Vanishing polar ice talk to be Webcast live, April 10
Waleed Abdalati is head of the Cryospheric Sciences Branch at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.
2:47 p.m., April 8, 2008--NASA scientist Waleed Abdalati, one of the world's pre-eminent experts on the study of global climate change, will present “Dramatic Changes in Earth's Polar Ice: Are We Waking Sleeping Giants?” at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, April 10, in the Gore Recital Hall of the Louise and David Roselle Center for the Arts at UD.

As head of NASA's Cryospheric Sciences Branch, Abdalati leads a group of scientists who work with satellites and aircraft instruments to understand Earth's changing ice cover. He will highlight the critical role that ice plays in shaping our environment and what the loss of ice cover may mean for life on Earth.

Abdalati received the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers from the White House in 1999 and the NASA Exceptional Service Medal in 2004. He also has made appearances on CNN, NBC, National Geographic and other major television and radio networks and programs.

The lecture, which will feature stunning NASA images and animations, also will be Webcast live at [www.udel.edu/UMS/udlive] and simulcast to UD's island in the Internet-based, 3-D virtual world of Second Life, at [http://slurl.com/secondlife/University%20of%20Delaware/141/227/30].

To attend the free event, register online at [www.udel.edu/research/polar/registration.html].

The lecture is the latest installment in UD's William S. Carlson International Polar Year Events--a year-long series of lectures, receptions, research seminars, art exhibits and film showings that was launched in February to increase public awareness of the importance of the world's polar regions.

For more information about UD's polar research, visit [www.udel.edu/research/polar].