Steve is deeply interested in the physics of volcanoes, the eruptions of which can be spectacular but also present risk to contempory economic activity.
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He has spent the last 20 years working on developing understanding of unobservable volcanic processes through field measurement and the use of analogue laboratory experiments and computer simulation.
The most important journals in volcanology
Putting science into the assessment of research
Published research
His published work includes over 40 refereed journal papers focused in three main areas:
- identifying the fluid dynamic sources of seismic and acoustic signals at volcanoes that result from flow processes, with the motivation here being to improve forecasting of volcanic events by establishing a link between flow within volcanic conduits and the ground displacements generated by those flows;
- understanding the transport of fine volcanic ash in Earth's atmosphere influenced by the aggregation of ash particles into larger clusters, a process that significantly changes aerodynamic behaviour and is key to predicting the atmospheric transport of volcanic ash and, therefore, managing the impacts of ash on air transport and ground deposition; and
- investigating the processes resulting from magmatic intrusion into the Martian crust where identifying the dominant processes will give insight into the nature of the Martian cryosphere and aquifer, as well as provide analogous insight into the consequences of magma intrusion into Earth's crust.
Current research
Steve’s current research projects include NEMOH, an Initial Training Network under the European Community FP7. The training objective of NEMOH is that of forming the next generation of European volcanologists, capable of extending further the knowledge and understanding of volcano dynamics and the methods and paradigms for volcanic hazard evaluation. Training is conceived to develop in the context of internationally coordinated research structured in closely interconnected research activities.
Teaching and administration
Steve's teaching includes:
Steve is Programme Director for LEC's Environmental and Earth Science BSc and MSci degrees.