Claire L. Parkinson

Claire L. Parkinson was a climatologist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center from July 1978 through December 2022 and a Senior Fellow at Goddard from 2005 until her retirement. Her research emphasis was on polar sea ice and its connections to the rest of the climate system and to climate change, with a particular emphasis on satellite remote sensing. This work involved satellite data set generation and analysis, including the determination of decreases in Arctic sea ice coverage since the 1970s and examination of their regional variabilities and impacts, plus the quantification and analysis of the very different time series of sea ice changes in the Antarctic. Claire also developed a computer model of sea ice, did field work in both the Arctic and the Antarctic, and is the lead author of an atlas of Arctic sea ice from satellite data and a coauthor of two other sea ice atlases. She has also authored books on the history of science, climate change, and satellite observations, and has coauthored additional books on climate change and climate modeling.