This photo of Melissa Burt was taken along the coast of Washington.
Click on image for full size
Courtesy of Melissa Burt

Melissa Burt

I've been interested in the weather since I was a little girl. I grew up in Maryland and during the summer I would call the weather line every hour to find out if we had a chance of thunderstorms or not. At first I wanted to know because the thunder used to scare me, but it then began to excit me. I was also fascinated by the many types of clouds and the shapes that they formed. Because of this I knew throughout school that I wanted to study the weather.

As a graduate student, I study paleoclimate, which is climate of the past. The time period we are studying is the Last Glacial Maximum, which occurred 21,000 years ago and during this time ice sheets were at their maximum extent. My research looks at how the climate has changed since the Last Glacial Maximum.

In my free time, I also enjoy shopping, snowboarding, watching clouds, and playing with my puppies.

Last modified May 22, 2008 by Becca Hatheway.

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