Dale is a physicist and geophysicist interested in the physics of electromagnetic radiation (from radio waves to X-rays) and ways to apply that physics to exploration of icy places in the solar system. He has also been leading development of an ice melt probe to further exploration of lakes beneath 1-4 km of ice in Greenland and Antarctica. These lakes are terrestrial analogs to ocean worlds in our solar system, in which he is interested from an astrobiological standpoint.