We’re celebrating the diverse career paths across NCAS, with a focus on 10 women in atmospheric science.

How did you get here? Where are you today? What’s next? Have you taken an unconventional route, transitioned between roles, or simply have a story that might inspire others? These are some of the questions we asked our colleagues, so join us in finding out what they shared:

Meet Dr Eliza Karlowska, a research scientist in tropical climate and high-impact weather, based in Reading:

“I did my undergrad in Geophysics and focused on tsunami modelling. I then did my PhD in ocean and atmospheric science, but it was focused more on the ocean than the atmosphere.

“I thought of NCAS as a great place to work as it is an institution based at universities but is its own entity adjacent to universities. I met a few colleagues prior to joining and I really liked the work they do, so I wanted to be a part of that.”

“I always liked Geography, Physics and Maths so I knew I wanted to do something in environmental sciences. I accidentally took one elective in Atmospheric sciences during my year abroad in my undergrad and I really enjoyed it so decided to pursue a PhD in that field. The rest is history.”

“I’m a research scientist in high-impact weather and tropical climate. I am mostly a data scientist, and use various techniques, including machine-learning to understand why thunderstorms initiate in Africa. My job is very varied day-to-day. Some days I read, meet my colleagues, run seminars, help with teaching, do outreach, travel to conferences. I also spent 4 weeks last year in Italy doing fieldwork for the TEAMx campaign.

“I like that no day is the same in my job! I like that I have a lot of creativity and can pursue my own scientific questions. I also love how passionate and welcoming the people at work are. It is very inspiring to be surrounded by many scientists who do brilliant work for underprivileged communities.”

“I am a part of the “I’m a scientist” programme during which I hold online chats with school kids on careers in STEM. It is an amazing programme because I get to do outreach without leaving my house or my office. Just the other day, one of the kids told me that I inspired them to study the ocean. It’s a wonderful way to show kids how many different things they can do in their career.”

“I would like to create my own research proposal and obtain a fellowship! I hope to propose a field campaign to Indonesia, and one day it would be great to build my own research group. I would like to stay in NCAS as long as I can!”

“Be passionate.”

Meet Fern Morgan – our Operations, Administration and Project Support Officer, based in Leeds:

“Before joining NCAS I was actually working in football and sports. At university I studied Sustainability and Environmental Management, and felt somewhat jaded by the subject afterwards as it can at times seem all negative. After working in sports I thought it would be nice to try and work in the earth science industry and be able to contribute, not necessarily through research, but through the events management and operations skills I’d learnt elsewhere.”

“My role is the longest job title in the world: Operations, Administration and Project Support Officer! My day to day involves keeping daily operations ticking, as well as planning for upcoming events and projects and supporting training courses.

“My favourite days at NCAS are the ones where I get to go out and deliver events. I enjoy the fast paced environment of keeping a conference running, helping out and socialising with new people. I also got the opportunity to be a fieldwork team leader last year! It’s been great to see the inside workings of a research centre, and even though at times climate change can seem like an intangible concept, it’s reassuring to see the amount of work that people put into understanding and hoping to solve future threats.”

“As with a lot of industries there are different ways to get in and experience can always be transferable no matter the context. Being part of the NCAS Operations Team shows that you can contribute to advancing research and science without actually studying much science – who knew!”

Meet Lisa Banton, Head of People, Equality, Diversity and Inclusion and Workforce Development, based in Leeds:

“I was working in Local Government in Workforce Development before joining NCAS. It had never actually crossed my mind to work in science and I didn’t know anything about NCAS, but when I saw the role advertised I thought it was really interesting! It also seemed to be a great opportunity to combine my previous experience into one role. I have friends who work at other universities and I have partnered with the University of Leeds on apprenticeships in the past, so that also played a part in me looking to work in science.”

“My role is so variable – that’s one of the reasons I like it. I could be on an interview panel, chairing the NCAS committee on equality, diversity and inclusion, supporting a promotion, commissioning some community engagement through an education charity, developing a guidance document, delivering a workshop, networking with colleagues from other research centres. There is also quite a bit of admin.

“I like the level of autonomy I have to choose my areas of focus. The work can be challenging but I like to think of myself as solutions focused. There is a real culture of learning at NCAS and the people are great!”

