Atmosphere Ocean Science Colloquium
Building mathematical frameworks for challenges in climate science: self-organisation, coupled interactions, multiscale processes
Speaker: Kasturi Shah, University of Cambridge
Location: Warren Weaver Hall 1302
Date: Wednesday, March 12, 2025, 3:30 p.m.
Synopsis:
Errors in climate and weather models, e.g., from missing or poorly represented physics, preclude their accuracy. In this talk, I will discuss progress towards developing mathematical frameworks for such physics in atmospheric and cryospheric dynamics informed by field and satellite data, using a combination of theoretical and laboratory techniques. In so doing, I will focus on some key challenges in climate research: self-organisation, dynamical coupling, and processes at multiple scales. The first part of the talk is motivated by the increasing frequency and intensity of wildfires. Wildfire-induced circulation patterns feature new dynamical phenomena due to additional sources of buoyancy and their coupled interactions with dynamics. I will present advances towards developing a theory for the self-organisation of wildfire smoke from the surface to the stratosphere, with a long-term vision of realtime detection of extreme wildfire weather. The second part of the talk will consider transient cryospheric phenomena that influence evolution of flowing ice, focusing on examples from my work that are applicable to subglacial processes and 'mélanges' of calved icebergs and sea ice in fjords where tidewater glaciers terminate. An enduring challenge is how to tie small-scale processes to large-scale behaviour, and I will highlight future avenues to incorporate these processes in continuum models based on my work developing laboratory analogues. The talk will conclude with an outlook on opportunities I see in the landscape of mathematical climate research.