Laura Wilcox

I am a Professor at the National Centre for Atmospheric Science (NCAS) in the University of Reading interested in the role of anthropogenic aerosol in regional climate change. I split my time across several projects:

As part of CATHY (Climate implications of rapid changes in Asian Anthropogenic Aerosol emissions: Temperature, Hydrological cycle and variabilitY) we are quantifying climate related hazards resulting from ongoing and projected changes in Asian aerosol emissions. The range of climate impacts and societal hazards may dominate regionally over greenhouse gas induced trends for the next several decades, but are not well understood. I am analysing global responses to local aerosol changes in climate models with a range of complexities to better understand the physical mechanisms involved.

In CleanCloud we are exploring how the influence of aerosols on climate change as we transition to a world with cleaner air. I am particularly interested in how the influence of aerosols changes far from their source regions.

In BlackRain we are working to quantify the link between black carbon emissions and changes in mean and extreme rainfall in Africa and Asia.

MACLOUD utilises multi-scale modelling to assess the potential of several marine cloud brightening (MCB) strategies and scenarios. In Reading, we are looking for ways to combine deployment regions to minimise the regional climate impacts of MCB, and investigating case studies of how MCB might help or hinder key components of the Earth system.

In OUTBREAK we are working to improve our understanding of the drivers of extended and severe monsoon breaks, and the role of monsoon breaks in heat extremes and poor air quality episodes.

In TerraFIRMA we are assessing a range of climate mitigation strategies and investigating the risks and consequences associated with overshooting key global warming targets, including the risk of rapid change in a range of regional climate phenomena and the potential reversibility of any triggered changes. My work focusses on the role of near-future changes in anthropogenic aerosol emissions, and the potential air quality co-benefits in climate mitigation strategies.

I am also the co-chair of RAMIP (Regional Aerosol Model Intercomparison Project). This is a set of experiments designed to quantify the role of anthropogenic aerosol in the spread in near-term climate projections. The experiments are based on the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways and designed to quantify the role of global and regional aerosol changes in near-term projections, and explore sensitivities to aerosol type and location. By performing these experiments with a number of models we can also explore sensitivities to the strength of aerosol forcing, and to differences in the representation of key climate processes.