Earth Observation and Space

Research spanning Earth and space

How is our planet changing and what are the implications for life on Earth? How can environmental data help us live more sustainably? With our research spanning the oceans, land, atmosphere, magnetosphere and solar system, we are tackling such questions.

The division鈥檚 efforts to better understand our planet are far-reaching and exploit a variety of remote observations, including information sourced from sensors on Earth-orbiting satellites.

Rooted in fundamental physics and advanced mathematics, our work ranges from helping farmers and insurers offset agricultural risks from drought and floods through the monitoring of precipitation across Africa to predicting 鈥渟pace weather鈥� with the aim of avoiding disruptions associated with solar storms.

We have strong links with leading meteorological and observational organisations 鈥� including the National Centre for Earth Observation, Met Office and European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (ECMWF) 鈥� and work closely with international space agencies such as UKSA, ESA, EUMETSAT and NASA.

Research highlights

Better food security, aid and agricultural planning in Africa

The (Tropical Applications of Meteorology using SATellite data and ground-based observations) programme is directly benefiting the lives of 250 million people across Africa.

The team uses satellite imagery, calibrated against ground observations, for estimating rainfall. This is helping to inform and improve food security, humanitarian aid, and agricultural and economic planning in several African countries. The research project has also helped establish weather-based index insurance schemes which protect farmers against the risks of droughts and floods. Project lead Dr Emily Black was awarded a UoR Research Engagement and Impact Award 2019 for the work (see 'Improved outlook for African Farmers' feature on this page)

Space weather’s effects on satellites

Dr Clare Watt’s research looks at space weather and how that can affect the networks of spaced-based platforms that orbit the Earth upon which we rely, for example for communications or navigation. Space contains a very sparse, but energetic, population of high-energy electrons and protons, the behaviour of which is controlled by the sun and planets’ magnetic fields. High-energy electrons and protons are a hazard for satellites; when there’s more of them, the chances of electric discharges (sparks) flying between parts of the spacecraft, or inside those parts, is increased, causing the satellites malfunction. .

Impact of WW2 bombs felt at the edge of space

Bombing raids by Allied forces during the Second World War (the electrified upper atmosphere) above the UK, according to a unique 黑瓜吃料网 research project between atmospheric physicist Professor Chris Scott and 黑瓜吃料网 historian Professor Patrick Major published in 2018.

Watching solar storms with the help of the public

is a citizen science project, which identifies and tracks Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) in the Heliospheric Imager (HI) data recorded by the twin STEREO satellites. The work could help give astronauts an early warning of dangerous solar radiation and aid our understanding of space weather: how solar storms change conditions in space and on Earth.

Measuring our climate from space

The FIDUCEO project brings insights from metrology (measurement science) to the observation of Earth’s climate from space. The aim of the collaborative project, which involves 12 partners including the 黑瓜吃料网 and the National Physical Laboratory is to produce datasets and a suite of software tools, which will be made available under the Creative Commons licence.

黑瓜吃料网

For specific enquiries, please contact:

Professor Emily Black

Research Division Lead

Email: e.c.l.black@reading.ac.uk

Telephone: +44 (0)118 378 6608

Find out how we can support your business

study opportunities

Find out more about funded PhD opportunities within our research division and the Department of Meteorology:

solar stormwatch

Solar Stormwatch is a project to map, for the first time, solar storms 鈥� eruptions of mass ejected from the sun鈥檚 atmosphere.

Led by Dr Luke Barnard and Professor Chris Scott in the Department of Meteorology, its key components are citizen science, open research and worldwide public engagement.

In 2006, NASA launched the twin STEREO spacecraft. With cameras taking images of the sun’s surface, atmosphere and solar winds, the spacecraft were soon producing a huge volume of data that was challenging for scientists to analyse in detail and in a timely manner. Solar Stormwatch plugged the gap, developing web-based, real-time activities enabling the public to record storms and work with scientists. Space weather, a natural hazard listed in the government’s national risk register, is now better understood, and the project has generated a number of peer-reviewed publications. Worldwide, more than 16,000 people participate in Solar Stormwatch from 94 countries. The project is ongoing. It has led to a collaboration between the university and the Space Weather Prediction Center in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in the US, and the creation of new activities to answer new research questions established in this fastmoving, dynamic area of research.

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黑瓜吃料网 research is safeguarding African farmers future through satellite derived rainfall estimates to design drought insurance products.

Improved outlook for african farmers

Emily Black - WINNER

Millions of smallholder farmers across Africa now look forward to a more secure future thanks to satellite-derived estimates of rainfall that are helping insurance companies provide effective cover against drought.

