Julius Garbe

PhD Project

My research focuses on the long-term stability behavior and potential critical thresholds—so-called 'tipping points'—of the Antarctic ice sheet under the scope of future global warming. In particular, I investigate how the stability of the Antarctic ice sheet is affected by the influence of interacting tipping elements in the global climate system, such as the Greenland ice sheet or the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation. The aim of my PhD project is to assess the likelihood that a tipping of the Greenland ice sheet influences the tipping potential of the Antarctic ice sheet. Using numerical ice sheet modelling, I want to answer the question, how such a tipping cascade impacts future sea-level contributions from Antarctica.

My work is funded by the Leibniz Association project DominoES – Domino Effects in the Earth System: Can Antarctica tip climate policy?, a joint project by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and the Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences, and the EU's Horizon-2020 project TiPACCs – Tipping Points in Antarctic Climate Components.

• Advisor: Prof. Ricarda Winkelmann

Research Interests

• Ice sheet / ice shelf modelling (co-development of PISM)
• Antarctic ice sheet stability and future sea-level change
• Hysteresis behavior and tipping points of the Antarctic ice sheet
• Climate and socio-economic tipping interactions (DominoES)
• Earth system resilience (ERAlab)

Peer-Reviewed Journals

In Review / Submitted

• Garbe, J., Zeitz, M., Krebs-Kanzow, U., and Winkelmann, R.
  The evolution of future Antarctic surface melt using PISM-dEBM-simple
  The Cryosphere Discuss., doi:10.5194/tc-2022-249, in review, 2023.
• Urruty, B.*, Hill, E. A.*, Reese, R.*, Garbe, J., Gagliardini, O., Durand, G., Gillet-Chaulet, F., Gudmundsson, G. H., Winkelmann, R., Chekki, M., Chandler, D., and Langebroek, P. M.
  The stability of present-day Antarctic grounding lines – Part A: No indication of marine ice sheet instability in the current geometry
  The Cryosphere Discuss., doi:10.5194/tc-2022-104, in review, 2022. *These authors contributed equally to this work.
• Reese, R., Garbe, J., Hill, E. A., Urruty, B., Naughten, K. A., Gagliardini, O., Durand, G., Gillet-Chaulet, F., Chandler, D., Langebroek, P. M., and Winkelmann, R.
  The stability of present-day Antarctic grounding lines – Part B: Possible commitment of regional collapse under current climate
  The Cryosphere Discuss., doi:10.5194/tc-2022-105, accepted, 2023.

Published

• Bauer, N., Keller, D. P., Garbe, J., Karstens, K., Piontek, F., von Bloh, W., Thiery, W., Zeitz, M., Mengel, M., Strefler, J., Thonicke, K., and Winkelmann, R.
  Exploring risks and benefits of overshooting a 1.5°C carbon budget over space and time
  Environ. Res. Lett., 18, 054015, doi:10.1088/1748-9326/accd83, 2023.
• Garbe, J., Albrecht, T., Levermann, A., Donges, J. F., and Winkelmann, R.
  The hysteresis of the Antarctic Ice Sheet
  Nature, 585, 538–544, doi:10.1038/s41586-020-2727-5, 2020.
• Official press release: Stability Check on Antarctica Reveals High Risk for Long-Term Sea-Level Rise
• Animation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOQK1BUuseY
• Media coverage: The Guardian, DER SPIEGEL, ScienceNews, t-online, Der Standard, NRC, La Vanguardia
• Levermann, A., Winkelmann, R., Albrecht, T., Goelzer, H., Golledge, N. R., Greve, R., Huybrechts, P., Jordan, J., Leguy, G., Martin, D., Morlighem, M., Pattyn, F., Pollard, D., Quiquet, A., Rodehacke, C., Seroussi, H., Sutter, J., Zhang, T., Van Breedam, J., Calov, R., DeConto, R., Dumas, C., Garbe, J., Gudmundsson, G. H., Hoffman, M. J., Humbert, A., Kleiner, T., Lipscomb, W. H., Meinshausen, M., Ng, E., Nowicki, S. M. J., Perego, M., Price, S. F., Saito, F., Schlegel, N.-J., Sun, S., and van de Wal, R. S. W.
  Projecting Antarctica's contribution to future sea level rise from basal ice shelf melt using linear response functions of 16 ice sheet models (LARMIP-2)
  Earth Syst. Dynam., 11, 35–76, doi:10.5194/esd-11-35-2020, 2020.
• Official press release: The Antarctica Factor: model uncertainties reveal upcoming sea level risk

Other Publications

Academic Theses

• Garbe, J.
  Long-term evolution and critical thresholds of the Antarctic Ice Sheet (M.Sc. Thesis)
  University of Hamburg, 2017.
• Garbe, J.
  An overview of explanations for the problem of weak temperature gradients in warm climates in Earth history (B.Sc. Thesis)
  Humboldt University of Berlin, 2013.

Data & Code

• Garbe, J., other PISM authors
  PISM version as used in Garbe et al. (Nature, 2020) publication (Version v1.0-hysteresis-antarctica)
  Zenodo, doi:10.5281/zenodo.3956431, 2020.

