photo credit: Geoff Notkin
I am a paleoclimate scientist, an author, and a speaker. As a professor in the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research at the University of Arizona, I use the rings in trees to study past climate and how it has influenced ecosystems and human systems. I was born and raised in Belgium, where I received my PhD in Bioscience Engineering at the KULeuven in 2004. I have worked at PennState University and at the Swiss Federal Research Institute WSL before moving to Tucson, AZ. In 2023 and 2024, I served as the founding Scientific Director of the Belgian Climate Centre. From 2026 onwards, I am also affiliated with the Department of Water and Climate at the Vrije Universiteit Brussels. You can find my recent full CV here.
I have been a dendrochronologist for almost two decades and my research focuses on the climate of the past ~2,000 years and how it has influenced human history and ecosystems. I have used tree rings to study hurricanes, snowpack, wildfire, and the jet stream. I have studied the influence of climate on historical events, such as the Fall of Rome, the Ottoman Crisis, and the Golden Age of Piracy. My research has brought me to sub-Saharan Africa, Siberia, the Californian Sierra Nevada, and the Balkans, where I was part of a team that found the oldest-known (1,075 years!) living tree in Europe. I have published more than 100 scientific papers and am a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).
I am also an award-winning author. I have written Tree Story (JHUP, 2020), a popular science book about dendrochronology, and was the consulting editor for In the Circle of Ancient Trees (Greystone Books, 2025), which features 10 iconic tree species and is beautifully illustrated by Blaze Cyan. Maybe unexpectedly, I published my first crime novel, Cuberdon, in 2026 (De Geus) in Dutch (my mother tongue).
I occasionally write essays about dendrochronology, climate, trees, and life as a scientist. My essays have been published in Aeon and The Guardian, amongst others.