Benjamin David Santer, Ph.D., is a physicist and atmospheric scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory at the University of California in Livermore.

Santer's research interests include the identification of human-induced climate change in observations, and evaluation of climate model performance. As a physicist in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Directorate at Lawrence Livermore, he works on statistical methods in climate model validation, climate change detection, and attribution studies.

Santer in 2002 earned the U.S. Department of Energy Ernest Orlando Lawrence Award (for environmental science and technology) and an Outstanding Scientific Paper Award from NOAA. He won a MacArthur Fellowship in 1998 and was included in the New York Times Science Times profiles of groundbreaking scientists in 2000. He has been active as a Contributor and as a Convening Lead Author with the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a member of NOAA's Science Advisory Panel, and a member of the National Research Council's panel on "Reconciling Observations of Temperature Change."

A member of the American Geophysical Union, Santer earned his B.Sc. in Environmental Sciences from the University of East Anglia, Norwich, U.K., and his Ph.D. in Climatology from the University of East Anglia.