Edouard Bard, born on September 1, 1962, is a French

climatologist Climatology (from Greek , ''klima'', "slope"; and , ''-logia'') or climate science is the scientific study of Earth's climate, typically defined as weather conditions averaged over a period of at least 30 years. Climate concerns the atmospheric ...

, Professor of

Climate Climate is the long-term weather pattern in a region, typically averaged over 30 years. More rigorously, it is the mean and variability of meteorological variables over a time spanning from months to millions of years. Some of the meteoro ...

and Ocean Evolution at the

Collège de France The (), formerly known as the or as the ''Collège impérial'' founded in 1530 by François I, is a higher education and research establishment () in France. It is located in Paris near La Sorbonne. The has been considered to be France's most ...

and a member of the

French Academy of Sciences The French Academy of Sciences (, ) is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French Scientific method, scientific research. It was at the forefron ...

Biography

After studying geological engineering (ENSG) in Nancy, Edouard Bard began his research at the

Commissariat à l'énergie atomique The French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission, or CEA ( French: Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives), is a French public government-funded research organisation in the areas of energy, defense and sec ...

(CEA) in

Gif-sur-Yvette Gif-sur-Yvette (, "Gif-on- Yvette") is a commune in southwestern Île-de-France, France. It is located in the Vallée de Chevreuse, from the centre of Paris (at Notre-Dame), in the Essonne department on the departmental border with Yvelin ...

(

doctoral thesis A thesis (: theses), or dissertation (abbreviated diss.), is a document submitted in support of candidature for an academic degree or professional qualification presenting the author's research and findings.International Standard ISO 7144: D ...

in 1987) and continued at the

Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory The Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (LDEO) is a research, research institution specializing in the Earth science and climate change. Though part of Columbia University, it is located on a separate closed campus in Palisades, New York. The obs ...

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

as a

postdoctoral A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). Postdocs most commonly, but not always, have a temporary acade ...

fellow in 1988 and as an associate researcher in 1989. Back in France, he first joined the CEA as a researcher, then began teaching as a professor at the

University of Aix-Marseille Aix-Marseille University (AMU; ; formally incorporated as ) is a public research university located in the Provence region of southern France. It was founded in 1409 when Louis II of Anjou, Count of Provence, petitioned the Pisan Antipope Alexand ...

in 1991 and at the Collège de France in 2001.Collège de France
/ref> He is currently deputy director of the European Centre for Research and Education in Environmental Geosciences (CEREGE) at the Arbois Technopole in

Aix-en-Provence Aix-en-Provence, or simply Aix, is a List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, city and Communes of France, commune in southern France, about north of Marseille. A former capital of Provence, it is the Subprefectures in France, s ...

and coordinates the EQUIPEX ASTER-CEREGE, project. Edouard Bard is the author of more than 200 articles in the peer-reviewed scientific literature, as well as some thirty popular articles (some available for download) and books intended for the general public, including L'Homme et le climat, Découvertes Gallimard, 2005 and director-author of L'Homme face au climat, Odile Jacob, 2006''L'Homme face au climat''.
/ref> and L'Océan, le climat et nous: un équilibre fragile ?, Le Pommier & Universcience, 2011. In 2011 and 2012, he was scientific curator of the exhibition "L'océan, le climat et nous" at the Cité des sciences et de l'industrie de la Villette in Paris. Since 2004, Edouard Bard has organized numerous symposia and symposia at the Collège de France on climate and ocean change, some of which are widely open to the general public and politicians, such as "L'Homme face au climat" in 2004, "Closing the Fourth International Polar Year" in 2009 in partnership with the Senate, "Arctic : the major scientific challenges" in 2012 in partnership with the Arctic Workshop, "Climate, energy and society: the Collège de France and COP21" in 2015 with the participation of the President of the Republic,

François Hollande François Gérard Georges Nicolas Hollande (; born 12 August 1954) is a French politician who served as President of France from 2012 to 2017. Before his presidency, he was First Secretary of the Socialist Party (France), First Secretary of th ...

. In 2007, he was vice-president of Group 1 of the

Grenelle de l'Environnement The Grenelle de l'environnement was an open multi-party debate that took place in France in the summer and fall of 2007 to define key points of public policy on environmental and sustainable development over the following five-year period. Bringin ...

on the fight against

climate change and energy Climate is the long-term weather pattern in a region, typically averaged over 30 years. More rigorously, it is the mean and variability of meteorological variables over a time spanning from months to millions of years. Some of the meteorolog ...

management, and participated in the French government delegations in

Ilulissat Ilulissat, also known as Jacobshavn or Jakobshav, is the municipal seat and largest town of the Avannaata municipality in western Greenland, located approximately north of the Arctic Circle. With a population of 4,670 as of 2020, it is the ...

