Cathy Whitlock

Cathy Lynn Whitlock is an American Earth Scientist and Professor at Montana State University. She is interested in Quaternary environmental change and palaeoclimatology and was a lead author of the 2017 Montana Climate Assessment. Whitlock has served as president of the American Quaternary Association and was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2018.

Early life and education Whitlock was born in Syracuse, New York. She grew up in Syracuse and Denver. Whitlock studied at Colorado College and was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. She moved to the University of Oregon in 1990, and was made Head of the Department of Geography in 1999.

In 2004 Whitlock joined Montana State University, where she acts as co-director of the Montana Institute on Ecosystems. She studied the impact of Rocky Mountain uplift on the climate of the Western United States.

She was the lead author of the 2017 Montana Climate Assessment. In 2018 Whitlock was the first scientist based in a Montana institution to be elected to the National Academy of Sciences. She serves on the editorial boards of the journals The Holocene, Quaternary Research and Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology.

Awards and honors 2011 elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (FAAAS) 2014 Edmund O Wilson Biodiversity Technology Pioneer Award 2015 Association for Women Geoscientists Professional Excellence Award in Research 2017 Fellow of the Geological Society of America 2017 American Quaternary Association Distinguished Career Award 2018 Elected member of the National Academy of Sciences 2018 Montana State University System Regents Professor