James Zachos


James Zachos is an American paleoclimatologist, oceanographer, and marine scientist. He is currently a professor and chair of the Department of Earth and Planetary sciences at University of California, Santa Cruz where he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2017. He has conducted research on a wide variety of topics related to biological, chemical, and climatic evolution of late Cretaceous and Cenozoic oceans, and he is recognized for transforming our understanding of long-term climate change and climate transitions in the past 65 million years. His investigations of past climatic conditions are intended to improve our ability to understand the consequences of anthropogenic carbon emissions on future climate change.
Professor Zachos has co-authored over 160 publications and has been invited to give over 140 lectures at institutions, universities, and conferences around the world, including Stanford University, University of Cambridge, and Utrecht University, University of Sao Paolo, and International Conference on Paleoceanography VIII. He has also participated on multiple Ocean Drilling Program Expeditions to the Arctic and Southern Ocean, Pacific and Indian Oceans. In 2004, Zachos served as the co-chief scientist of Leg 208 expedition to the south Atlantic.
Zachos is a fellow of the Geological Society of America, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and American Geophysical Union. In 2016, he received the Milutin Milankovic Medal by the European Geosciences Union, which is awarded to scientists for their outstanding research in long-term climatic changes and modelling.

Research

James Zachos’ research is focused on the biological, chemical, and climatic evolution of late Cretaceous and Cenozoic oceans. This research typically involves analysis of the chemical and isotopic composition of fossil shells from marine sediments to reconstruct past changes ice-volume, ocean temperatures, circulation, productivity, and carbon cycling. Combined with numerical models, such observations are used to determine the mechanisms responsible for the long and short-term changes in global climate. Presently, Zachos’ research group is studying several episodes of rapid and extreme changes in climate including the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum.

Academic Background

In 1981 Zachos received bachelor's degrees in Geology and Economics from the State University of New York, Oneonta. Zachos obtained his M.S. in Geology at The University of South Carolina and a Ph.D. in Geological oceanography at the University of Rhode Island. After completing his education, he pursued a postdoctoral fellowship at University of Michigan from 1988 to 1990 before joining the faculty of the Department of Earth Sciences UC Santa Cruz in 1992. In 2000 he was a visiting fellow at the University of Cambridge.

Recognition