Greenland Greenland is an autonomous territory in the Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark. It is by far the largest geographically of three constituent parts of the kingdom; the other two are metropolitan Denmark and the Faroe Islands. Citizens of Greenlan ...

and

Bali Bali (English:; Balinese language, Balinese: ) is a Provinces of Indonesia, province of Indonesia and the westernmost of the Lesser Sunda Islands. East of Java and west of Lombok, the province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller o ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Pacific oceans. Comprising over List of islands of Indonesia, 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, ...

for the

United Nations Climate Change Conference The United Nations Climate Change Conferences are yearly conferences held in the framework of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). They serve as the formal meeting of the UNFCCC parties – the conference of the par ...

( COP13). In 2009, he was a member of the Commission du Grand Emprunt national (Programme des investissements d'avenir) chaired by

Alain Juppé Alain Marie Juppé (; born 15 August 1945) is a French politician. A member of The Republicans, he was Prime Minister of France from 1995 to 1997 under President Jacques Chirac, during which period he faced major strikes that paralysed the c ...

and

Michel Rocard Michel Rocard (; 23 August 1930 – 2 July 2016) was a French politician and a member of the Socialist Party (France), Socialist Party (PS). He served as Prime Minister of France, Prime Minister under François Mitterrand from 1988 to 199 ...

, former prime ministers. From 2010 to 2013, he was a member of the Scientific Council of OPECST.

Scientific contributions

Edouard Bard's scientific work is at the interface of climatology, oceanography and

geology Geology (). is a branch of natural science concerned with the Earth and other astronomical objects, the rocks of which they are composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology significantly overlaps all other Earth ...

. Its main objective is to understand the natural functioning of the ocean-atmosphere-cryosphere-biosphere system on time scales ranging from a few centuries to several million years. Better documenting these changes, accurately dating them, understanding their mechanisms and modelling them are important tasks in projects to predict future climate change. For his research, Edouard Bard uses

analytical chemistry Analytical skill, Analytical chemistry studies and uses instruments and methods to Separation process, separate, identify, and Quantification (science), quantify matter. In practice, separation, identification or quantification may constitute t ...

techniques to determine the magnitude and chronology of climate variations. New quantitative methods have allowed him to reconstruct past environments from various archives such as marine and lake sediments,

coral Corals are colonial marine invertebrates within the subphylum Anthozoa of the phylum Cnidaria. They typically form compact Colony (biology), colonies of many identical individual polyp (zoology), polyps. Coral species include the important Coral ...

stalagmite A stalagmite (, ; ; ) is a type of rock formation that rises from the floor of a cave due to the accumulation of material deposited on the floor from ceiling drippings. Stalagmites are typically composed of calcium carbonate, but may consist ...

s and

polar ice A polar ice cap or polar cap is a high-latitude region of a planet, dwarf planet, or natural satellite that is covered in ice. There are no requirements with respect to size or composition for a body of ice to be termed a polar ice cap, nor a ...

. The common thread is the desire to study the same climatic phenomena, such as

glaciations A glacial period (alternatively glacial or glaciation) is an interval of time (thousands of years) within an ice age that is marked by colder temperatures and glacier advances. Interglacials, on the other hand, are periods of warmer climate betw ...

, using complementary and often innovative geochemical techniques. To study the climate of the past, he uses "time machines" - sophisticated

mass spectrometers Mass spectrometry (MS) is an analytical technique that is used to measure the mass-to-charge ratio of ions. The results are presented as a '' mass spectrum'', a plot of intensity as a function of the mass-to-charge ratio. Mass spectrometry is us ...

to measure radioactive isotopes and date climate variations recorded in geological archives. Another feature of his research is a back and forth between studies of past and recent periods, as well as current environments. Since variations in the climate system involve mechanisms with very different time constants, it is indeed crucial to have a long-term perspective in order to be able to distinguish the effects of climate forcings according to their geological, astronomical and anthropogenic origins. Edouard Bard's main scientific contributions concern the following topics: the diffusion of radiocarbon-labelled carbon dioxide in the ocean (first measurements in

accelerator mass spectrometry Accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) is a form of mass spectrometry that accelerates ions to extraordinarily high kinetic energies before mass analysis. The special strength of AMS among the different methods of mass spectrometry is its ability t ...

, variations in surface ocean temperature using organic, isotopic and elemental geochemistry indicators, the dating of fossil corals by mass spectrometry of

uranium Uranium is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Ura ...

and

thorium Thorium is a chemical element; it has symbol Th and atomic number 90. Thorium is a weakly radioactive light silver metal which tarnishes olive grey when it is exposed to air, forming thorium dioxide; it is moderately soft, malleable, and ha ...

to reconstruct sea level variations and to study the history of ice caps, the innovative use of radiocarbon as a tracer of CO₂ exchanges at the ocean-atmosphere interface, the calibration of the radiocarbon dating method and the use of other cosmogenic nuclides such as

beryllium Beryllium is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Be and atomic number 4. It is a steel-gray, hard, strong, lightweight and brittle alkaline earth metal. It is a divalent element that occurs naturally only in combination with ...

