- British Antarctic Survey
- High Cross
- Madingley Road
- Cambridge
- CB3 0ET
- +44 (0)
Current Research
Based at the British Antarctic Survey (BAS), I’m involved in Strand 1 (WP 1.3) of the QUEST-DESIRE project: Methane and atmospheric chemistry. This work draws on the experience of people not only at BAS, but also the Centre for Atmospheric Science (University of Cambridge) and the Laboratoire de Glaciologie et Geophysique de L’Environnement (Grenoble).
The concentration of methane trapped in Antarctic ice shows large variations over the last 800,000 years. We focus on the increase in methane between the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) and the pre- industrial (PI) era. Fundamentally, the increase must result from a change in methane sources (e.g. wetland emissions) and/or a change in methane sinks (e.g. oxidation by OH), however, the balance between changes in sources and changes in sinks remains uncertain.
Our aim is to identify any chemical signals (preserved in the ice?) with which we might differentiate between changes in methane emissions and changes in oxidising capacity. To this end, we are carrying out sensitivity experiments using a tropospheric chemistry-transport model to explore what impacts changes in methane emissions/ oxidising capacity have on the chemical composition of the Antarctic boundary layer.