01
Ice clouds and climate
How do dust, soot, and other airborne particles that help ice form affect clouds and climate?
Explore the workAtmospheric science · Climate physics
Understanding how aerosols and clouds shape Earth's climate.
I use physical reasoning, theory, and a hierarchy of models to test how the atmosphere works—and to find where accepted explanations and model behavior break down.
Postdoctoral researcher · Climate Dynamics group · University of Vienna
Research program
From microscopic processes to planetary climate.
My work follows how microscopic aerosol and cloud processes propagate to radiation, convection, precipitation, circulation, and surface temperature. The goal is not only better simulations, but more reliable physical explanations.
02
Volcanic aerosols and climate
How do particles high in the atmosphere alter heat, rainfall, and temperature—and when do models exaggerate the response?
Explore the work03
Predicting tropical climate change
Do long-standing predictions of weaker tropical rising air and fewer high storm clouds follow from real mechanisms or flawed reasoning?
Explore the work04
Models, theory & prediction
How can we tell when a model result reflects atmospheric physics, a modeling choice, or the way a question is framed?
See the approach
Featured question
How does rainfall change after a large volcanic eruption?
Volcanic aerosols change how the atmosphere gains and loses heat. My work uses computer simulations and physical reasoning to explain how these changes affect precipitation. Understanding these processes is important for evaluating how volcanic eruptions may have affected people and societies in the past, how future eruptions could affect populations, and the risks of deliberate climate interventions.
Read the related publicationsTropical climate change
What does warming really do to the tropical atmosphere?
I use theory and high-resolution models to test which hypothesized responses reflect real atmospheric mechanisms.
Read the related preprints
Research approach
Connecting physical mechanisms to climate.
Test the assumptions
Understand a standard argument deeply enough to identify its limits, unresolved assumptions, and consequences for the questions we care about.
Connect the scales
Connect small-scale aerosol processes to clouds, rising air, and climate while testing how model detail and assumptions shape the processes they represent.
Interpret the mechanisms
Use equations as a guide to physical intuition, asking what each process means for the atmosphere and climate.
What comes next
Building an integrated theory of aerosol–cloud–climate interactions.
Build analytical foundations for predicting tropical and extratropical responses to aerosol perturbations.
Use kilometer-scale models to investigate aerosol impacts on weather systems and climates.
Evaluate deliberate climate interventions with models that make their effects on sunlight and heat, particles, and atmospheric motion traceable.
Selected first-author work
Publications & preprints
Preprint
Reconciling the Lack of a Robust Anvil Cloud Amount Response to Warming
arXiv · Read preprint
Preprint
No Reduction of Tropical Convection with Warming Expected from Theory or Models
arXiv · Read preprint
Published
Direct Radiative Impacts of Stratospheric Aerosols on the Tropical Troposphere: Clouds, Precipitation, and Circulation in Convection-Resolving and Global Simulations
Journal of Climate · DOI
Published
Do Climate Models Support Claims of Volcanic Global Catastrophes?
Geophysical Research Letters · DOI
Published
The Cloud Radiative Response to Surface Warming Weakens Hydrological Sensitivity
Geophysical Research Letters · DOI
Published
Severe Global Cooling After Volcanic Super-Eruptions? The Answer Hinges on Unknown Aerosol Size
Journal of Climate · DOI
Published
On the Links Between Ice Nucleation, Cloud Phase, and Climate Sensitivity in CESM2
Geophysical Research Letters · DOI
Published
Global Radiative Impacts of Black Carbon Acting as Ice Nucleating Particles
Geophysical Research Letters · DOI
Published
Global Radiative Impacts of Mineral Dust Perturbations Through Stratiform Clouds
Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres · DOI
In the news