Trym is a PhD student with the Geography Department at UBC. His research focuses on Chinese foreign policy and extractive activities in the global commons. In his doctoral project, he studies interactions between science and diplomacy in developing regional expertise in the Arctic region, again focusing on China. He is a Predoctoral Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin, where he is involved in a project studying the rise of China and the changing geopolitics of international science. He is also a Research Associate with the Arctic Institute in Washington D.C., tracking developments related to shipping, extractive industries, and Chinese foreign policy in the Arctic region.
He is also a frequent contributor to The Diplomat, a magazine focusing on politics in the Asia-Pacific region, where he writes on the abovementioned topics.
Trym has previously worked for the Norwegian Foreign Service in China. He is trained as an anthropologist and went on to specialize in China Studies. He has previously studied at the University of Oslo, Peking University, and Fudan University.