People

Veerabhadran Ramanathan is the Edward A. Frieman Endowed Presidential Chair in Climate Sustainability at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego. 

He discovered the greenhouse effect of halocarbons, particularly chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) used in such applications as refrigeration and manufacturing. This discovery showed how gases such as CFCs that deplete the ozone layer could also have ramifications for climate.This led to establishing the now accepted fact that non-CO2 gases are a major cause of planet warming and also enabled the Montreal Protocol to become the first successful climate mitigation policy. Ramanathan is a distinguished contributor to several areas of the atmospheric sciences including developments to climate models, radiative forcing of climate change, atmospheric pollution and brown clouds. He has been a part of major projects such as the Indian Ocean Experiment (INDOEX) and the Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE). His work has led to numerous policies including the formation of the Climate and Clean Air Coalition by the United Nations. He now heads the Bending the Curve: Climate Change Solutions project of the University of California; and editor and author of the 2019 book: Bending the Curve: Climate Change Solutions.

For his illustrious work, he received the Tyler Prize by Nobel Laureate Sherwood Rowland in 2009 and named as Earth Champion by UN in 2013.He is a recipient of numerous honors and awards, and was named as Science Advisor to Pope Francis’ Holy See delegation to the Paris Climate Summit;  is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and council member of the Pontifical Academy of Science and a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.