GFZ German research centre for geo sciences

Dr. Gerhard Helle

Scientist
Dr. Gerhard Helle
Building D, Room 220 (Büro)
Telegrafenberg
14473 Potsdam

Function and Responsibilities:

Jointly with my trainees for the profession of a physics laboratory technician I am running the Dendroclimatology Laboratory. Our laboratory focuses on stable isotope analyses of tree organic matter, mostly tree ring cellulose at annual to sub-annual resolution and quantitative wood anatomy, i.e. wood cell structure analyses to produce multi-parameter time series for reconstructions of climate and environmental dynamics. We carry out the entire sequence of necessary project work from field deployment (tree-ring sampling & dendrohydrological monitoring (TERENO-NE)) to precisely dated annually-resolved time series of climate and environmental proxy data.

Further informationen online:
Patents:
  • "Verfahren zur thermischen Umsetzung von Probenmaterial in Messgas". DE102010001677.2; WO2011/095639A1

Research Interests:

  • Impact of climatic and geological extreme events on the isotopic signature of tree rings 
  • Climate signal and stable isotope transfer from atmosphere, soil and leaves into tree-rings
  • Stable isotope techniques with focus on invention and optimization of methodologies for high-resolution and high-throughput isotope analysis of tree-rings
  • Natural climate variability of the late Glacial/early Holocene period as well as the Common Era, i.e. the last 2000 years
  • Stable isotope variability in tropical timber (Tropical dendroclimatology) 

Career:

  • since 2009 Senior Scientist, Section 4.3 (formaly 5.2) Climate Dynamics and Landscape Evolution, German Centre for GeoSciences GFZ
  • 2005-2008 Group Leader “Tree-ring stable isotopes” at the Institute for Chemistry and Dynamics of the Geosphere, ICG-4 Sedimentary Systems, Helmholtz Centre Jülich
  • 2000-2005 Research Group Leader and Co-Ordinator of the young researchers network project  “ TRICE – Tree-Rings, Isotopes, Climate and Environment”, at the Institute for Chemistry and Dynamics of the Geosphere, ICG-4 Sedimentary Systems, Helmholtz Centre Jülich, funded by the German Federal Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF) within the German Climate Research Programme DEKLIM
  • 1998-2000 PostDoc at the Institute for Chemistry and Dynamics of the Geosphere, ICG-4 Sedimentary Systems (Prof. Dr. G.H. Schleser), Helmholtz Centre Jülich, Germany (special leave from MünsterUniversity)
  • 1997-1998 Assistant lecturer at the Chair of Palaeontology (Prof. F. Strauch), University of Münster, Germany    
  • 1997 Young scientist at the Chair of Palaeontology, Institute for Geology & Palaeontology, University of Tübingen, Germany

Education:

  • 1997 Dissertation (Dr. rer. nat.) in Geosciences, Department 14: GeoSciences, University of Münster, Germany Title: "Hochauflösende intra-annuelle Kohlenstoff-Isotopenuntersuchungen an Baumjahresringen"
  • 1994 Diploma in Geology & Palaeontology, Department 14: GeoSciences, University of Münster,  Germany

Research Boards and Committees:

2012 - 2018 Member of the board of Association for Tree-ring Research (ATR) (treasurer)

2001 Founding Member of the Association for Tree-ring Research (ATR) 


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