SCENe Action Group Forum: Unlocking Antarctic Secrets with Julianne Burns
- 3 hours ago
- 1 min read
Earth's history is written in the mud at the bottom of the ocean. PhD student Julianne Burns is currently decoding this history to help us understand our future. She works with long cylinders of ocean floor mud that act as natural archives of the planet.
These sediment cores contain the story of past climates. They hold proxies that reveal details about ice sheet size, ancient vegetation, and ocean current behaviour. By understanding how Antarctic ice sheets responded to warming periods in the past, we get a much clearer picture of what might happen in the future.
This forum is a great opportunity for kaiako and rangatahi to learn how climate information is extracted from ancient sediment. The talk will cover how orbital cycles are imprinted in Antarctic ice sheet behaviour over millions of years.
Event Details:
Date: June 20, 2026
Time: 09:00 AM
Speaker: Julianne Burns
This research is vital for New Zealand. By looking at how the planet has shifted over millions of years, we gain the knowledge to make smarter decisions about climate resilience here at home. Understanding these ancient cycles helps our communities prepare for the environmental changes ahead.