Jud Partin

Jud Partin serves as a Research Associate Professor at the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics (UTIG), part of The University of Texas at Austin, with primary affiliation in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences. His research integrates paleoclimate archives—particularly tropical speleothems, corals, and foraminifera—with climate modeling to evaluate historical climate variability and improve future projections.

Education:

• Ph.D. in Earth and Atmospheric Sciences from Georgia Institute of Technology
• M.A. in Physical Chemistry from University of Southern California
• B.S. in Chemistry from The Citadel

Dr. Partin's work centers on paleoclimatology, specializing in tropical hydroclimate dynamics and ENSO reconstruction. He develops quantitative methods for interpreting proxy records while rigorously assessing reconstruction uncertainties. Current projects address abrupt climate transitions, Holocene hydroclimate shifts, and millennial-scale ENSO behavior through field-based proxy development and model-data comparisons. His approach emphasizes translating paleoclimate insights into constraints for modern climate models.

Analysis of his 2019-2025 publications reveals three dominant themes: methodological innovation in proxy interpretation (e.g., speleothem trace element calibration), tropical climate dynamics during key periods (Holocene, Common Era), and systematic data-model comparisons for ENSO and hydroclimate. Notable community contributions include the Iso2k paleoclimate database and PaCTS 1.0 reporting standards, reflecting his commitment to open science and reproducible research in paleoclimatology.

Based at UTIG's J.J. Pickle Research Campus, Partin collaborates extensively with climate modelers and field researchers across institutions. His work has received significant media attention, including coverage of tropical paleosea level studies in Micronesia and analyses of Greenland ice sheet dynamics, demonstrating the real-world relevance of his paleoclimate research to contemporary climate challenges.