“I look forward to developing my leadership skills and seeing where that takes me. I’m currently studying for a qualification in Organisational Development and Design to support NCAS to grow and adapt. I am late in my career and enjoying my current role, but I am an opportunistic person so if I saw an interesting secondment I would be interested in exploring that as an option.”

“Move roles quite a bit when you are early in your career, so you can get a broad range of experience. This will help you to identify where, or if, you want to specialise. It also helps with skills development around communication and managing change. Focus on your leadership development – maybe with support from a mentor – as it really helps build your confidence! Put yourself forward for new challenges whenever you can. Don’t be afraid to take risks, and make mistakes. Know your strengths and areas for development, and look out for colleagues with complimentary skills to team up with and learn from.”

Meet Jai Sandhu, Industrial placement student at the FAAM Airborne Laboratory, based in Cranfield:

“I have always championed climate and social justice, and felt these intersected significantly in this field. Whilst studying throughout my undergraduate chemistry degree, I knew that I wanted the work I ended up doing to be impactful by way of meaningful research or advocacy. For me, atmospheric and environmental science took the shape of this – I felt that it centred on urgent issues and combined my interest in chemistry with my desire to make meaningful change.

“By working in a research facility such as NCAS’s FAAM Airborne Laboratory, I feel that I have gained greater insight into climate research, and it has helped to affirm that this is a field I would like to work with or in tandem with.

“I think consistent climate and pollution monitoring is incredibly important, and NCAS facilitates the ability to do this. Equally, the communication of this science to people in an accessible and meaningful way is just as important, and something I feel is done very well at NCAS.”

“I am currently working as an Industrial Placement student, and I’m doing the final year and research for my Master’s in Chemistry. My research involves assessing the accuracy of a sulphur dioxide instrument at making atmospheric measurements, and understanding the sources of interferences in the instrument. My primary goal is to produce a report that I am proud of and graduate!”

“I would say to always follow a path that aligns with your values and the work you want to achieve or change you hope to enact. If that is atmospheric or environmental science, great! Ultimately, the quality of your work and the passion you have for it is driven by your love and care for the field. I would say to be guided by your principles and gut, rather than by the basis of merit or external reward.”

Meet Dr Nuru Stracey, Scientific Training Manager, based in York:

“Before NCAS I was working in curriculum and programme development for the Harvard Medical School Therapeutics Graduate Program, and also worked part time in a cell-biology lab. I’ve always had a keen interest in therapeutic science as well as environmental chemistry.

“My doctoral research involved the study of enzymes implicated in neurological diseases but also those with the potential for environmental clean up. After graduate school I taught undergraduate chemistry courses at a women’s college, including one in environmental chemistry. The role of NCAS Scientific Training Manager provided me with the opportunity to apply my expertise in curriculum design and pedagogy, while exploring the field of atmospheric science.”

“My role helps to further NCAS’s scientific training mission – to provide students and researchers with essential training and develop the next generation of atmospheric science leaders and experts. Central to this endeavour is a commitment to safeguard the psychological safety of students, encourage a growth mindset, and promote NCAS EDI values.

“I enjoy the variety of my work, which includes design, operations, budgeting and teaching. I work with course leads, staff across NCAS sites, Finance, IT, Comms, and EDI teams to organise, deliver and evaluate the NCAS training programme, and I’m responsible for developing new course offerings and instructor training.”

“STEM education is part of my professional work at NCAS. But, in my spare time I hope to work more on my science comic, which I started a few years ago. My plan is to use fun chemistry-based stories to educate people about health and environmental issues.”

“I’m always striving to improve my teaching skills and incorporate novel techniques and technologies, like VR, into the classroom. As I moved from the US to the UK teaching system, I plan to acquire formal certification in education here in the UK.

“I’m looking forward to learning more about atmospheric science research and helping to elevate science training at NCAS. I recently completed NCAS’s UKCA training as a student and thoroughly enjoyed reacquainting myself with computational modeling – something I hadn’t done for many years. The more I learn, the better I can serve the NCAS training community.

“I just started in this role and plan to get the most out of my time with NCAS. Whatever I do next in my career will likely sit at the interface of education and science – and, if I’m very lucky, I will be able to incorporate art into that!”

“Teach for a few years to determine if you enjoy working in education. While instructional designers don’t necessarily have extensive teaching experience, I would argue that the best way to understand pedagogical practice and the challenges associated with it, is to spend several years teaching. Furthermore, experience as a course lead or co-lead is also vital to fully appreciate what goes into delivering a successful course. Teaching helps develop communication skills, reflexive practice, empathy and openness.