10 to reconstruct solar activity in the past, as well as variations in the

geomagnetic field Earth's magnetic field, also known as the geomagnetic field, is the magnetic field that extends from Earth's interior out into space, where it interacts with the solar wind, a stream of charged particles emanating from the Sun. The magne ...

and the global

carbon cycle The carbon cycle is a part of the biogeochemical cycle where carbon is exchanged among the biosphere, pedosphere, geosphere, hydrosphere, and atmosphere of Earth. Other major biogeochemical cycles include the nitrogen cycle and the water cycl ...

. A more detailed description of Edouard Bard's research is available on the GEOMAR Kiel website (Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research) published as part of the Petersen Foundation's 2013 Award of Excellence.

Main awards and honours

1991 - CNRS Bronze medal, For his research 1993 - Outstanding Young Scientist Award from the

European Union of Geosciences The European Geosciences Union (EGU) is a non-profit international union in the fields of Earth, planetary, and space sciences whose vision is to "realise a sustainable and just future for humanity and for the planet". The organisation has headq ...

1994 - Junior member of the

Institut universitaire de France The Institut Universitaire de France (IUF, Academic Institute of France), is a service of the French Ministry of Higher Education that annually distinguishes a small number of university professors for their research excellence, as evidenced by t ...

(IUF) 1997 - Donath Medal of the

Geological Society of America The Geological Society of America (GSA) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the advancement of the geosciences. History The society was founded in Ithaca, New York, in 1888 by Alexander Winchell, John J. Stevenson, Charles H. Hi ...

(GSA) and Fellow of the GSA 1997 - Paul Gast Award Geochemical Society Reading 1997 - Macelwane Medal of the

American Geophysical Union The American Geophysical Union (AGU) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization of Earth, Atmospheric science, atmospheric, Oceanography, ocean, Hydrology, hydrologic, Astronomy, space, and Planetary science, planetary scientists and enthusiasts that ...

(AGU) and Fellow of the AGU 2005 - A.G. Huntsman Award for excellence in the marine sciences (Canada) 2005 - Georges Lemaître Prize for Geophysics and Astronomy (Belgium) 2006 - Sverdrup Award Lecture, "ocean sciences" section of the AGU 2006 - Grand Prix Gérard Mégie of the French Academy of Sciences and the

CNRS The French National Centre for Scientific Research (, , CNRS) is the French state research organisation and is the largest fundamental science agency in Europe. In 2016, it employed 31,637 staff, including 11,137 tenured researchers, 13,415 eng ...

2007 - Chevallier in the

Ordre National de la Légion d'Honneur The National Order of the Legion of Honour ( ), formerly the Imperial Order of the Legion of Honour (), is the highest and most prestigious French national order of merit, both military and Civil society, civil. Currently consisting of five cl ...

2009 - elected Member of the

Academia Europaea The Academia Europaea is a pan-European Academy of humanities, letters, law, and sciences. The Academia was founded in 1988 as a functioning Europe-wide Academy that encompasses all fields of scholarly inquiry. It acts as co-ordinator of Europe ...

2010 - elected member of the

(Institut de France) 2011 - elected Foreign Member of the

Royal Belgian Academy Royal may refer to: People * Royal (name), a list of people with either the surname or given name * A member of a royal family or royalty Places United States * Royal, Arkansas, an unincorporated community * Royal, Illinois, a village * Royal, ...

, Science Section 2012 - Jaeger-Hales

Australian National University The Australian National University (ANU) is a public university, public research university and member of the Group of Eight (Australian universities), Group of Eight, located in Canberra, the capital of Australia. Its main campus in Acton, A ...

(

Canberra Canberra ( ; ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the Federation of Australia, federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's list of cities in Australia, largest in ...

) Reading 2013 - Wegener Medal of the

European Geosciences Union The European Geosciences Union (EGU) is a non-profit international union in the fields of Earth, planetary, and space sciences whose vision is to "realise a sustainable and just future for humanity and for the planet". The organisation has headq ...

(EGU) and Honorary Fellow of the EGU 2013 - Award of Excellence from the Petersen Foundation, Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research, GEOMAR Kiel 2014 - elected Foreign Member of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA 2014 - Grand Medal Prince Albert 1st of the Oceanographic Institute of Monaco. Video 2016 (As well as 2014 and 2001) - Thomson Reuters Highly Cited Researcher

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bard, Edouard Living people 1962 births French climatologists Academic staff of the Collège de France Academic staff of Aix-Marseille University Members of the French Academy of Sciences Foreign associates of the National Academy of Sciences

Biography

Scientific contributions

Main awards and honours

See also

References