James Davis, Ph.D.

Dr. James L. Davis has been a Lamont Research Professor since coming to the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in 2010. His expertise is in the field of Geodesy—the science of measuring of the size, shape, rotation, and gravitational field of the Earth—focusing on plate tectonics and on impacts of climate change, especially sea-level change and postglacial rebound. Dr. Davis received his B.S. in Physics at Michigan State University and his Ph.D. in Geophysics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He held a postdoctoral position at Harvard University and a National Research Council (NRC) Postdoctoral Associateship at the U.S. Geological Survey.

Before coming to Columbia, Dr. Davis was a Senior Geodesist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and Lecturer on Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University. Dr. Davis is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) and of the International Association of Geodesy (IAG). He served on the NRC Committee on National Requirements for Precision Geodetic Infrastructure and the Committee on Seismology and Geodynamics. He was President of the Geodesy Section of the AGU and the Founding President of UNAVCO. He has served as associate editor for the Journal of Geophysical Research and was a member of the NASA GRACE Science Team.