“One of the strengths of this field is that there are several avenues available thereafter, including administration, instructional design, educational research, media etc.”

“Everyone has a role to play in protecting the environment – education and empathy are primary catalysts for change.”

Meet Dr Valeria Mascolo, a research scientist in climate extremes and tipping points, based in Reading:

“Before joining NCAS in September 2025, I was a PhD candidate in Physics, and a member of EDIPI – a Marie Curie ITN programme funded by the European Commission, working on understanding, predicting, and simulating high-impact atmospheric phenomena. In particular, I focused on heatwaves and on “double jets” (a rare atmospheric configuration) over the Northern Hemisphere.

“To be completely honest, I wasn’t interested in working in environmental science in the beginning. I come from a very theoretical background in statistical physics and applied mathematics. I started this journey because the professor who later became my PhD supervisor was doing fascinating work applying methods from statistical physics to climate science. At first, climate was “just” an application for me, but quite quickly it became my main passion and the focus of my work.”

“I’m a postdoctoral research scientist at NCAS, working on the simulation and impacts of climate tipping points, especially the weakening of the Subpolar Gyre and the melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Day to day, my work ranges from analysing data from existing simulations (mostly in Python, which involves a lot of writing, testing, and refining code) to setting up and running new experiments with Earth system models to produce novel climate simulations.

“I enjoy the topic itself. Climate tipping points are a major focus right now, because they may play a crucial role under ongoing human-driven warming. Being able to contribute to improving our understanding, and hopefully reducing the uncertainties around these processes, is genuinely motivating, and I feel very fortunate to work at the forefront of this research.

“More broadly, I’m based at NCAS in Reading and I really love the workplace atmosphere here. People are genuinely kind, supportive, and collaborative, and coming into work is honestly a pleasure. I would recommend anyone to work in this place!”

“Starting this semester, I’ll be helping with teaching a module, which I’m really looking forward to. From next academic year, I’ll also be co-supervising a PhD thesis in collaboration with the Department of Mathematics, and I’m excited to step into that new mentoring role.

“Alongside this, I’m Co–Chief Blog Editor for two EGU divisions – Nonlinear Processes in Geosciences, and Climate Past, Present and Future. I’m also a member of the Steering Committee of the Knowledge-Action Network on Emergent Risks and Extreme Events (RiskKAN), which focuses on systemic, emergent, and cascading risks under global and societal change, supports disaster risk reduction, and provides an open platform for cross-disciplinary collaboration.

“Finally, I’m part of the COST Action ANTICIPATE: “Extended-range multi-hazard predictions and early warnings”, the first pan-European network dedicated to extended-range multi-hazard prediction and warning. It brings together disciplines, operational practitioners, and stakeholders who don’t always naturally overlap, with the goal of advancing the science, training, communication, and real-world application of next-generation early warning systems.”

Meet Professor Laura Wilcox, a research scientist in aerosol-climate interactions, based in Reading:

“My PhD was in the climate impact of water vapour emissions from aircraft. The impact these have depends on how high in the stratosphere they are emitted. The higher the water enters the stratosphere the longer it takes to leave, and the greater impact it has on climate. This meant I spent a lot of my PhD thinking about stratospheric circulation, and how we define the tropopause: the boundary between the stratosphere and the troposphere. So, when an opportunity came up in Reading to keep thinking about the stratospheric circulation using the (then) brand new CMIP5 dataset, I jumped at the chance. I joined NCAS in 2011, and initially worked to determine how ozone recovery might change the atmospheric circulation in the Southern Hemisphere. And I’ve worked at NCAS ever since.”

“I’ve always been interested in the natural world and environmental science, and environmental science was the A-level I enjoyed the most. However, it took me a while to decide between a degree in physics and a degree in engineering. I wanted to save the world by designing green technologies! However, a residential course in engineering at 17 convinced me that engineering really wasn’t for me, and that I found physics much more interesting and rewarding. From there, I was always going to end up in atmospheric science.”

“I am a professor in Reading. I split my time across lots of projects, and my work is a mixture of research, management, and teaching. No two days look the same, and I spend a lot of time jumping between tasks. Lots of email and meetings, and I try to make sure I factor in some time for analysing data and writing papers or proposals each week. I also travel a lot as part of my job, either to attend conferences or work with collaborators in different institutions.

