Current group members

Alex Aves (PhD student)

Alex is an environmental science PhD candidate, based at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch. Alex completed a Bachelor of Science (Environmental) at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) before moving to the University of Canterbury to complete a Postgraduate Certificate and Masters in Antarctic Studies. Alex’s research looks into the emergence of microplastics as an airborne pollutant, the impact these have on remote regions with a focus on Antarctica and necessary method developments for microplastic analysis and monitoring. As well as completing her PhD, Alex works on outreach programs to engage primary and high school students in Antarctica and taking up STEM.

Hunter Douglas (PhD student)

Hunter is a Geophysics PhD candidate from Wellington with a background in engineering. He has a Bachelor of Science in Civil & Environmental Engineering from Duke University and Master of Engineering degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Singapore University of Technology and Design. Hunter also brings five years of industry experience as an environmental engineer working in the US and New Zealand. He’s motivated to study climate change to do his part in enacting a rapid, informed, and equitable transition to a low-carbon society.

Hunter researches climate change emergence in the latest generation of global climate models. His project investigates the influence of emissions pathways on the spatio-temporal patterns of how the climate change signal emerges from the background noise of natural variability. In particular, Hunter’s research compares emissions pathways between model generations and the reversibility of emergent patterns under net-negative emissions.

Dr Cameron McErlich (Postdoctoral fellow)

Cameron is a post-doctoral fellow based at the University of Canterbury. His current research investigates indirect microplastic-cloud interactions and the effect they have on the global climate.

Cameron’s PhD at the University of Canterbury investigated extra-tropical cyclones in relation in extreme precipitation events, aiming to assess how extreme precipitation behaves in a cyclone centred coordinate system. His work also investigated the underlying conditions in the atmosphere that led to an extreme precipitation event.

Dr Catherine Hardacre (Research & teaching fellow)

Catherine’s expertise is in running, developing, and evaluating atmospheric models with a focus on their chemistry and aerosol behaviour. Catherine’s current research focusses on understanding atmospheric composition over New Zealand and the wider Southern Ocean region, and how this impacts climate and air quality in the current and future climate. Catherine also has expertise in scientific programming for model development, data visualisation and analysis. She is also interested in developing new observational datasets for model evaluation.

Catherine returned to New Zealand from the UK in 2023 where she spent >17 years, firstly studying for a PhD in Environmental Chemistry at the University of Edinburgh, followed by postdoctoral positions at the University of Edinburgh and the University of Lancaster. Catherine then worked at the UK Met Office, initially developing the UK’s operational air quality forecasting system with the Atmospheric Dispersion and Air Quality Team and then developing the UK Earth System Model (UKESM). Research highlights were improving nitrate aerosol chemistry in both the air quality and UKESM models, albeit at very different spatial scales!

Dr Abhi Venugopal (Postdoctoral fellow)

Abhi’s current research focuses on investigating the impact of marine emissions of microplastics under a range of boundary conditions relevant to future climate scenarios. His previous modelling work explored the emissions of sea spray aerosols and how different parameterizations contribute to inter-model diversity and climatic biases in Earth system models. In addition, Abhi specializes in understanding long-term climate change and climatic processes using natural archives such as ice cores and marine sediments

Felix Goddard (PhD student)

Earth system modelling & radiative effects of airborne microplastics