Title: Ash Ice Mud: tephras and rapid climate change

Speaker: Professor Siwan Davies

Time: 7:30pm

Venue: The Dylan Thomas Centre, Swansea

Admission: Free, all welcome

Abrupt climate changes have occurred in the past, heating the planet by up to 16˚C in a few decades causing major environment impacts on the face of the Earth. These shifts are thought to have involved a strong interplay between the ocean circulation and atmospheric dynamics, yet the mechanisms that drove these processes are poorly understood. In order to help understand the mechanisms that drove these sudden climate shifts, a team of scientists led by Professor Siwan Davies in the Department of Geography investigate the evidence of past events that remain buried deep within Arctic ice and mud from the sea-bed. Work by this team has revealed several previously undocumented eruptions and allow us to link and compare the North Atlantic marine records with the Greenland ice-core records. Their work will boost people’s understanding of the cause-and-effect relationship between large-scale changes in both atmospheric and sea temperatures.

Contact details: http://swansea.ac.uk/science/swanseasciencecafe/

About Science Cafe Wales

Each month, a leading expert in their field will give a brief introductory talk followed by a friendly informal chat. You can sit back, relax with a drink and listen or get involved in the discussion and debate. The Science Café organisers are committed to promoting public engagement with science and to making science accountable.

Science Café Wales are held in casual settings in Cardiff, Swansea and Bangor. They are informal and accessible and entrance is entirely free. They usually start with a short talk from the speaker, usually a scientist or writer, followed by a quick break and then an hour or so of discussion afterwards.

Previous topics have included dark matter, the common cold, Dr Who, the Big Bang and alternative therapies.

The first Cafes Scientifiques in the UK were held in Leeds in 1998. From there cafés gradually spread across the country.

Currently, some 40 or so cafés meet regularly to hear scientists or writers on science talk about their work and discuss it with diverse audiences.