The John F. Nye Lecture honors the work of cryospheric science pioneer, John F. Nye. This named lecture is presented annually during the AGU Fall Meeting in San Francisco. The Nye Lecturer is selected based on highlighting and recognizing an outstanding cryospheric scientist and her/his recent accomplishments as well as the individual’s ability to present exciting science to the non-cryosphere community of AGU scientists.
Who is Dr. John Nye?
John F. Nye is a cryospheric science pioneer; currently professor emeritus in physics at the University of Bristol, in the UK. Nye planted intellectual seeds widely on topics in their infancy. Nye developed a new theory in the early 1950s that ice deformed irrecoverably. Nye applied this new ice rheology theory with success in predicting glacier behavior, including a new science of glacier surging. What is today commonly referred to as Glen’s flow law is more appropriately named the Glen-Nye flow law; and remains in widespread use. Nye studied water flow in ice more than 50 years ago, a topic receiving critical attention today as melt water is now widely recognized as providing a rapid response mechanism of land ice to climate warming. Nye made other pioneering work investigating dynamics at the bed of glaciers. So-called, Nye-channels are those forming in the glacier bed, in contrast to Röthlisburger channels that form in the overlying ice.
(From Jason Box’s introduction to the 2008 Nye Lecture)