Gavin A. Schmidt is a climatologist, climate modeler and Director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York, and co-founder of the award-winning climate science blog RealClimate. Work He was educated at The Corsham School, earned a BA (Hons) in mathematics at Jesus College, Oxford, and a PhD in applied mathematics at University College London. Schmidt worked on the variability of the ocean circulation and climate, using general circulation models (GCMs). He has also worked on ways to reconcile paleo-data with models. He helped develop the GISS ocean and coupled GCMs to improve the representation of the present day climate, while investigating their response to climate forcing. NASA named Schmidt to head GISS in June 2014. He stepped into the position left vacant after the retirement of long-time director James E. Hansen, becoming the third person to hold the post. In an interview with Science News, Schmidt said that he wanted to continue the institute's work on climate modeling and to expand its work on climate impacts and astrobiology. Research His main research interest is climate variability, both its internal and the response to climate forcing, investigated via ocean-atmosphere general circulation models. He also uses these to study palaeoclimate by working on methods to compare palaeo-data with model output. Schmidt helps to develop the GISS ocean and coupled GCMs (ModelE). This model has been "isotopically enabled" to carry oxygen-18 tracers, allowing the model to simulate the pattern of δ18O observed in ice cores, cave records and ocean sediments. Media and outreach Schmidt has appeared on various occasions in the media, often he is asked about his expertise on climate related study findings, current events or gives lectures. Schmidt worked with the American Museum of Natural History, the College de France, and the New York Academy of Sciences for education and outreach. Schmidt and eight other colleagues founded in 2004 the RealClimate blog. The blog provides critical commentary on climate science with the scope on outreach to the public and for journalists. Additionally, the blog features frequent guest posts by experts in their field. Articles and commentary have defended scientific research against allegations made about the hockey stick graph. During the 2009-2010 Climatic Research Unit email controversy he strongly defended the scientists involved, including Michael E. Mann and Phil Jones. Journalist Fred Pearce noted, "Schmidt wrote that the emails merely showed how scientists interact in private", and