Julie Arblaster

Education

Arblaster grew up in country Victoria, Australia. She earned a Bachelor of Technology in Atmospheric Science, from Macquarie University, Sydney, and in 1995 was awarded First Class Honours, also from Macquarie University, for her thesis titled "Investigation of the storm tracks of the mid-latitude regions in an AGCM". Her Honours supervisors were Bryant McAvaney and Ann Henderson-Sellers.

From 1997-1999 Arblaster studied at the University of Colorado, USA, where she obtained an MSc in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences. Her Masters thesis, supervised by Gerald Meehl (National Center for Atmospheric Research) and Andrew Moore (University of Colorado) was titled "Interdecadal modulation of Australian climate in the Parallel Climate Model".

From 2007-2013 Arblaster completed her PhD, on drivers of southern hemisphere climate change, at the School of Earth Sciences, University of Melbourne, Australia. Her PhD supervisors were David Karoly, Ian Simmonds (University of Melbourne) and Gerald Meehl.

Career

From 1999-2003, Julie Arblaster worked as an Associate Scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). In 2003 she returned to Australia, working with NCAR and the Bureau of Meteorology in Melbourne. Arblaster worked as a Senior Research Scientist from 2003-2016 in the climate change processes team at The Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research, which is a partnership between the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation and the Bureau of Meteorology. She still maintains her research collaborations with the climate change prediction group at the NCAR. In 2016, Arblaster joined the School of Earth, Atmosphere and Environment at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, where she is an Associate Professor.

Honours

In 2014 Arblaster was awarded the Anton Hales Medal for research in earth sciences by the Australian Academy of Science. This award recognised Arblaster's research on the global climate system and its sensitivity to changes.

Arblaster was a contributing author to the reports of the IPCC, which was a co-recipient of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.

Research interests

Arblaster developed an interest in meteorology during the first year of her science degree, and subsequently switched the focus of her degree to study Atmospheric Science. During her time as a student she completed a summer internship at the Bureau of Meteorology, which inspired her to learn more about the climate system.

As of 2014, Arblaster's research was focused on mechanisms of recent and future climate change. She uses climate models to understand shifts in the Southern Hemisphere atmospheric circulation, tropical variability and climate extremes. Arblaster is interested in the interplay between the predicted recovery of the Antarctic ozone hole over coming decades and greenhouse gas increases in future climate projections.

Arblaster is a member of the World Climate Research Programme Stratospheric-Tropospheric Processes and their Role in Climate (SPARC) scientific steering group. She was a contributing author to the Working Group I contribution to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2007, and a lead author on the chapter on long-term climate change projections of the Working Group I Contribution to the Fifth Assessment Report of the IPCC. This chapter reviewed the available evidence to understand how the world's climate might have changed by the middle of this century and beyond. Notably, this IPCC report was the first to outline how much additional carbon dioxide can be emitted to keep global temperatures below specific thresholds.

Arblaster is also a lead author of the 2014 World Meteorological Organisation (WMO)/United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Scientific Assessment of Ozone Depletion.

Professional memberships