The DRI Foundation has just awarded the next round of seed grants to six teams of researchers through the Innovation Research Program (IRP). The IRP provides the start-up funding DRI scientists need to test new ideas and produce initial data, which will help them...
Lead pollution in Arctic ice shows economic impact of wars, plagues, famines from Middle Ages to present
Photo: Dr. Joe McConnell and graduate student Nathan Chellman work in the ice lab at the Desert Research Institute, in Reno, Nev., on Wednesday, May 15, 2019. Photo by Cathleen Allison/Nevada Momentum. RENO, Nev. (July 8, 2019) – How did events like the Black...
Traces of Roman-era pollution stored in the ice of Mont Blanc
Researchers drill ice cores from a field camp on Mont Blanc in the French Alps. Credit: B. Jourdain, L’Institut des Géosciences de l’Environnement. RENO, Nev. (May 8, 2019) – Last spring, an international team of researchers led by Joe McConnell, PhD, Director...
North Atlantic Ocean productivity has dropped 10 percent during Industrial era
Researchers use a drill to extract one of the Greenland ice core samples that became the basis for this research. Credit: Joe McConnell/DRI. RENO, Nev. (May 7, 2019) - This week, new research outlining the steady decline of phytoplankton productivity in the North...
Forest fires accelerating snowmelt across western U.S., new study finds
Kelly Gleason, assistant professor of environmental science and management at Portland State University, and crew head out in a recently burned forest to collect snow samples. Credit: Kelly Gleason/Portland State University RENO, Nev. (May 2, 2019) - Forest...
DRI ice core research makes Discover magazine’s list of top breakthroughs in 2018
Reno, Nev. (Thurs. January 17th) - For the second time, research out of the Ultra-trace Ice Core Chemistry Laboratory at the Desert Research Institute (DRI) in Reno, Nevada, has been named one of the year’s biggest scientific discoveries by Discover magazine. The...
Data from DRI ice core lab shows rapid melting of Greenland ice sheet
Reno, Nev. (Dec. 5, 2018): The melting of the Greenland ice sheet has increased rapidly in response to Arctic warming, and is likely to continue to do so into the future, according to new research from an international team of scientists including Joe McConnell,...
DRI ice core data illustrates climate “teleconnection” between Earth’s poles during climate changes in the last Ice Age
Reno, Nev. (Nov. 28, 2018): This week, new research on historical climate changes in the Earth’s polar regions by an international team of scientists was published in the journal Nature. The study, titled “Abrupt Ice Age Shifts in Southern Westerlies and Antarctic...
First non-polar historical iodine record shows impact of fossil fuel emissions
Reno, Nev. (Nov. 13, 2018): A new ice core record from the French Alps shows impacts of fossil fuel emissions in the form of a steep increase in iodine levels during the second half of the 20th century, according to a study released this week by an international team...
DRI ice core data provides insight into how dust and precipitation reach Earth’s poles
Above: A lone researcher is silhouetted by the summer sun, low in the Antarctic sky. Credit: Bradley Markle, UCSB. Reno, Nev. (Sept. 20, 2018) - In September, new research by a team from the University of California, Santa Barbara, the University of Washington,...