Drought can drastically affect the outlook for the 200 million smallholder farmers who rely on rainfed agriculture across Africa; when crops fail, farmers struggle to feed their family and cannot invest in seeds for future harvests. Although insurance against drought has long been available, it usually only compensates farmers for proven crop losses. Weather index insurance (WII) presents an alternative solution; it provides pay-outs if cumulative rainfall drops below a pre-agreed threshold. But until recently, only one in a hundred farms was close enough to rain gauges to be eligible. Now, TAMSAT鈥檚 satellite-derived rainfall estimates mean more farmers can get cover.

Professor Black鈥檚 team, working in partnership with financial and agricultural organisations in Africa, has developed a suite of services under the Satellite data for Weather Index Insurance (SatWIN) project. The resources are free to use and easy to apply. They provide robust rainfall and soil moisture datasets, together with validation tools and guidelines.

Uptake of TAMSAT-based insurance products has soared throughout Africa. For example, TAMSAT data have been used by the Zambian Government to insure over 2 million farmers since 2017. During the 2017-18 rainy season, drought conditions in Zambia, identified by TAMSAT data, resulted in insurance pay-outs of more than US$3 million.

With success proven, SatWIN services are being rolled out across Africa and employed by international development agencies, including the Red Cross, to protect millions of vulnerable households.

Partners

Risk Shield (Zambia) - Insurance Consultants, International Research Institute for Climate and Society/Penn State, Ghana Meteorological Agency

Funders

Natural Environment Research Council, Global Challenges Research Fund, National Centre for Atmospheric Science

Judges' comments

"The benefits have been optimised during the project through lessons learned, and the impacts are large, real and extensive.鈥�

Professor Black鈥檚 team, working in partnership with financial and agricultural organisations in Africa, has developed a suite of services under the Satellite data for Weather Index Insurance (SatWIN) project. The resources are free to use and easy to apply. They provide robust rainfall and soil moisture datasets, together with validation tools and guidelines.

Uptake of TAMSAT-based insurance products has soared throughout Africa. For example, TAMSAT data have been used by the Zambian Government to insure over 2 million farmers since 2017. During the 2017-18 rainy season, drought conditions in Zambia, identified by TAMSAT data, resulted in insurance pay-outs of more than US$3 million.

With success proven, SatWIN services are being rolled out across Africa and employed by international development agencies, including the Red Cross, to protect millions of vulnerable households.

Partners: Risk Shield (Zambia) - Insurance Consultants, International Research Institute for Climate and Society/Penn State, Ghana Meteorological Agency

Read more

Selected publications

Lockwood, M., Owens, M. and Macneil, A. (2019) . Solar Physics

Wadge, G., McCormick Kilbride, B. T., Edmonds, M. and Johnson, R. W. (2018) . Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research

Asfaw, D., Black, E., Brown, M., Nicklin, K. J., Otu-Larbi, F., Pinnington, E., Challinor, A., Maidment, R. and Quaife, T.(2018) . Geoscientific Model Development,

Lees, K. J., Quaife, T., Artz, R. E. E., Khomik, M. and Clark, J. M. (2018) Science of the Total Environment

Maidment, R.I., Grimes, D., Black, E., Tarnavsky, E., Young, M., Greatrex, H., Allan, R.P., Stein, T., Nkonde, E., Senkunda, S., Alc谩ntara, E.M.U. (2017) Scientific Data

Lockwood, Michael L., Owens, Matthew J., Riley P.G. (2017) Scientific Reports

Woolway, R., Merchant, C.J. (2017), Scientific Reports

Lockwood, M., Owens, M. J., Barnard, L. A., Scott, C. J. and Watt, C. E. (2017) Journal of Space Weather and Space Climate

Woolway, R.I., Dokulil, M.T., Marszelewski, W., Schmid, M., Bouffard, D., Merchant, C.J. (2017) Climactic Change

Linker, J.A., Caplan, R.M., Downs, C., Riley, P., Mikic, Z., Lionello, R., Henney, C.J., Arge, C.N., Liu, Y., DeRosa, M.L., Yeates, A., Owens, M.J. The Open Flux Problem (2017), The Astrophysical Journal

Barnard, L., Scott, C., Owens, M., Lockwood, M., Tucker-Hood, K., Thomas, S., Crothers, S., Davies, J. A., Harrison, R., Lintott, C., Simpson, R., O'Donnell, J., Smith, A. M., Waterson, N., Bamford, S., Romeo, F., Kukula, M., Owens, B., Savani, N., Wilkinson, J., Baeten, E., Poeffel, L. and Harder, B. (2014)The Solar Stormwatch CME catalogue: results from the first space weather citizen science project. Space Weather, 12 (12). pp. 657-674. I

Van Leeuwen, P. J. (2015) Representation errors and retrievals in linear and nonlinear data assimilation. Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, 141 (690). pp. 1612-1623. ISSN 1477-870X doi: 10.1002/qj.2464

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