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Professor Martyn Chipperfield

Professor Martyn Chipperfield

Profile

I am an atmospheric scientist within the School of Earth and Environment. I am also a member and former Director of the Institute for Climate and Atmospheric Science (ICAS).

After obtaining my PhD at Cambridge, I worked in the Space Science Department of the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory and then at the French Met Office in Toulouse. I returned to Cambridge in 1993 where I was a Research Fellow and Assistant Lecturer in the Department of Chemistry. I moved to Leeds in January 2000.

My research group consists of 5 PhD students and 5 Post-Doctoral research fellows. Our current research includes:

  • Modelling of tropospheric chemistry and aerosols (e.g. impact of chlorine/bromine/iodine).
  • Studies of stratospheric chemistry and transport (e.g. stratospheric ozone depletion and recovery and impact of solar variability).
  • Interpreting and exploiting satellite observations in the stratosphere and troposphere.
  • Data assimilation and inverse modelling to retrieve carbon fluxes.
  • Modelling of regional air quality using regional models.
  • Modelling mesospheric metal layer chemistry.

I am the PI and lead developer of the TOMCAT/SLIMCAT 3-D atmospheric model. I am a PI in the NERC National Centre for Earth Observation. I am PI (or Co-I) on the current NERC projects LSO3, Polygram, InHALE, MeteorStrat and the ESA OREGANO project.

I was the first Director of the Leeds-York NERC Doctoral Training Partnership (2013-2017). The DTP started in 2014 and recruits around 28 PhD students per year across 6 departments in the two universities.

I am currently on the Science Team for the ESA Explorer 11 candidate mission:  The Changing-Atmosphere Infra-red Tomography Explorer (CAIRT). CAIRT will be the first limb-sounder with imaging Fourier-transform infrared technology in space. By observing simultaneously the atmosphere from the mid-troposphere to the lower thermosphere (about 5 to 115 km altitude), CAIRT will provide global observations of ozone, temperature, water vapour, as well as key halogen and nitrogen compounds.

I have served on a number of national/international committees, especially related to ozone depletion, satellite missions and chemistry-climate modelling.

Awards:

  • Royal Society Wolfson Merit Award 2015
  • Royal Society of Chemistry John Jeyes Award 2018
  • Elected Fellow of American Geophysical Union 2020

Research interests

I have published over 360 peer-reviewed papers (h-index 63). A formatted list is available here.

  • Chemistry of the lower and middle atmosphere
  • Global modelling of stratospheric and tropospheric chemistry and transport
  • Chemistry-climate interactions
  • Stratospheric ozone layer depletion and recovery
  • Atmosphere-land interactions
<h4>Research projects</h4> <p>Any research projects I'm currently working on will be listed below. Our list of all <a href="https://environment.leeds.ac.uk/dir/research-projects">research projects</a> allows you to view and search the full list of projects in the faculty.</p>

Qualifications

  • PhD, Atmospheric Science, University of Cambridge
  • BA, Natural Sciences (1st class honours), University of Cambridge

Professional memberships

  • Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC, CChem)
  • Royal Meteorological Society (FRMetS)
  • American Geophysical Union (Fellow)
  • American Meteorological Society

Student education

I contribute to teaching in the areas of environmental science, atmospheric chemistry and satellite earth observation.

I am module leader for:

I also teach on the modules:

Before coming to Leeds I taught physical chemistry at the University of Cambridge and for the Open University.

Research groups and institutes

  • Institute for Climate and Atmospheric Science
  • Atmospheric Chemistry and Aerosols

Current postgraduate researchers

<h4>Postgraduate research opportunities</h4> <p>We welcome enquiries from motivated and qualified applicants from all around the world who are interested in PhD study. Our <a href="https://phd.leeds.ac.uk">research opportunities</a> allow you to search for projects and scholarships.</p>