Non-Peer-Reviewed Publications

• Garbe, J.
  Hysteresis For Dummies – Why history matters
  EGU Blogs, 2020.

Current Projects

• TiPACCs – Tipping Points in Antarctic Climate Components (Funded by the EU's Horizon 2020, 2019–2023)

Former Projects

• DominoES – Domino Effects in the Earth System: Can Antarctica tip climate policy? (Funded by the Leibniz Association, 2017–2021)

Associated Member

• COPAN – Coevolution of human-environment systems in the Anthropocene
• PROTECT – Projecting Sea-Level Rise: From Ice Sheets to Local Implications

• J. Garbe, M. Zeitz, U. Krebs-Kanzow, R. Winkelmann
  The evolution of future Antarctic surface melt using PISM-dEBM-simple (talk)
  PIK RD1 Science Discussion, February 8, 2023, Potsdam, Germany
• J. Garbe, M. Zeitz, U. Krebs-Kanzow, R. Winkelmann
  The evolution of future Antarctic surface melt using PISM-dEBM-simple (talk)
  Copenhagen PISM Workshop, October 24, 2022, online
• J. Garbe, M. Zeitz, U. Krebs-Kanzow, R. Winkelmann
  The evolution of future Antarctic surface melt using PISM-dEBM-simple (talk)
  EGU General Assembly 2022, May 23, 2022, Vienna, Austria
• J. Garbe, T. Albrecht, A. Levermann, J. F. Donges, R. Winkelmann, M. Kreuzer
  The Hysteresis of the Antarctic Ice Sheet (poster)
  28th International Polar Conference, May 4, 2022, Potsdam, Germany
• J. Garbe, T. Albrecht, A. Levermann, J. F. Donges, R. Winkelmann
  The Hysteresis of the Antarctic Ice Sheet (ignite talk and poster)
  InTENSE Workshop, August 16, 2021, Bad Belzig, Germany
• R. Winkelmann, J. Garbe, T. Albrecht, A. Levermann, J. F. Donges
  The Hysteresis of the Antarctic Ice Sheet (online display)
  AGU Fall Meeting 2020, December 16, 2020, online
• J. Garbe, T. Albrecht, A. Levermann, J. F. Donges, R. Winkelmann
  The hysteresis of the Antarctic Ice Sheet (talk)
  PIK RD1 Science Discussion, September 2, 2020, Potsdam, Germany
• R. Winkelmann, T. Albrecht, J. Garbe, J. F. Donges, A. Levermann
  Antarctic ice dynamics - from deep past to deep future (online display)
  EGU General Assembly 2020, May 5, 2020, online
• J. Garbe, T. Albrecht, J. F. Donges, A. Levermann, R. Winkelmann
  Long-term stability of the Antarctic Ice Sheet (poster)
  AGU Fall Meeting 2019, December 13, 2019, San Francisco, USA
• J. Garbe, T. Albrecht, J. F. Donges, A. Levermann, R. Winkelmann
  Hysteresis of the Antarctic Ice Sheet (poster)
  EGU General Assembly 201, April 9, 2019, Vienna, Austria
• J. Garbe
  Hysteresis Behavior of the Antarctic Ice Sheet (talk)
  PIK RD1 Young Scientist Seminar, November 14, 2018, Potsdam, Germany
• J. Garbe, T. Albrecht, J. F. Donges, A. Levermann, R. Winkelmann
  Hysteresis behaviour of the Antarctic Ice Sheet with the Parallel Ice Sheet Model (PICO presentation)
  EGU General Assembly 2018, April 9, 2018, Vienna, Austria
• J. Garbe
  Tipping of the Antarctic Ice Sheet influenced by Greenland ice loss (talk)
  PIK RD1 Young Scientist Seminar, October 26, 2017, Potsdam, Germany
• M. Martin, J. Garbe
  Entdeckungsreise zum Südpol (children's lecture)
  Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2017, June 24, 2017, Potsdam, Germany
• R. Reese, J. Garbe
  Entdeckungsreise zum Südpol (children's lecture)
  Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2016, June 11, 2016, Potsdam, Germany

• InTENSE Workshop on Interacting Tipping Elements
  Interacting Tipping Elements in the Natural and Social Components of the Earth System (InTENSE)
  August 15-18, 2021, Bad Belzig, Germany
• DominoES Workshop on Social Tipping Elements III (co-hosted)
  Criticality in Social Tipping Processes
  December 4, 2020, online
• Emergent Constraints & Tipping Points Workshop (University of Exeter)
  Emergent Constraints and Tipping Points
  November 23-26, 2020, online
• FRISP 2020
  Forum for Research into Ice Shelf Processes
  June 16-25, 2020, online
• DominoES Workshop on Social Tipping Elements II (co-hosted)
  Social Tipping Elements relevant to stay within planetary boundaries
  June 17-19, 2019, Cologne, Germany
• Karthaus Summer School 2018
  Ice Sheets and Glaciers in the Climate System
  September 11-22, 2018, Karthaus, Italy
• DominoES Workshop on Social Tipping Elements I (co-hosted)
  Social Tipping Elements Decisive for the Future of the Anthropocene
  June 4-6, 2018, Cologne, Germany