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Dr Ailish Graham

Dr Ailish Graham

Profile

I’m a research fellow in the School of Earth and Environment at the University of Leeds, where I work in the Atmospheric Chemistry Modelling Group and Biosphere and Atmosphere Group. My work on the PaCSAC project focuses on the impacts of current and future agricultural emissions on air pollutants (particularly fine particulate matter and ozone) and crop yields in China. In order to identify feasible future agrciultural emissions reductions options the project has worked closely with Chinese stakeholders. The impacts of the identified emissions reductions options on air quality are modelled using WRF-Chem and this allows the impacts on human health and crop yields to also be quanified.

Alongside my work on the PaCSAC project I am also involved in a Met Office Academic Partnership with Ben Drummond who works in the Met Office's Numerical Atmospheric-dispersion Modelling Environment (NAME) team. The project aims to investigate the affect of model resolution on the modelled impacts of wildifres on AQ using the Saddleworth Moor 2018 wildfire as a case-study. We compare simulations for the fires from WRF-Chem (10 km resolution) and two NAME configurations (12 km and 2.2 km resolution).

I am also involved in a University of Leeds outreach project working with 3 local schools. Within the project students will design and carry out their own experiments to learn about their local air quality using low-cost personal air quality sensors. The students are currently in year 8 and the project will follow them throughout their secondary school years, using different topics each year to show them possible careers in STEM and introduce them to the university. 

Research interests

My main reserach interests are:

  • The relationship between emissions and meteorology and their impact on regional air quality (AQ) (paper) 
  • Atmospheric modelling of air pollutants (e.g. PM2.5, O3 and NO2)
  • AQ and its impact on population exposure (e.g. the 2018 Saddleworth Moor fires (observational and modelling) , the Australia megafires 2019/2020 (observational and modelling))
<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: Simulation and evaluation of regional UK air quality using WRF-Chem
  • MRes Climate and Atmospheric Science
  • BSc Geological Oceanography

Research groups and institutes

  • Institute for Climate and Atmospheric Science