007
  11. ^ Andreas Sentker: Brain Drain: Research in the Corset . In: The time . No. 12, March 15, 2007
  12. ↑ Gerald Traufetter: Global warming: climate researchers protest against institute directors. In: Spiegel Online . November 17, 2009, accessed October 12, 2013 .
  13. ↑ Hubertus Fischer, Nicolas Gruber, Gerald Haug & Peter Lemke: A limit of two degrees of warming is necessary from a geoscientific perspective. In: KlimaLounge ( SciLogs ). November 18, 2009, accessed October 12, 2013 .
  14. ↑ The ship Eugen Seibold . Website of the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry. Retrieved May 18, 2020.
  15. ↑ Claus Reissig: The ocean, the professor and the yacht . In: Frankfurter Allgemeine , January 11, 2018.
  16. ^ German Research Foundation: Albert Maucher Prize 2001 to Gerald Haug . November 5, 2001
  17. ^ German Research Foundation: Albert Maucher Prize 2001
  18. ↑ German Research Foundation: [1]
  19. ↑ Simone Ulmer: [2] . In: ETH Life. June 18, 2010
personal data
SURNAME Haug, Gerald H.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German paleoclimatologist
DATE OF BIRTH April 14, 1968
PLACE OF BIRTH Karlsruhe