Professor Russell Drysdale serves as Professor of Physical Geography in the School of Geography, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences within the Faculty of Science at the University of Melbourne. He heads the Melbourne Stable Isotope Facility and specializes in palaeoclimatology, employing speleothems—cave minerals—as key archives for reconstructing past climates. His investigations target the nature, timing, and causes of ice-age terminations as well as millennial-scale climate changes throughout the Quaternary Period. Drysdale collaborates with geochronologists, palaeoceanographers, ice-core scientists, and palaeoclimate modellers to integrate speleothem records with ocean and insolation data, probing the drivers behind glacial terminations. Within Australia, his research emphasizes past hydrological variations in southern Australia and the monsoon tropics, assessing their connections to global climate disruptions.

Drysdale's scholarly output includes over 300 publications, amassing more than 10,600 citations according to Google Scholar, reflecting his substantial impact in the field. Prominent works encompass 'Evidence for obliquity forcing of glacial termination II' (Science, 2009), 'Magnesium in subaqueous speleothems as a potential palaeotemperature proxy' (Nature Communications, 2020), and 'Stalagmite evidence for the onset of the Last Interglacial in southern Europe' (Geophysical Research Letters, 2005). Additional significant papers cover synchronous abrupt climate changes during the last glacial period, persistent obliquity influences on ice-age terminations since the Middle Pleistocene Transition, and millennial climate change in southern Australia during the Last Glacial. He has contributed to public discourse through articles in Pursuit by the University of Melbourne, including 'What causes an ice age to end?', 'The rapid climate changes of the last glacial period', and 'A new thermometer for studying our past climate'. His interdisciplinary approach has enhanced comprehension of global teleconnections in palaeoclimate systems.

Professional Email: rnd@unimelb.edu.au