Shawn Wang

Email:
[email protected]
Download Curriculum Vitae

Education

  • Massachusetts Institute of Technology - Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, PhD, 2025
  • Columbia University, BA, 2018

Research Interests

Dr. Wang is interested in understanding how Earth’s climate system varies on a range of different timescales, from year-to-year fluctuations to long-term climate change. He specializes in investigating the drivers and impacts of ocean-atmosphere variability in the tropical Pacific, Indian, and Atlantic Oceans. An area of his current research involves characterizing how climate oscillations in these tropical ocean basins can influence each other through two-way interactions.

Because of the relatively short record of instrumental climate data, Dr. Wang leverages a diverse set of tools including numerical climate simulations, paleoclimate proxy records, and low-order stochastic models in his research. By clarifying the mechanisms of tropical variability and change, his research aims to improve our ability to forecast and mitigate future climate extremes. 

Links

Publications

(Selected)

Hess A, Wang S, Oppo DW, Ummenhofer CC, Rosenthal Y, Oppo DW (2026) A strong Pacific Walker Circulation during the Little Ice Age, Science Advances

Wang S, Oppo DW, Ummenhofer CC (2026) Coupling of Pacific and Indian Ocean variability disrupted by 19th century volcanism, Nature Communications

Wang S, Waitzmann D, Oppo DW, Ummenhofer CC (2026) Remote and regional drivers of the Indonesian Throughflow: Implications for inter-basin freshwater transport, Geophysical Research Letters

Lu W, Oppo DW, Condron A, Liu Z, Zhu C, Lynch-Stieglitz J, Guo W, Hess A, Wang S (2025) Warmer shallow Atlantic during deglaciation and early Holocene due to weaker overturning circulation, Nature Geoscience

Wang S, Ummenhofer CC, Murty SA, Nguyen HTT, Buckley B (2024) Quantifying the internal and external drivers of Southeast Asian rainfall extremes on decadal timescales, Climate Dynamics

Teaching Experience

University of Colorado, Boulder

  • Physical Oceanography and Climate (Guest lecturer)
  • Dynamics of Past Climate Changes (Guest lecturer)

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

  • Climate Change Seminar (Guest lecturer)