Welcome back to One Thing. I'm David Rind and this former NASA climate scientists felt like she was on another planet.

It is cowardice to retreat from asking the basic scientific questions because you fear that they might anger somebody in power.

Why she left and what it could mean for the future of government research. Stick around.

Is it true? Your office was above the diner from Seinfeld?

It was Tom's Diner on 112th in Broadway.

Kate Marvel worked at set office for a decade across two different stints from 2014 to March 26.

But unlike the TV show, the work she did there was definitely not about nothing.

Kate is an accomplished climate scientist. She has a PhD in theoretical physics.

She's also the author of the book Human Nature, Nine Ways to Feel About Our Changing Planet.

She now works at the nonprofit Project Drawdown, but up until a few weeks ago, she was doing climate research for the federal government.

So I was a research physical scientist at NASA, and it was my job to help understand using

both models and observations, this amazing planet

that we live on.

I think some people might hear NASA and think, what does that have to do with climate

change, climate science?

Can you just explain some of the Goddard Institute's history

specifically where you were? Of course, yeah. So NASA is in the business of studying planets,

and it just so happens that there is only one planet out there that we know of that is capable of

supporting life. And so NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies

really represents the pinnacle of what happens

when you turn all of that expertise you have in studying planets

and their atmospheres and how they work back on our own home.

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