Professor Martyn Chipperfield
- Position: Professor
- Areas of expertise: Atmospheric chemistry; atmospheric science; ozone layer; climate; air pollution; air quality; numerical modelling; satellite observations
- Email: M.Chipperfield@leeds.ac.uk
- Phone: +44(0)113 343 6459
- Location: 11.110 School of Earth and Environment
- Website: Personal homepage | Web of Science | Googlescholar | Researchgate | ORCID
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. I am currently on the Steering Committee for the 2026 WMO/UNEP Assessment for Stratospheric Ozone
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
Group Alumni
- Dr Stewart Davies (PhD 2003), Senior Environment and Sustainability Advisor, efinium.
- Prof. Bjoern-Martin Sinnhuber (Postdoc), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany.
- Prof. Miriam Sinnhuber (Postdoc), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany.
- Dr Wuhu Feng (Postdoc), NCAS Scientist, University of Leeds.
- Dr Cate Bridgeman (Postdoc)
- Prof. Steve Arnold (PhD 2004, Postdoc), Professor, University of Leeds.
- Dr Jeff Evans (Postdoc)
- Prof Dominick Spracklen (PhD 2005), Professor, University of Leeds.
- Dr Adrian Hill (PhD 2006), ECMWF
- Prof Wenshou Tian (Postdoc, Visitor), Dean, College of Atmospheric Scences, Lanzhou University, China.
- Dr Kirsty Pringle (PhD 2006), Project Manager - Software Sustainability Institute, University of Edinburgh.
- Dr Beatriz Monge-Sanz (PhD 2008, Postdoc), Senior Researcher, University of Oxford.
- Dr Lara Gunn (PhD 2008)
- Dr Tom Breider (PhD 2010), Principal Data Scientist, The RepTrak Company, Boston, MA, USA.
- Dr Sarah Monks (PhD 2011)
- Dr Chris Wilson (PhD 2011, Postdoc), NCEO, University of Leeds.
- Dr Sandip Dhomse (Postdoc), University of Leeds.
- Prof Ryan Hossaini (PhD 2012, Postdoc), Professor of Atmospheric Chemistry, Lancaster University.
- Dr Michael Holloway (Postdoc), Senior Data Scientist, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Lancaster.
- Dr Erin Dawkins (PhD 2014), NASA Godard Spaceflight Center, USA.
- Dr Richard Pope (PhD 2014, Postdoc), NERC Fellow, NCEO, University of Leeds.
- Dr Nigel Richards (Postdoc), Associate Research Scientist, NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center, USA.
- Dr Joe McNorton (PhD 2016, Postdoc), Research Scientist, ECMWF.
- Dr Tim Keslake (PhD 2017), Chemistry teacher.
- Dr Natasha Aylett (PhD 2019)
- Dr Evgenia Galytska (PhD 2019), University of Bremen, Germany.
- Dr Shane Daly (PhD 2020), Analytical Development Chemist, Thermo Fisher Scientific.
- Dr Yajuan Li (Visitor), School of Electronic Engineering, Nanjing Xiaozhuang University, China.
- Dr Giorgio Taverna (PhD 2020), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany.
- Dr Chris Kelly (PhD 2020), Software Engineer, ECMWF.
- Dr Andreas Chrysanthou (PhD 2020, Postdoc), Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece.
- Dr Peter Joyce (PhD 2022)
- Dr Mike Cartwright (PhD 2023), Research Associate, University of Leicester.
- Dr Yang Li (Visitor), Lecturer, Chengdu University of Information Technology, China.
- Dr Xin Zhou (Visitor), Lecturer, Chengdu University of Information Technology, China.
- Dr Antonio Bruno (PhD 2023, Postdoc), NCEO Research Associate, University of Leicester.
- Dr Matilda Pimlott (PhD 2023)
- Dr Carlo Arosio (Postdoc), University of Bremen, Germany.
- Dr Ailish Graham (Postdoc), Research Associate, University of Leeds.
- Dr Emily Dowd (PhD 2024, Postdoc), Research Associate, University of Leeds.
<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>
- FlyZero - Climate impact of emissions from aircrafts using alternative fuel and energy systems
- Investigating HALocarbon impacts on the global Environment (InHALE)
- National Centre for Atmospheric Science
- National Centre for Earth Observation (NCEO)
- Ozone Recovery from Merged Observational Data and Model Analysis (OREGANO)
- POLYisotopologues of GReenhouse gases: Analysis and Modelling (POLYGRAM)
- Process analysis, observations and modelling - cleaner air for Delhi (PROMOTE)
- Sources and Impacts of Short-Lived Anthropogenic Chlorine (SISLAC)
- Stratospheric and upper tropospheric processes for better climate predictions (StratoClim)
- The Global Methane Budget
- Why is Lower Stratospheric Ozone Not Recovering?
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:
- SOEE2481 Atmospheric Pollution from Local to Global Scales
- SOEE2701 Fieldwork and Tutorials 2
- SOEE3190 Earth Observation from Space
I also teach on the modules:
- SOEE1281 Atmosphere
- SOEE1444 Fieldwork and Tutorials 1
- SOEE3431 Atmospheric Pollution: Causes, Impact and Regulation
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