Research
INSTAAR researchers investigate fundamental questions about ecosystems, climate systems and landscapes. These six stories highlight the environmental research that the institute is doing in 2025.
A new study unveils a powerful dataset quantifying snow darkening and its impacts on snowmelt across the Colorado River Basin in real time. INSTAAR research scientists Karl Rittger and Sebastian Lenard are co-authors on the University of Utah-led paper.
A new modeling tool from INSTAAR provides weekly snow-water equivalent estimates for the entire Western US. It has already caught the attention of local and regional water managers.
Grad student Genevieve Clow is currently working aboard a research vessel on a 41 day expedition to the Indian Ocean. Read her blog post about gathering hydrographic measurements and collecting water samples.
Abby Eckland, Irina Overeem and collaborators investigate how a reservoir on the Rio Grande buries organic carbon beneath layers of sediment. The researchers found that the process is amplified during drought and flash floods.
Gifford Miller has studied the fossilized eggshells of the elephant bird Aepyornis maximus and comments on how human predation may have contributed to their extinction.
An INSTAAR-led study measured water vapor in Greenland’s air, collecting data crucial for improving climate models and forecasting Arctic changes.
A new study from Chloe Brashear, Tyler Jones and others suggests abrupt warming events were preceded by periods of unusually stable temperatures during the last ice age. The researchers point toward shifting sea ice as a potential driver of the phenomenon.
INSTAAR researcher Alton Byers and Wesleyan University professor Suzanne OConnell highlight research on a global increase in flooding due to melting glaciers. Nearly 2 billion people rely on water from alpine glaciers. But, as the climate warms, they are becoming more volatile.
When Jay Falk and Scott Taylor first saw the white-necked Jacobin hummingbird chick in Panama’s dense rainforest, the bird biologists didn’t know what they were looking at. They later realized that it was potentially mimicking a poisonous caterpillar to avoid getting eaten.