Image, Illecillewaet Glacier, BC

Dr Shawn Marshall

Positions

Departmental Science Advisor

Environment and Climate Change Canada

Contact information

Background

Educational Background

B.A.Sc. Engineering Physics, University of Toronto, 1991

Ph.D. Geophysics, University of British Columbia, 1996

Research

Areas of Research

Glaciology and Glacier Response to Climate Change

NSERC-funded research studying glacier-climate processes, glacier modelling, and glacier response to climate change in western and Arctic Canada, Greenland, and former (Ice Age) ice sheets.

Paleoclimate

Ice cores, Pleistocene ice age climate and ice sheet dynamics.

Climate Change in Mountain and Arctic Regions

A longterm interest, with current project funding for the Canadian Mountain Assessment, a project of the Canadian Mountain Network being led by postdoc Graham McDowell and including PhD student Kate Hanly.

Hydrology of glacial and mountain streams

The isotopic and chemical fingerprint of glacial runoff is interesting as a way to characterize and quantify glacial contributions to streamflow, which are declining in southwestern Canada. As a spinoff of this work, my group is working with Alberta Environment and Parks on stream temperature monitoring of alpine streams in the Canadian Rockies to understand the altitudinal variations and seasonal evolution of stream temperature as a function of snow melt, glacier runoff, and groundwater inputs, including CABIN work to assess invertebrate populations. Undergraduate RA Althea Brolsma (Environmental Science program) is driving this research.

Courses

Course number Course title Semester
GEOG 303 LEC 01 01 Introduction to Climate Change Winter 2022 and Fall 2022
GEOG 503 Climate Change Fall 2021
GEOG 391 Geographic Feld Methods Summer 2021 and 2022

Awards

  • Faculty of Arts Distinguished Researcher Award, 2014
  • UofC Student Union Teaching Excellence Award (GEOG 503), 2011
  • Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, 2009
  • NSERC Discovery Accelerator Supplement (DAS), 2009
  • Canada Research Chair (Tier II) in Climate Change, 2007
  • W. Garfield Weston Foundation Fellow, Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, 2006
  • Young Scientist Award, Canadian Geophysical Union, 2005
  • Distinguished Research Award, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Calgary, 2004
  • Invited Delagate, "Leaders of Tomorrow" Symposium, Ottawa, 2004
  • Nomination, Student Union Teaching Excellence Award (GEOG 503), 2004
  • Council Member, International Glaciology Society, 2003-2005, 2003
  • Nomination, Student Union Teaching Award (GEOG 305), 2002
  • Appointed Chair of the American Geophysical Union Cryospheric Sciences Committee, 2001-2003, 2001
  • Nomination, Student Union Teaching Award (GEOG 305), 2001
  • Scholar, Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, 2001
  • Governor General's Gold Medal, UBC, 1997
  • NSERC Doctoral Thesis Prize, 1997

Publications