Exhibit shows how U scientists have been warming up
for climate change discussion

With politicians discussing global warming legislation, and weather behaving erratically across the nation, climate change suddenly seems to be hot news.

The new Exhibit Museum of Natural History exhibit, Climate Change: Local Impacts, Global Responsibility, features the work of 10 U-M researchers who have been examining changing climate for decades, long before the issue began drawing wide attention. Their studies have ranged from changing weather systems that spawned Hurricane Katrina, above, to the work of Philip Myers of the Museum of Zoology and the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, below, whose research over 20 years reveals that species of mammals are expanding their ranges in Michigan. (Katrina image courtesy NASA; bottom photo courtesy Philip Myers)

But around the U-M campus, scientists have been probing the complexities and consequences of changing climate for decades. The work of 10 such researchers is featured in "Climate Change: Local Impacts, Global Responsibility," a new exhibit in the Exhibit Museum of Natural History rotunda.

Banners with dramatic, climate-related photos greet visitors as they enter the museum. Beneath the banners are displays that depict with photos, text, museum specimens and artifacts the issues the scientists seek to understand, the methods they use in their research and the insights they're gaining. Featured in the exhibit are:

• Henry Pollack and Shaopeng Huang of the Department of Geological Sciences, whose measurements of temperature deep inside Earth document a worldwide continental land mass temperature increase of about 1 degree Celsius (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) over the past 500 years, with about half of that change occurring in the past 100 years.

• Philip Myers of the Museum of Zoology and the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, whose work over the past 20 years shows that, in response to climate change, species of mammals that once lived only in Michigan's Lower Peninsula and the southern portion of the Upper Peninsula are expanding their ranges farther north, while northern species are disappearing from all but the most northerly reaches of their ranges in the state.

• Kacey Lohmann of the Department of Geological Sciences, who studies the chemical evidence for climate change laid down as shells grow.

• Mercedes Pascual of the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, who along with collaborators in Barcelona and Bangladesh found evidence that a phenomenon called the El Nino-Southern Oscillation—a major source of climate variability from year to year—influences cycles of cholera in Bangladesh.

• A team from the Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic and Space Sciences that includes Natasha Andronova, Mary Anne Carroll, Joyce Penner, Richard Rood and Christopher Ruf, whose interdisciplinary research examines the factors that force climate change and seeks to improve the quality of data used in modeling Earth's climate.

In addition to the displays on U-M research, an interactive exhibit allows visitors to test their knowledge of climate change facts and to see how much various lifestyle choices contribute to carbon dioxide emissions.

"A key role for a science museum is to help citizens better understand the scientific issues of the day that affect their lives," says Exhibit Museum Director Amy Harris. "With climate change being one of the most important and pressing issues for society today, we saw an opportunity to both provide basic information and also show what researchers are doing right here at the University of Michigan.

"Some of our visitors may not realize that there are world-class scientists right down the street and across town on North Campus, and this exhibit introduces them to a sampling of the many important climate-related research projects under way. It's just one example of our commitment to communicating current research, particularly University of Michigan research."

The exhibit, which runs through May, is part of a semesterlong slate of events organized around the theme "Wild Weather, Changing Climate." Other U-M researchers will present lectures on climate-related topics and participate in a science café series—informal gatherings in the Arbor Brewing Company Tap Room, during which scientists and citizens can discuss climate change and its implications in a relaxed setting. A planetarium show; educational workshops for undergraduates, teachers, and families; and a family-oriented Discovery Day also are scheduled. A complete schedule is available on the museum's Web site, www.lsa.umich.edu/exhibitmuseum.

The programming is the museum's contribution to the LSA 2006-07 Citizenship Theme Year.

"Scientific literacy is essential to a well-informed citizenry," says Harris, "especially on this issue, which affects us locally, nationally and globally."