Kumiko Goto-Azuma is an Antarctic palaeoclimatologist and glaciologist and Director of the Ice Core Research Center at the National Institute of Polar Research, Japan.^[1]

Early life and education

Goto-Azuma obtained her D. Eng in March 1986 from Hokkaido University.^[2]

Career and impact

Goto-Azuma has analysed ice cores from both polar regions^[3] and participated in Antarctic research expeditions to study the deep ice cores drilled at Dome Fuji.^[4] She analyses Arctic and Antarctic deep ice cores, with the goal of shedding light on the mechanism of glacial-interglacial cycles and the mechanisms behind the millennial-scale changes in global climate and environment.^[5][6]

Goto-Azuma has served as a Vice-President of the International Association of Cryospheric Sciences and on the Council of the International Glaciological Society.^[7] She is on the steering committees of the Japan Consoritum for Arctic Environmental Research,^[8] International Partnerships in Ice Core Sciences (IPICS),^[9] the committee of the East Greenland Ice-core Project,^[10] the Dome Fuji Ice Core Consortium^[11] and the Japan Consortium for Arctic Environmental Research.^[12] She has been appointed as a Science Adviser of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), Japan as of April 2016.

Awards and honours

Goto-Azuma was awarded the Hirata Prize of the Japanese Society of Snow and Ice in 1998.^[13] She also received a European Commission Marie Curie Fellowship Supporting international mobility and training in Bizkaia (B-MOB).