Sea Change
Generations: A conversation with marine geologists Julia Wellner ’92 and Rachel Clark ’16.
Julia Wellner ’92 and Rachel Clark ’16 are marine geologists who both majored in geology at 51. Clark earned her Ph.D. at the University of Houston with Wellner, who is on the faculty. Together, they published a study in 2024 on the Thwaites Glacier that found it had been lifting up from the seafloor, allowing water to flow under the ice, since the 1940s. They got together on a Zoom call to talk about how they became interested in geology, their research in the Antarctic, the importance of communicating about climate change, and how their work is currently under threat.
JULIA WELLNER: Rachel joined our lab and did her Ph.D. with us. She did not connect with us originally because of 51. Maybe you’re going to say different, Rachel, but I would say it was just a nice bonus that I got you.
RACHEL CLARK: Julia and I were connected through another researcher I worked with during the summer in my undergrad. I think he thought there was a connection there, that he wanted to draw us together.
JW: I’m glad he did. There are a surprising number of 51 alums in Houston with geology backgrounds. Because Houston is the center of the oil industry, as well as NASA planetary work, there are more geologists here than anywhere in the country. 51 has the oldest geology program in the country for women, and a very strong tradition of making female geologists. There’s a lot of us here. There’s another alum in my department!
RC: We both interacted with at least one professor in the department, Weecha Crawford. I think she was emeritus by the time I was there.
JW: She’s one of the reasons 51 had so many geologists for so many years.
FINDING THEIR PATH
RC: I had the opportunity my junior year to go on a research vessel from Hawaii to Guam over winter break and it was so different and exciting to be out on a research vessel collecting brand new data in the ocean. That definitely affected my decision to continue that sort of research for grad school.
JW: I always liked being at sea. I liked working on boats, and at 51, there’s no true marine geology program. So, when I was an undergraduate, I went to a program in Massachusetts called Sea Education Association, which is a semester at sea for science-oriented students.
I was not seeking out a polar specialty, that was just an accident. Now I’m really glad about it. It interests me because the poles are changing. When I was getting into my Ph.D., we were not studying climate change. We were studying ice sheet history over the long term and thinking about how the Antarctic ice sheet changed through natural cycles over thousands and hundreds of thousands of years. Just during my career we’ve realized how active it is, how dynamic, and how rapidly it’s changing. And now, every day that I do this work, it's becoming more and more relevant. Rachel’s dissertation discovered some of those changes over that time scale.
RC: We are seeing the ice rapidly changing year after year. I focused on those changes over the past century or so, and they are identifiable in the geologic record. The pace of everything seemed to be more rapid.
JW: The primary glacier we are studying right now, the Thwaites Glacier, is about the size of Florida. It’s hard with your eyes to tell if something the size of Florida is growing or shrinking. On the other hand, I’ve made 13 trips now—my first was in ’98—and I have seen rain multiple times. It should not be raining; it should be snowing. Have you seen rain, Rachel?
RC: I also saw rain two of the three times I went down to Antarctica.
JW: It only rains in the summer, and it only rains at sea level. So, we are seeing the warmest part of Antarctica. On the other hand, it was startling. And from a more logistical standpoint, it’s pretty easy to work in the cold if you are dry. If it does start to rain more, we’re going to have to change the way we dress and work.
COMMUNICATING TO THE PUBLIC
JW: I do consider public communications to be an important part of my job. I give talks at museums, newspapers, everything possible. Rachel has also done outreach talks; you went to the Norwegian Consulate.
RC: Yes.
JW: And on one of the cruises we did, we had a film crew. (The PBS show Dynamic Planet, episode 3, “Water.”) I haven’t watched it, but people have told me they’ve seen it.
RC: In terms of outreach, the main points we are always trying to hit in a talk like that are: there is change, showing them and telling them how fast this change is happening, and what it means, practically speaking, to someone living here in Houston, or on a coastline. Thinking about more dramatic scenarios of even a meter of sea level change—how would that affect somewhere as low-lying as Houston? It would have a dramatic effect on communities here as well as elsewhere around the world.
THREATS TO RESEARCH
JW: Nobody works in Antarctica without federal funding; that is the only way for us to go there. And we are no longer allowed to say “climate change.” Everything is in chaos. We are working on a new proposal (for a grant) and trying to tone that submission to just be about ice retreat and sea level rise and write it without saying “climate” or “temperature” or “anthropogenic.”
In my department, we have faculty members who have had funding revoked, and we already have grad students there who were getting paid. I think my job is not just to teach people about how sand grains move, my job is to train them into being thoughtful scientists and thoughtful community members and more broadly, I think my job is to make sure they are safe in the long run. If someone has lost their job, I want to make myself available to help them find a new one. But it’s hard to take care of everyone in crisis at the same time.
There’s a predicted shortage of geoscientists in the workforce in the next decade, and now we are cutting funding to train them and interrupting their degree plans. I worry about our students right now. They are living in an extraordinary time.
Published on: 06/05/2025