Climate researcher receives Vega medal

Professor Dorthe Dahl-Jensen, Center for Ice and Climate, has been awarded the Swedish Vega medal – an honour she shares with polar explorers such as Scott, Nansen, Amundsen and Shackleton. HRH Carl Gustav XVI of Sweden presented the medal at the royal palace in Stockholm on 24 April, also known as Vega-day in Sweden.

Dorthe Dahl-Jensen leads the ice core drillings through the three kilometre thick ice cape on Greenland, and she is awarded the medal for her important climate-historical research.

Dorthe Dahl-Jensen is only the second woman ever to be awarded the honorary gold medal.

”It was quite an experience to be received at the royal palace in Stockholm and have the medal presented by the Swedish king. We talked for around 20 minutes, and the King revealed that he knows quite a lot about the climate conditions in the Arctic”, says Dorthe Dahl-Jensen, who participated in the Vega-symposium on the next day at the Kungliga Vetenskabsakademien (Royal Science Academy) in the Swedish capital.

The Vega award is instituted by The Swedish Society for Anthropology and Geography and is given out every three years on 24 April (Vega day). The award has been given 61 times.