Weather and climate impacts are often felt locally even though they may be caused by remote drivers operating across a wide range of spatial and temporal scales. The Climate Dynamics group currently explores these teleconnections in the context of modes of variability such as the quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) in the tropics and the polar vortex, including those phenomena driving them (e.g. small-scale gravity waves and Rossby waves) and their inherent predicability on seasonal to decadal timescales.
The student will be encouraged to explore how well-known modes of tropospheric weather and climate, such as the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), El Nino and the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) impact and are influenced by phenomena, processes and pathways operating throughout the full atmosphere.
The student may like to pursue innovative and robust methods for diagnosing coupling in observations and climate models, ranging from multi-linear regression to more specialised techniques including Networks (e.g. Causal Effects Networks, Complex Networks etc) and synchronisation metrics. The student may also like to pursue climate modelling using large and sophisticated Earth system models and physics parameterisation (e.g. small scale gravity waves) or novel machine-learning methods exploring these.
Through strong links with the National Centre for Atmospheric Science the student will achieve: an increased awareness of long-term datasets; access to the latest Earth System models, such as UKESM; direct links with a large and diverse network of physical climate scientists.
Qualifications & experience
B.Sc.(Hons, 1st), Ph.D.(Physics); Have experience teaching undergraduates within college (Wadham) and Department (Physics) environments. Teaching has involved small tutorial groups and Senior Laboratory Demonstrating. I have (co-)supervised a number of past and present undergraduate (MPHYS) and Graduate (MPhil, DPhil) students.
