Dr. Martin Sharp

Biography

Dr. Sharp is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and the inaugural Director of the Canadian Ice Core Archive at the University of Alberta. Martin is a glaciologist with interests in ice-climate interactions, glacier dynamics and glacier change, and glacier hydrology and biogeochemistry.

Since 1982, has authored or co-authored over 200 peer-reviewed scientific papers, and co-authored (in 2017, with Dr. M. Tranter, Bristol University) a monograph on Glacier Biogeochemistry. He was also a Lead author of two scientific assessments of the state of the Arctic Cryosphere for the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program. He has received the Gordon Warwick and Wiley Awards for his research from the British Geomorphological Research Group and is an Aldo Leopold Leadership Fellow. He has extensive field experience in Iceland, Alaska, Norway, the Swiss Alps, the Canadian Rockies, Arctic Canada and Antarctica. He obtained his B.A in Physical Geography from Cambridge University (1979), and his Ph.D. in Glacial Geomorphology from the University of Aberdeen (1982). After holding a Junior Research Fellowship at Merton College, Oxford (1982-84), he was a Faculty member in Physical Geography at Cambridge University from 1984-1993, before moving to Canada. Over his academic career, he has supervised 55 graduate students and 15 PDFs.

Chairs/ Chaires

CAIP Chair in Watershed Science

Awards/ Prix

2014 – Elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada

2018 – University of Alberta Teaching Unit Award (joint award) for work on INTD 280, an Interdisciplinary Course on Mountains delivered as both a classroom course and in an on-line (MOOC) form

Selected Publications/ Publications sélectionnées

Modelling intra-annual dynamics of a major marine-terminating Arctic glacier. Pimentel S, GE Flowers, MJ Sharp, B Danielson, L Copland, L, W Van Wychen, A Duncan, & J Kavanaugh. Annals of Glaciology 58(74):118-139 (April 2017)
doi: 10.1017/aog.2017.23.

Brown, R., Barrette, C., Brown, L., Chaumont, D., Grenier, P., Howell, S. and Sharp, M. 2017. Chapter 2: Climate Variability, Trends and Projected Change. In Bell, T. and Brown, T.M. (Eds.) From Science to Policy in the Eastern Canadian Arctic: An Integrated Regional Impact Study (IRIS) of Climate Change and Modernization. ArcticNet, Quebec City, 18-57.

Glacier Biogeochemistry. Sharp M & M Tranter. Geochemical Perspectives 6 (2), 1-177 (European Association of Geochemistry) (Oct 2017)

Spatiotemporal variability of Canadian High Arctic glacier surface albedo from MODIS data, 2001–2016. Mortimer CA & M Sharp. The Cryosphere 12(2):701-720 (Feb 2018)

The world’s largest High Arctic lake responds rapidly to climate warming. Lehnherr I, VL St Louis, MJ Sharp, AS Gardner, JP Smol, SL Schiff, DCG Muir, CA Mortimer, N Michelutti, C Tarnocai, K St Pierre, N Michelutti, CA Emmerton, J Wiklund, G Köck, SF Lamoureux & CH Talbot. Nature Communications 9:1290 (Mar 2018)

Discovery of a hypersaline subglacial lake complex beneath Devon Ice Cap, Canadian Arctic. Rutishauser A, DD Blankenship, M Sharp, ML Skidmore, JS Greenbaum, C Grima, DM Schroeder, JA Dowdeswell, & DA Young. Science Advances 4(4): eaar4353 (Apr 2018)

Surface Velocities of Glaciers in Western Canada from Speckle Tracking of ALOS PALSAR and RADARSAT-2 images. Van Wychen W, L Copland, H Jiskoot, L Gray, M Sharp, & D Burgess. Canadian Journal of Remote Sensing 44(1):1-10 (Apr 2018)

Continuous non-marine inputs of per- and polyfluoralkyl substances to the High Arctic: A multi-decadal temporal record. Pickard H, A Criscitiello, C Spencer, M Sharp, D Muir, A De Silva, & C Young. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics 18:5045-5058 (Apr 2018)

Influence of recent warming and ice dynamics on glacier surface elevations in the Canadian High Arctic, 1995-2014. Mortimer C, M Sharp, & W VanWychen. Journal of Glaciology 64(245):450-464 (June 2018)