Climate and Atmospheric Science (ICAS) PhD Projects

The Institute for Climate and Atmospheric Science (ICAS) is dedicated to understanding the physical and chemical processes that govern the behaviour of the Earth's atmosphere. Please have a look at our latest projects listed below and use the links to the right of your screen which give information about the application procedure, fees and scholarships, and other relevant information. If you have already secured sponsorship for your research degree study and have a specific research proposal, we would welcome an application form from you.

Projects with Guaranteed Funding

• No Projects currently available

Projects in competition for the School's NERC Doctoral Training Awards 

The deadline for applications is 5pm on Friday 3 February 2012, and interviews will be held on Monday 27th February, Tuesday 28th February, and Friday 2 March 2012.

Our NERC Doctoral Training Awards are generally awarded to the best candidates following interviews. If you would like to be considered for one of these awards, you should select and rank up to 3 projects from the list below, submit a formal application, and supply all supporting documents before the closing date listed above. You may wish to check whether you are eligible for one of these quota awards.

Alternatively, funding for any of these projects may be sought in the University's scholarship competitions.

• Investigating links between vegetation and the water cycle using observations and models Steve Arnold (SEE), Dominick Spracklen (SEE), Chris Taylor (Centre for Ecology and Hydrology)

• Observations and Predictions of Heavy Convective Precipitation Professors Alan Blyth and Chris Collier, Drs. Peter Knippertz and Alan Gadian

• Modelling air-sea interaction in the coastal atmospheric boundary layer Ian Brooks, Andrew Ross (Leeds) and Judith Wolf (National Oceanography Centre, Liverpool)

• Improving NWP forecasts by the use of remotely controlled aircraft measurements Ralph Burton, Barbara Brooks, Alan Gadian and Alan Blyth

• Aerosol interactions and feedbacks in the Earth system Ken Carslaw, Dom Spracklen + CASE partner Gerd Folberth (Met Office, Exeter)

• The influence of climate change on the occurrence of crop pests and diseases Andy Challinor and Andy Jarvis

• Estimating and understanding large-scale CO2 sources and sinks in a warming world M.P. Chipperfield and E. Gloor (School of Geography)

• Predictions of rainfall changes - an energy budget approach Professor Piers Forster and Professor Douglas Parker

• Predicting the West African Monsoon Dr Peter Knippertz, Prof Doug Parker, Dr John Marsham, Dr Caroline Bain (Met Office)

• Quantifying the Environmental Effects of Stratospheric Geo-engineering Graham Mann, Ken Carslaw, CASE partner supervisor: Nicolas Bellouin (Met Office)

• Atmospheric mixing processes derived from aircraft observations in the Tropics Jim McQuaid, Doug Parker & Mat Evans (NCAS/York)

• Ice in the coldest clouds on Earth Ben Murray, Liane Benning, John Plane

• Convective storms, rainfall and their interaction with the continental land surfaces Professor Douglas Parker; Dr John Marsham, Dr Chris Taylor (external; CEH Wallingford)

• Ice-Multiplication Mechanisms: Their Role in the Linkage between Aerosols, Cold Clouds and Climate Vaughan Phillips, Steven Dobbie, Benjamin Murray, Alan Blyth.

• New approaches to quantifying the uncertainty in aerosol radiative forcing of climate Kirsty Pringle and Ken Carslaw (University of Leeds) and Nicolas Bellouin (Met Office CASE partner)

• Improving fog prediction through improved representation of deposition processes Dr Andrew Ross (Leeds), Prof Alan Blyth (Leeds and NCAS), Dr Jeremy Price (Met Office, MRU Cardington), Dr Adrian Lock (Met Office, Boundary-Layer processes group)

• Mitigation of climate by reductions in air pollutants Dr Dominick Spracklen (SEE), Prof Ken Carslaw (SEE), Prof Piers Forster (SEE) and Dr Jim Haywood (Met Office)