Linda Mearns

Linda O. Mearns—A Life Lived on Her Own Terms

Linda Mearns, a lifelong student of uncertainty, was sure of the things that mattered: her love for her long-time partner and wife, Zhenya Gallon, her deep and abiding friendships, and her belief—often wry, sometimes stubborn—that the fight for a better world was always worth it. She lived with fierce intellect, unwavering loyalty, and a keen eye for injustice.

Linda passed away peacefully at home on the evening of January 23, 2025, surrounded by love, after an arduous six-month battle with pancreatic cancer. Zhenya was by her side, along with her beloved cats, Crispin and Theo. She was 75 years old. During her illness Linda received excellent, compassionate care from the Anschutz Medical Center’s cancer and palliative care teams and from at-home hospice and home health aides. Zhenya is eternally grateful for the friends near and far who rallied around both of them with such unbridled love and support.

From her birth in 1949 on Long Island, Linda never followed a conventional path. Whether in life or in thought, she questioned with deep intent, challenged with acerbic wit, and resisted easy answers. She studied philosophy at the University of Wisconsin–Madison as an undergraduate—a fitting foundation for a scholar whose career would be defined by grappling with uncertainty.

With her unbounded curiosity, Linda could have taken many paths. After a few years in France, where she earned a diploma in French language skills, she chose to pursue her love of science and nature through graduate studies in geography and climatology at the University of California, Los Angeles. After completing her master’s and PhD, Linda accepted a postdoctoral fellowship in 1987 at the National Science Foundation’s National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado. She spent the next four decades there, rising to Senior Scientist in 1995 and directing an institute and several programs along the way. At NCAR, she pioneered research on climate change, from regional climate modeling, climate change scenario development, and decision making under uncertainty, to climate impacts on agriculture, ecosystems, and the built environment.

Linda was a renowned scientist with an extraordinary national and international influence. Her development of the North American Regional Climate Change Assessment Program (NARCCAP) was fundamental in advancing regional climate research in the U.S. and abroad. Her work was groundbreaking, not just in its scientific contributions, but in her insistence that different disciplines should actually talk to each other, long before interdisciplinarity and convergence research gained currency. She helped make a seat at the table for diverse stakeholders, from farmers to water and wildfire managers, infrastructure engineers, and other planners and policymakers. She was an indefatigable participant in the United Nations–sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, serving as an author for all but the first of the panel’s six assessment reports to date (1995-2022). Linda’s work and that of colleagues from around the world led to the IPCC being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007—though she would have been first to point out that the honor did not come with a tiara.

Linda had a profound influence on the young people in her life. As a dedicated mentor, she guided dozens of young scientists—not only but especially women—with a balance of challenge and grace, leaving a lasting impression on their careers. Yet Linda’s passion for science extended far beyond the academic world: she shared it generously with her friends and their children, making complex ideas accessible and inspiring. She had a gift for turning everyday moments into opportunities for wonder and learning.

Most notably, though, Linda collected people and never lost them. Her professional collaborators often became lifelong friends, and her personal friendships, spanning decades, were sustained by her attentiveness, playfulness, and the kind of loyalty that means showing up—always. The fervent fellow students at Madison fighting racial and social injustice and protesting the Vietnam War, the Los Angeles Bread and Roses feminist theater group bringing laughter and light to gender issues, the Save Mono Lake Committee, the many dedicated NARCCAP participants, the late-lunch crowd at NCAR, the eternally famous Book Group—Linda was somehow always essential. Every group became a circle, and every circle a family, whether writing a book, saving a lake, or sharing a song.

Linda navigated the world of science much as she did the world at large—with intellect, persistence, wit, and a healthy skepticism of authority. The impact of her pioneering work was recognized upon her retirement in 2024, when she was named an NCAR Distinguished Scholar, making her the only woman to date to hold that title. It was, as she might have said, about damn time.

Linda authored more than 100 peer-reviewed publications. Her honors include the American Association of Geographers Distinguished Scholarship and Lifetime Achievement Awards, the Stephen Schneider Lecture of the American Geophysical Union, and election as a fellow of the American Meteorological Society.

Linda and Zhenya had many plans for their retirement, but the universe, as it so often does, had other ideas. And yet, Linda died as she had lived—on her own terms, surrounded by the people she loved, questioning, challenging, and always completely herself.

Donations in Linda’s memory may be made to the Gaylord Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies Fund (https://bit.ly/niespriorities) (University of Wisconsin), the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund (https://www.csldf.org/donate/) , or Doctors Without Borders (https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/) . A memorial gathering is planned for the spring.