I'm a paleoclimatologist at the Irish Climate Analysis and Research Units at Maynooth University. I study how tropical rainfall changed in the past and what changes in the climate system cause periods of droughts and periods of wetter conditions. To do this I use stalagmite geochemistry, using the changing chemical composition of layers of stalagmite calcite formed from falling dripwater over thousands of years as a record of how rainfall changed above the cave. I've worked in field areas across the world including Indonesia, Australia and Madagascar. I have a Geology degree from the University of Oxford and did my PhD at The Australian National University. After postdoctoral positions at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and University College Dublin I am now at Maynooth University.