School of Earth and Environment
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Cathryn Birch Dr Cathryn Birch

Research Fellow

Telephone number: +44(0) 113 34 34931
Email address: C.E.Birch@leeds.ac.uk
Room: 11.121

Link to personal page

Biography

Cathryn Birch is a Research Fellow in the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science. Her current work involves modelling case studies of mesoscale convective systems over West Africa, which were observed during the African Monsoon Multidisciplinary Analysis (AMMA). She is also evaluating the performance of the Met Office Unified Model over various temporal scales over West Africa. In addition, she is involved in Fennec, which is a large-scale, multi-platform observational campaign in the Saharan Heat Low region that is due to take place during 2011.

Cathryn's PhD work looked at surface-atmosphere coupling over the central Arctic Ocean and she continues to do some research in this area.

Memberships/Fellowships

  • Associate Fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society

Research Interests

  • West African water cycle
  • Mesoscale convective systems
  • Saharan boundary layer
  • Polar meteorology

Publications

  • Norris, SJ; Brooks, IM; de Leeuw, G; Sirevaag, A; Leck, C; Brooks, BJ; Birch, CE; Tjernstrom, M (2011) Measurements of bubble size spectra within leads in the Arctic summer pack ice, OCEAN SCI, 7, pp.129-139. doi:10.5194/os-7-129-2011
  • Sedlar, J; Tjernstrom, M; Mauritsen, T; Shupe, MD; Brooks, IM; Persson, POG; Birch, CE; Leck, C; Sirevaag, A; Nicolaus, M (2011) A transitioning Arctic surface energy budget: the impacts of solar zenith angle, surface albedo and cloud radiative forcing, CLIM DYNAM, 37, pp.1643-1660. doi:10.1007/s00382-010-0937-5
  • Birch, CE; Brooks, IM; Tjernstrom, M; Milton, SF; Earnshaw, P; Soderberg, S; Persson, POG (2009) The performance of a global and mesoscale model over the central Arctic Ocean during late summer, J GEOPHYS RES-ATMOS, 114, . doi:10.1029/2008JD010790