“My favourite part of my role is still the reason I got into science in the first place: I like solving problems and learning more about our planet. I still really enjoy analysing data, even if my students can make plots three times faster than me! I have also been working to grow an international network focussed on understanding the regional climate responses to aerosol changes over the last decade, and I really love working with this great group of people. We are trying to answer big questions, and we do this much better as part of a team. I really enjoy working with a small team to answer a particular question, and hearing other peoples’ unique approaches to solving problems.

“I enjoy the integration and breadth of NCAS. I feel more a part of a community within NCAS than I think I would in a university department. I also enjoy that we have experts in so many things. If you have a crazy new idea, we’ve often got someone with the right expertise to go and discuss it with.”

“I do outreach as part of my role. I contribute to science fairs and talk to the media about my work, and climate issues more generally. I also enjoy visiting schools to talk about climate science and science careers. For these visits, I try to focus on schools in areas where a low proportion of pupils go on to higher education. I was one of those pupils myself, and now understand the importance of role models for raising aspirations. At school, I always enjoyed reading about science and scientists, but it never occurred to me that I could be one! I didn’t meet someone with a PhD until I was in the sixth form, and he was really influential in my career trajectory, encouraging me to read ‘proper’ science articles instead of ‘comics’ and making me realise that you didn’t need to go to a fancy private school in order to apply to our top universities.”

Meet Ilze Millere, our Digital Communications Coordinator, based in Leeds:

“I am from Latvia – a small country of vast woodlands, wild meadows and empty beaches where people to this day practice pagan traditions and tend to live in harmony with the seasons, which means that I’ve always felt a strong connection with nature. I am a storyteller – a writer, a filmmaker, and a poet – and all my art is either inspired by or focuses on Earth and our interactions with it. So, it makes sense that about seven years ago I became really overwhelmed by the climate crisis and environmental collapse, and decided that I had to do everything in my power to contribute to spreading awareness on these issues and to inspire and empower others to believe in and act for a more sustainable future.

“So, with my passion for the Earth in one pocket, and with work experience in communications and with two media degrees in the other, plus my experience as an eco-conscious filmmaker up my sleeve, I got my role as the digital communications coordinator here. After having just graduated from my MA in Film, Photography and Media where I had created an environmental short film about how the climate crisis affects us emotionally for my dissertation, I really felt like I had manifested a job which was the perfect combination of everything my education, career and interests had led me to.

“Did I hesitate applying for this job despite having no scientific background? Not really – I just had to remind myself that David Attenborough once said that “saving our planet is now a communications challenge”. It didn’t matter that I did not have any education or experience in science, because I am proactive at consuming books, documentaries and online courses in climate change and climate communications, connecting with activists, and getting involved with local climate action groups. I have plenty of experience in communications and media production, which over the years has led me to pursuing research in environmental humanities and climate communications.”

“Every day is different, which is what my busy neurodiverse brain loves very much. From designing social media assets and huge science banners to travelling across the country (and abroad!) to create photography and video content, from writing news articles and newsletters to running social media channels, from supporting internal communications to launching a podcast – I get to do and learn so many different things!

“By finding written and audiovisual ways to communicate science, I am learning about these topics that genuinely interest me – climate change, air pollution, weather – directly from scientists. What’s more, I even get opportunities to share my knowledge in return by showing scientists why science communications and creative storytelling matter so much.

“There’s this sense of alignment that my values and passions align with my day-to-day work, and that inspires and motivates me every day. It really feels like what I do makes a difference, and it gets me excited and proud to do what I do.”

“It’s been so fun and rewarding to introduce more and more video content to NCAS, and to see my colleagues get more comfortable and even excited to be in front of my camera. I’ve also loved the opportunities to photograph all the different NCAS activities – like training courses, science experiments, networking events, and even fieldwork in Italy! So I’m looking forward to doing more of that and to slowly tick off all my ambitious ideas. And I’m certainly excited for another opportunity to travel and capture science in action abroad!”

“You don’t have to be a scientist to work in science! Atmospheric science and all the global changes that are happening due to the climate crisis and air pollution are huge, important topics, and we need people from various fields and backgrounds to spread awareness, educate themselves and others, and get excited for a future where we all live in a better alignment with this Earth.”

