Birth: 1958
Specialty: Climatology
Major Contributions:
Co-Chair, New York City Panel on Climate Change
Member, IPCC Task Group on Data and Scenarios for Impact and Climate Assessment
Founder of Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP)
Image: United Nations University in Bonn (CC BY-SA 4.0 DEED)
The Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project is a major international effort that links the climate, crop, and economic modeling communities with cutting-edge information technology in order to produce improved crop and economic models as well as the next generation of climate impact projects for the agricultural sector. And it was co-founded by climate scientist Dr. Cynthia Rosenzweig. AgMIP’s goals are to enhance adaptation capacity in developed and developing countries and to improve substantially the characterization of world food security due to climate change.
Considered one of the pioneers in the study of the impact of climate change on agriculture and human cities she fuses together impact models with climate models to predict future outcomes for both land-based and urban systems under changing climate conditions. Earning degrees in agricultural science, soils and crops; her doctorate in Plant, Soil and Environmental Sciences was awarded by the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 1991. Working as a Senior Research Scientist at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, she is the head of the Climate Impacts Group, has published numerous articles and books, and has been involved with many working groups looking at climate change.
Rosenzweig is the Co-Chair of the New York City Panel on Climate Change, a group created by the city’s mayor to provide advice on adaptation of its critical infrastructure. For the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report, she filled the role of a Coordinating Lead Author as well as being a co-lead of the Metropolitan East Coast Regional Assessment of the U.S. National Assessment of the Potential Consequences of Climate Variability and Change.
Named as one of Nature’s Ten People Who Mattered in 2012 by the science journal Nature, she is also a recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship. In 2007 her work with the IPCC Task Force on Data was recognized as part of the joint Nobel Peace Prize between Al Gore and the IPCC. In 2022 she was awarded the World Food Prize for her research to understand the relationship between food systems and climate and forecast how both will change in the future. Rosenzweig is also a professor at Barnard College and a Senior Research Scientist at the Earth Institute at Columbia University.
Written by Angela Goad
Sources:
NASA: GISS Personnel Directory – Dr. Cynthia E. Rosenzweig
Wikipedia: Cynthia E. Rosenzweig
AgMIP Co-Founder Cynthia Rosenzweig Receives 2022 World Food Prize
See Also:
Google Scholar: Cynthia Rosenzweig
The Chicago Council on Global Affairs: Interview with Cynthia Rosenzweig (YouTube)
EarthSky: Cynthia Rosenzweig on Climate Change and Cities
ESPPmsu: Cynthia Rosenzweig talks urban adaptation to climate change (YouTube)