Meet Dr Jessica Girdwood, an instrument scientist, based in Manchester:

“Before NCAS I was working as an instrumentation development engineer at the University of Hertfordshire, while getting my PhD in physics part-time. It was excellent experience and I learned a lot of skills which I apply daily in my current role at NCAS.

“I had attended several NCAS courses during my PhD, which was tangentially related to atmospheric science. I was impressed with the quality of the courses and with the knowledge and attitudes of the staff members who taught on them.

“I got into atmospheric science because I wanted to apply my knowledge of engineering to large scale climate problems in whatever small way I could.”

“I am the instrument scientist for the cloud physics instrumentation. This involves going on fieldwork and taking measurements on an aircraft. I am also developing national measurement capability for cloud physics on uncrewed aircraft.

“I enjoy the mixture of fun engineering challenges with large scale science questions. I also enjoy teaching and guiding the careers of PhD students, and going on fieldwork which is both exciting and stressful!”

“I am currently working on getting reliable cloud measurements working on an uncrewed aircraft and looking at validating the data. It’s my hope that this can be eventually adapted into something which other people can use. I am also working on fellowship applications to further my own career.”

Meet Ellie Fisher, a polar earth observation doctoral researcher and environmental data scientist, based in Leeds.

“I have always found earth sciences fascinating, which was the reason for studying geology after I left school. I was curious about how scientists could tell what had happened in the distant past using evidence from our current landscape and physical processes, and as I continued studying, this transitioned into a wider curiosity about the climate system and how observations and modelling help us to understand future changes. Working in atmospheric and environmental science has been a natural consequence of wanting to understand how our planet came to be, and where it’s heading.

“I joined NCAS shortly after graduating from a MSc in high latitude environmental science, and writing my thesis on the characteristics and seasonality of aerosol microphysical and optical properties in North-East Greenland. This was within the Institute for Atmospheric and Earth System Research at the University of Helsinki.

“I had come across NCAS during my Masters course when I did a summer placement with the Centre for Environmental Data Analysis in 2022, which was focused on data archival for the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report. This was a really interesting few months which helped me learn about the breadth of the atmospheric and climate research community, and the public sector science which is carried out within NCAS and its partner institutions. I discovered that CEDA was very much entwined with NCAS’s activities, and because my MSc involved some atmospheric science and meteorology, it felt like a great place to start my career after graduating.”

“At the moment, I have two hats. I am an environmental data scientist at CEDA, and have also recently started a PhD at the University of Leeds, in earth observation and glaciology.

“In CEDA, I work primarily with long-term datasets of Essential Climate Variables produced for the Climate Change Initiative. I check the metadata quality within these datasets against officially recognised standards and conventions, curate user-facing metadata records, and ultimately make the data public and citable through the CEDA Catalogue, boosting its discoverability.

“I help ensure that atmospheric and earth observation data from NERC-funded science continues to be FAIR (i.e. Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable), meaning that researchers and policy-makers have the ability and evidence to interpret past, present and future atmospheric change. This facilitates world-leading discoveries, and is becoming increasingly essential for pushing change to happen.

“At Leeds, my research focuses on ice speed and dynamic change on the Greenland Ice Sheet, measured with satellite-acquired Synthetic Aperture Radar data. This is part of a project called GIANT (Greenland Ice sheet to AtlaNtic Tipping points from ice loss), which is aiming to better understand how melting Greenlandic glaciers interact with the North Atlantic ocean and Subpolar Gyre through ice-ocean interactions and meltwater discharge. My research group processes SAR images from the Sentinel-1 constellation to obtain ice velocity using a technique called offset feature tracking, which uses the high performance computing services and scientific analysis environments provided by JASMIN.

“As a polar earth observation data scientist, I really enjoy getting to chat to people in other areas of NCAS about their work that I don’t often hear about. I’ve had many really interesting conversations about research aircraft instruments, measurement campaigns, atmospheric chemistry models, indoor air quality experiments, and lots more. It’s definitely made me a better and more inquisitive scientist!

“I think NCAS does a really great job of bringing people together across research areas and services, and sharing its science with the public through interviews, blog posts and other types of active science communication.”

“There are so many types of roles out there in NCAS and atmospheric science. No two people’s careers are the same, and neither is the work they do. It’s always brilliant to see the diversity and breadth of experience in atmospheric research.”